Guild Wars 2

I think this is great. Because everyone gets exemplar’d I can’t tell if that downscaled 14 is a 15 who just levelled or an 80 who probably knows what they’re doing and might not need someone careening in to help them out. A 15 will be on Basic/Fine/Masterwork armour while an 80 will probably be on Rare/Exotic/Ascended and with changes to the NPE; it’s even easier for an 80 to wander round low-level zones.

Chyanne Waters.8719:

City of Heroes had quite a few supporters and players I tried it had no friends in it but it was kind of cool anyway. The problem with it was mainly things like this http://www.gamespot.com/articles/marvel-sues-ncsoft-over-city-of-heroes/1100-6113055/

That is probably the main reason or on of the main reasons for COH demise. How many times can an MMO get sued before they let go. It was a smart decision on NC Softs part. Unfortunately for the player base it happened though, but do not blame NC Soft for it all

….

Anyway there are forces that cause problems with MMO’s like anything else. For COH one of them was players could make their characters too similar to DC and Marvel super heroes.

No, they were sued AT LAUNCH (article dated 2004) and settled out of court. And the reason was because Marvel shot themselves in the foot twice; once because they commissioned people to make the ‘homage’ characters invalidating that evidence but twice because in acknowledging the character creator was an authoring tool (part of their copyright infringement angle) it also meant that every character created could potentially be used to countersue Marvel and go after DC, Dark Horse and all the other comic book creators for infringing NC, Cryptic’s and the players’ copyrighted characters.

There was a number of reasons why but “constantly being sued” wasn’t one of them. Clunky game engine, lack of cashshop till its last year and rumours of clash of management styles (to put it delicately) all contributed.

Yeah, these are rediculous… still. PvP is too but not overly so but maybe because it’s not open-house like having to win matches for it to count.

And of course some of the WvW ones are affected by how dedicated your ‘server’ is to WvW. If yours is really good at keeping WvW; then you might actually lose out in the long run. I mean you can’t get yakslapper if yours owns every camp in every zone but you need to have them to succesfully escort them so there’s some mutual exclusivity there. You have one AP to defend SMC but there’s also one for capturing it. And finally we have one for 1million objective captures and three others for defending camps, keeps and towers.

The Edge of the Mists sets is at least a little more reasonable and you get matched up with multiple servers of the same colour and the APs are a little more reasonable to get: spent 200 supply on generators, 3 generators at each point, 7 solo runs to get it, maybe a little longer if the zergs stick around to help build them. Potentially 100 times if you only get to spend 2 on one so no more than three months to get it.

It’s similar to how the first tournament launched with almost a literal copy of WvW APs; you’d have to play it constantly to get them to qualify for the season reward. Last tournament they had a few token APs that were much easier to obtain and your reward was determined by server progress anyway.

Unlike Paragon Studios which was a wholly-owned subsiduary; ArenaNet is more like the days of Cryptic where the studio retains some independence from the publisher (hence why GW1 wasn’t simply shuttered either).

Juba.8406:

also as far as i know there is the game and 3 expansions, is there a (Full edition) the game and all its expansions in one pack ?

On Steam there is each edition on its own, Guild Wars GOTY edition, Factions and Nightfall, a trilogy set containing all 3, and the expansion Eye of the North. So you can buy Trilogy and Eye of the North and that’s a complete GW1 set (You need EotN for the Hall of Monuments and all the bonus stuff you get in GW2 Hall of Monuments). Of course; you will have to have Steam open if you go this route.

If/when you do create a GW1 account; use the SAME login credentials as GW2. So if it’s j.smith@gmail.com and the password is banana use those as your GW1 account details as this links them together automatically for the Hall of Monuments. GW1 also asks for the name of a character on your account as security (which you leave blank the first time because you haven’t made one yet). If you have EotN; once the accounts are linked you’ll get 3 points towards the HoM and unlock the heritage chest, leggings and boots skins in the GW2 HoM for all weights.

There is no EU/NA divide as such but that’s only because the ‘towns’ are shared environments called ‘districts’ which you can swap between via a drop-down menu.

TL;DR – a code for physical appearance that we can view/save for recreating characters

I’d like a way to re-create a particular physique without neccessarily having to remember every precise slider detail I might make.

In Wildstar they had physique setting distilled into a long alphanumeric code that you could copy and paste if you wanted to create a twin or recreate a character exactly as you wanted should you play them a bit, hate the profession and want to change it before you became too invested.

Would also help if you use a makeover kit, change your appearance and then decide to go back. Or if someone would like a quick design you could trade codes with them to help get them started.

Mental Paradox.3845:

Kulvar.1239:

These are the players statistics, not the real one.

Charrs outnumber Humans and are more advanced technologicaly than them. Many Asura think that Humans are living museum pieces to study before their extinction. Only one out of five kingdom remain for what they know. Human population decreased brutally. Also, while others races can sustain themselves, Humans have to buy food and things to the others.

And even if they manage to reclaim Ascalon… For what? Having to fight Ascalon’s Ghosts, Flame Legion, Branded, Ogres, Renegades, and the local fauna additionnaly to Centaurs and bandits?

We’ll see who has the last laugh when we re-establish contact with the Canthan Empire.

Assuming the Canthans didn’t channel dark, forbidden magics too and destroy their own dynasty.

Tom Gore.4035:

Too bad you can’t see any identifying data about enemies so Anet can probably never know who it was…

Actually you can add them as a friend or block them and their actual name and global show up in your list. You can even party up with ‘enemies’ (at least in the Obsidian Sanctum you can).

You can travel to your character’s native home from anywhere in the world and back again (or exit the door to your home city), use the vendor to sell off junk, harvest nodes for your dailies, charge quartz with the shard if you have it. 100 gems cheaper than the perma-passes and available right now as opposed to returning occasionally (and it went on sale too at nearly 50% off).

Pretty sweet when I want to get home from far out in the world.

Pinkamena Diane Pie.8054:

Whats this bout shiny foil whatevers?

I’m sorry but this halloween had been so drab that I barely did a thing.
Jumping from post to post in LA was more fun. Honest ask my guild, I spend ages just jumping aimlessly in LA

Rare drop in the Trick or Treat bags was a Shiney Foil Wrapper. There was a Skritt in the old Black Lion HQ that was taking them and he was (effectively) raffling off some of the 2012 Halloween weapon skins.

It is a shame given we got to redo the 2013 content and given the wardrobe malfunction of not unlocking it despite having to pick it up first in order to get the complete edition; it would’ve been a nice addition.

For me; I find the question is more irritating. It’s “Would you like to move to a more populated map?” and the choice is ‘Yes’ or ‘Later’ but there’s no real choice to it. It should be ‘Now’ or ‘Later’ since you’ll either be pushed over when the hour is up or the instance you occupy will be refilled when more players enter that map.

juno.1840:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

juno.1840:

Essence Snow.3194:

Imo it should be lowered to match the master kits. That would make it fair/balanced.

Not sure how that’s “fair/balanced” when you get infinite uses out it, reducing your bag space etc.

It should come with a small convenience penalty. The copper-o-matic is a good example of said implementation.

Except the copper-fed one costs less per salvage than a Basic salvage kit (the same effectiveness kit).

I thought there was a small penalty but I double checked the wiki and u r right. No clue why the silver version went on the opposite direction. That doesn’t make any sense now.

I imagine it was to make it less of a pay2win kind of deal but pushed it a bit too far the other way OR tried to keep with the theme of copper-fed by going silver-fed and coupling it with a bump in rarity but not accounting for the percentage cost increase.

Special Outfits:

Siege Golems; Alpha and Omega
Size-shifiting: micro and macro-size changes

I kinda like walking in a golem in WvW so it would be nice to be able to use them as costumes too. And I love the size-changing from Box O’ Fun and Elixir X so I’d love to have a permanent usage of that outside of the power/booster.

Is it not like the gathering tools? Can you not equip the temp finishers and let it use them up before the perma-ones take over again?

Wolfheart.1879:

I like the idea that if I urgently need, say 120g for something, I just input that number, pay my gems and away I go. Its lovely, and works well. The problem is if I have my gems, by the items I want and then just for the sake of using up everything, want to offload my remaining gems into gold. 2 issues present themselves. 1) There is no option to input your number of gems and just get the gold out. 2) Dealing only in gold as opposed to silver and copper makes it hard to use up everything still.

There is still the question of increased functionality in some areas but severely reduced functionality in others. It still isn’t that convenient for those who want to use up what they have. Its better than what it was a few days ago, but it still isn’t quite as precise or user-friendly as before.

More implementation of the previous system into this would sort it – allow gem inputs as well as gold on that the gem to gold part, perhaps same for gems to gold, and allow the full range of the ingame currency. Ok,, perhaps its not as big a deal for many, but its still the reduction in choice, which Anet seems to like to inflict upon us and a lot do bristle at.

And the ingame graphs showing fluctuations is still something that would be valued, as shown with the debate over prices here. Anet love their precious metrics, why not let us share that love as we could a few weeks ago.

Yeah, it’s still getting X FROM Y instead of converting X TO Y with regards to getting gold. I put in how much gold I want instead of converting what gems I want to whatever that works out to.

Right now it’s 9 gems to get 1 g but I may want to convert a 10 gems remainder to get whatever that is say 1g 11s 11c. And why does it the value of gems shift? Currently 1g is 9 gems, 10g is 82 gems and 100g is 803g. That’s like applying a bulk discount to an exchange rate or rather now we can’t see the graph or get an exact value; the loose remainders are being ignored and/or rounded up.

Edit – the max button is okay if you want to sell everything you have (left) but doesn’t allow for selling a specific amount out of what you have.
Edit 2 – the gems side is better, being able to pick select amounts to convert to is what was missing from the old exchange. Espcially as it could dynamically shift when you added silver and copper.

City of Heroes had a problem with RNG too. Single-use Recipes for crafting enhancements dropped at the end of every Taskforce but the problem was the table was filled with recipes and more often than not people ended up with a rather lame slow or immobilise recipe (or worse; a confusion recipe of which only five powers in-game could slot for). After beating the tough enemies in the Statesman Taskforce; getting a Pacing of the Turtle (slow) recipe was basically “I beat Lord Recluse the supervillain and all I got was this lousy enhancement recipe”.

They changed it by giving out reward merits at the end of each Taskforce and giving players the choice to roll on the reward table for less merits and risk getting another ‘junk’ recipe OR saving up and buying the recipe they wanted at a larger cost. This also meant that if one particular TF was easily farmable they could lower the awarded merits without immediate change to the TF itself until a change could be implemented or boost merits on TFs that took longer to complete. And each recipe would have a tailored cost based on its rarity so uncommon recipes would be 50-75 merits compared to 125-275 for rare recipes depending on the stats they boosted and if they were a chance-for-boost enhancement.

Sungak Alkandenes.1369:

Are these only for the BL tickets, or for the other tickets during LS1 as well?

I still have two Dragon Jade tickets lying around – will I be unable to use those? I believe these have a different weapon vendor.

Same vendor, different option. If you have old currency or tickets; you get to pick ‘I have a time-limited ticket’ and it opens the old LS1 claim menu.

What would be nice is if there was a blowout/clearance sale on the last weekend. 1 or 2 tickets each for 1/2/3 day(s) only.

Or a ‘sale’ weapons vendor that only gets the stock in when he finds it, constantly rotating discontinued stock (like how reward tracks rotate in and out).

Malediktus.9250:

DeWolfe.2174:

This game needs exclusivity like it needs a server cluster made up of 286 IBM’s.

Stop feeling entitled to it. Events are boring if you cant earn exclusive items.

And what about those who didn’t join right off? Or those that built up Mad Memories: Complete Edition and didn’t get the unlock for Mad Memories because the system didn’t recognise that fact you had to have one to make the other?

Gaile Gray.6029:

Hey there,

Here are a few tidbits from the team:

• A lot of newer players had trouble with the interface. That doesn’t apply to you, you’re veterans who have been around the conversion block a time or two. But newer players will benefit from the updated system.
• The goal was to make the Gem Store more like other shopping experiences, and if you think about it, there is more of that feel to it now.
• You may be surprised to know this (I know I was) but very few people bought gems at smaller denominations than the first one offered in the new system. That’s not to say they never did, nor that there wouldn’t be the desire to do so. But overall, the current options were selected based on player purchases in the past.
• The team is going to listen to your feedback and, if and when it’s practical and desirable, they can look towards adjusting the new system to better meet your needs.

So please keep your thoughts coming on the new system. Feel free to make suggestions but please, keeping them constructive would be very much appreciated.

Let’s tackle each point in order:

* A lot of newer players had trouble with the interface. That doesn’t apply to you, you’re veterans who have been around the conversion block a time or two. But newer players will benefit from the updated system.
Okay, fine. New players have a hard time with it but it should not have removed the “veteran” option of being able to convert as-is. GW2 is only my second most played MMO and the first I’ve played with a cash conversion. I figured out pretty quick that converting x amount of gold yielded y gems at least once I’d got past the wildly different playstyle compared to City of Heroes.

EDIT – I’ve just had a look in-game and it’s a confusing layout. Buying gold on the left depletes from the right and vice-versa. I don’t see how that’s easier or simpler than the old ‘convert this and you’ll get xxx’

* The goal was to make the Gem Store more like other shopping experiences, and if you think about it, there is more of that feel to it now.
It feels more like a voucher/reward card system by only allowing certain amounts. Or like the old Microsoft points system for Xbox Live (which they’ve abandoned for precise money amounts).

I’d prefer something like the Steam wallet. That gives you options to put in prefixed amounts OR the exact amount of your purchase. But that’s obviously a basket system where purchases get lined up before exchange.

* You may be surprised to know this (I know I was) but very few people bought gems at smaller denominations than the first one offered in the new system. That’s not to say they never did, nor that there wouldn’t be the desire to do so. But overall, the current options were selected based on player purchases in the past.
Actually that was me. One of my first gem purchase were the khaki shorts. After gathering up about 15-20 gold I converted 12ish of it to gems just to buy them. I later went for the Layered Vest and Casual Hoodie in an as-and-when. When permanent tools came out I decided to buy a gemcard, bypassing the conversion altogether. But I appreciated having the option available to convert back and forth in particular amounts.

* The team is going to listen to your feedback and, if and when it’s practical and desirable, they can look towards adjusting the new system to better meet your needs.
Just add a custom amount option at the bottom and put ‘advanced’ or ‘veteran’ or some other suitable warning. Best of both worlds then. Vets still have a full custom option and newbies can pick bulk packs.

John Smith.4610:

This is a spinoff of the economy thread to talk about RNG tactics in games in a general form.
Here’s the premise. RNG is evenly distributed on aggregate. On an individual level this means that while almost everyone falls into a reasonable range in the middle, there are outliers on each side of the distribution that are either highly rewarded or not rewarded at all. These individuals become sample cases and spotlights for experiences that maybe shouldn’t exist.

We do need to be very careful about ideas that flatten the experience entirely as that quickly becomes not fun at all.

There are two concepts that have been discussed in the other thread that I’ll briefly summarize.

1. Use a specifically non-random NG. The NRNG functions similarly to a RNG, but has characteristics that either squish the distribution so that outliers exist much less or specifically manipulate a player’s experience for loot in a more complicated way that makes it feel rewarding.

2. Implement measures that counteract low-end outlier behavior inside of game design. This would be a system that is something like: If player hasn’t received a rare drop in X time send them Y tickets for random drops.

2.5: “Add secondary reward mechanisms (ie. token based system) alongside the primary RNG system; allow progress to be made even when you don’t get the result you want.”

Obviously these are hyper-simplified descriptions, but I don’t want this to get too long.

Option 2 would be good but more as a strikebreaker. If they reach a certain amount of drops, falling within a range of say 200-300 drops (a randomised number between the two median values), they get a roll in a secondary rng with rare/exotic as a minimum ie. no blue or green. It would still be RNG but there would be at least some guarantee that it will happen around a certain number and there will be at least a certain time either by regular or coerced RNG.

And as for Precursors; the scavenger hunt can be done (people love Mawdrey). Either issue it as a birthday present so it can only be done once-a-year or make it so the end result is an accountbound version because people will then either wield it or have to craft the resulting legendary either for themselves or for the money after significant investment in the game or TP. This means existing precursors will retain their value being fully tradeable when dropped.

Having got most crafts to 400; there is a way for players to create their own exotics.

Another token is yet another currency to work with unless it’s time-gated like dated and ascended recipes.

The outfits aren’t bad, just some are a bit too fancy for my tastes. And for the town clothes ones to be made into outfits rather than tonics. Immensely annoying not being able to dye them.

Vegeta.2563:

Was fighting Inquest Golem Mark II .. he died.. i crashed before I could loot the chest.. i relogged back in, had to fight Golem a 2nd time.. no chest after 2nd kill.

Pretty much same thing happened to me with Tequatl.. was in an organized TTS raid.. crashed out.. i come back.. join party member in map after its dead, since map was full.. and no chest… guarantee if I try to kill teq a 2nd time.. there will be no chest.

Why the hell am I crashing out.. I have my graphics turned to crap even..

This is what you get for trying to kill Kakarot

I do agree that if you don’t loot the chest; it should still be waiting like the bonus and daily chests OR you should still be able to loot it within the same day if you do it again.

Thought I’d pick up my latest aquisition at the traders near Three Legions Court but they were removed with the NPE.

The saddest part isn’t that but their poor, mourning friends who still act like they’re all there. 3 assistants and 2 customers and dialogue that goes “That crafter left a message for you boss”.

Boss is gone, man. Boss is gone.

Relshdan.6854:

a dye-able effect isn’t going to happen.

personally, i think this one looks fantastic……….but i’d rather they just release all “effect” colors at once (red/green/blue/yellow/magenta/white)

And cue complaints of “I can’t buy them all at once; Anet is gouging me!”

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Gulesave.5073:

Chris,

Let me take this from a different angle: What are the things guilds like to do together, and how can the guild hall and its various spaces makes these things easier and more enjoyable?

For example, how can the hall serve as a superior launching pad for jumping en mass into PvE or WvW content? How can the space itself benefit PvP’ers in practicing and testing builds, or organizing and running tournaments? How can it be laid out to enable roleplaying? What incentive is there to visiting other guilds’ halls other than gawking? How are a guilds’ accomplishments demonstrated in the hall, and how can that be interacted with? How can guild members interact with each other in ways they can’t do elsewhere?

How might the spaces and objects and rules specific to the guild hall improve the overall experience of being in a guild?

Yep those are some good questions. Thoughts folks?

Chris

Well I like convenience. I also like themes. I sometimes vary between the two, depending on what I’m doing.

When I build up my crafting; I like a place that has stations close together but also has guild bank access. When recently building Chef up to 400; I was in the Black Citadel. The guild bank was only a short jog from the chef station and back again. Having utilities close together would be a boon.

When I started in a guild; I barely had any map completion. Getting to dungeons was bad enough but I’m glad I had much more uncovered when we tried bounties. Someway to either get to or bypass unlocking waypoints to get more involved in guild activities like buying a ‘waypoint map’ from a guild cartographer. Just waypoints like WvW does when you enter; no vistas, skill points or p.o.i.

Phase 2 Topic Title: How would you like to see Guild Halls function if they were part of GW2?
Larger instances – We’d use the home instance if it wasn’t limited to just 5. More like the Tower of Nightmares where it was like a world instance.

RP locations – this harks back to the ‘uninstance Salma’ thread where people were asking about it

Choosing themes – As many as we can get. If the Pact and Scarlet can combine tech then we should be able to do the same but we should also be able to make allowances like a Sylvari garden, Charr workshop, Asuran lab, etc. separate if we choose to.
Representation of boosts, banners, et. al. – the ability to have set pieces reflect things like what boosters and banners we have ready and maybe even reflect what is stored in the guild bank. If we store a lot of weapons; more shown in an armoury, food makes a pantry/kitchen full, potions and other boosters fill the alchemy lab

Locations – I prefer using something like the Mists as a base or more random locations that look like the environment they’re set in if we’re gonna do outside areas.

Upgrades – keeps in WvW have a pretty good basis for an upgrade plan; weapons, defenses, utilities. Build on and refine that for more guild-specific stuff.

Currency – Influence. Multiple currencies just complicate matters. Influence flows steadily and most stuff is limited by time and build slots. Add building slots, make the time to build and cost extensive enough. No more currencies.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

“Have you a dog in Heaven, Lord?
Is there room for just one more?
Cause my little dog died today;
he’ll be waiting at your door.

Please take him into Heaven, Lord.
And keep him there for me,
just feed him, pet him, love him, Lord,
that’s all he’ll ask of Thee."

-Unknown

When they rebuild Lion’s Arch fully; a small dog (or group of animals) statue with this as a plaque would be enough. I’m sure LA’s citizens lost a lot of pets too.

Sturm Medik.1569:

Did I just waste 200 Tournament Claim Tickets? Anyone have any ideas how to turn this horrible loss into a less horrible one? :/

Next weapon pick you make just choose the Hero’s version of it and use the gift to upgrade that one instead. You can always re-buy the torch and upgrade that.

Belenwyn.8674:

Sunshine.4680:

DaShi.1368:

Really disappointed that any of the Chinese changes are coming into our game. The leveling, the story, the ugly backpeices. They all made me feel sorry for the Chinese. Thankfully we won’t get the VIP system. I’m out, if that is ever implemented.

What’s funny is didn’t Anet come and tell us we wouldn’t get the China stuff? Now here we are.

Arenanet announced the future implementation of the Chinese tutorial and leveling system already in July last year. There was enough time to prepare yourself for it.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/looking-ahead-guild-wars-2-in-2013/

They also mention crafting precursors, new legendaries and the returning festivals section has a picture of SAB in that article.

EDIT – to clarify; that is meant as unreliability of the article due to things being subject to change as development continues.

Aphoticrain.8420:

Pyreo.8517:

Part of the story is the encroaching threat of these dragons. What games often do to make the threat tangible is to show death early on when the main antagonist becomes clear. See Mass Effect 3 and that little kid you meet right at the start, who comes to personify the main character’s survivor guilt, as just one example.

I think what the Mass Effect writers did well with that kid is that they connected it to something more. As you pointed out survivors guilt. Balthazar knows Shepard’s passed a lot of dead without batting an eyelash and as a whole the player feels nothing for them but the kid stands out because in the story he has a purpose. That purpose is not to die simply for some feels but to highlight a broader picture of the events unfolding. He is loss of the innocents personified, he is Shepards guilt, he is to some extent the cost of war. He is not just some kid who dies, which is kinda how I feel about Belinda.

And I think it was something Bioware did poorly; providing an avatar for something that they wanted us to feel which ultimately detached those of us who HAD an avatar for ’survivor’s guilt’; the Virimire Sacrifice. It’s something that forced the character of Shepard to feel not allow the player to start questioning. If (in my case) Shepard had suddenly had dreams and halleucinations about Kaiden, someone who I’d let go due to an event I experienced; it might’ve paid off but instead we got some random kid that wouldn’t come out of an airvent.

It sets up a cognitive disassociation where we are pushed out of immersion because we are being forced to feel something rather than becoming attached and then feeling it ourselves. Belinda’s death was nothing more than a show piece in a long line of showpieces.

Aphoticrain.8420:

Overall it felt like a cop out, like they didn’t know how to get from point A to B without killing someone randomly. And that is frustrating.

At this point it’s a problem with saturation. Molten forces murdered thousands, Aetherblades killed thousands, Toxic killed thousands and ruined Kessex, Scarlet killed thousands and ruined Lion’s Arch, even though Scarlet’s dead; the Zephyrites are now being killed off, Fort Salma is destroyed….

I forget who said it but “I’m finding it hard to care”.

Suggestion: Keep them around after to keep the Favors valuable as well as the skins but increase the cost due to “Limted availability”.

There’s some nice skins in there and it would nice to be able to still attain them even if the associated cost of gold increases, similar to how BLT costs go up for Fused, Jade, Wintersday et.al. weapons or a Laurel or similar cost added after the Gauntlet was over.

Wanderer.3248:

Talk about arrested development.

I’d say it’s a most Excellent Adventure.

http://i.imgur.com/KRotKf1.gif

How I’ve handled the wardrobe change:

No more outfits. I see them on sale but I just think ‘why bother?’.
Limited transmutations. Gone the opposite direction. Now they’re more limited and precious; I just salvage or store old armour and don’t bother with runes or transmutation till I hit 80. Which is twice now. Also means I’m not in a hurry to explore everywhere and get around the world.
Tonics. Still annoyed.

calyx.9086:

Realist.5812:

It doesn’t have to be good… it just has to be UNIQUE to the birthday gift, and it just has to be useful or have some variance in drops like GW1 minis.

Giving “auto level 20 scrolls” to people after 12 months is just…. stupid, completely stupid, utterly stupid, and ridiculously stupid.

The scrolls drop from Achievement Chests as well.

I have 9 of those scrolls that I’m never going to use, and I have 9 characters at 80….

As long as they don’t give out a stupid and useless item like that again, I’ll be happy.

Some of us love these scrolls for auto-level to 20, since we actually invested a lot of time into just a few characters instead of banging out a metric ton of them and still have only played a few classes.

So keep the level 20 scrolls! If people don’t want them they can delete them.

So how about a trade-in vendor? One Experience Scroll for five Tomes of Knowledge. Something that could benefit characters beyond 20 if they so choose but less so than a new character that would skip up to 19 levels.

And for the minis; what about one random accountbound-set mini instead? The ones that aren’t part of Mini-packs like Jenna, Gnashblade, Toxic Nimross, etc.

There’s an Iron Ore node on the west edge of Bloodtide Coast that appears down in the depths right at the pushback edge. You can just about reach it but then you get rubberbanded back up.

I like some of what’s changed and loathe others.

GOOD STUFF:
Accountwide dyes - didn’t bother collecting dyes because they were too numerous and the idea of gathering+unlocking them PER CHARACTER was abismal. With the ever-increasing costs of some rare dyes that looked really nice and the daunting task of collecting them meant most of them were just written off and I made do with my lucky Ancient Silver drop I got on one of my first U-Dye unlocks. Now all my characters can make use of it and any new dyes I might buy or open.

Skin unlocks - only getting ONE skin and having it FOREVER is good. I still have LS skins that I’ve never used because I didn’t want to use up my one shot in case I changed my mind or some other use for them came along. Only needing to buy one skin from the gem store to have it forever makes the prices more bearable rather than feeling gouged for per-character purchases. I’d actually avoided opening my Legacy heavy armour from the Deluxe upgrade for the same reason. I kind of wanted it on my main but there was an alt that could use it too. And now they both could.

MIXED BAG:
Transmutation costs - much better having a singular currency for them instead of stones for 1-79 and crystals for 1-80. Using crystals to transmute anything less than 80 was a waste and by 80 the stones became worthless to that alt unless they chose <80 gear to equip. So one cost instead of two is better. What lets it down a bit is this now means we transmute a third of what we used to on the way up to 80 forcing a more conservative approach to those who can’t afford it (or coaxing towards a gemstore purchase for those that can). This is counterbalanced by keeping the city reward, in reduced form, and in PvP tracks. The biggest downside is the loss of rune transference. Not so bad at the green level of runes but more of a problem when we get to the higher orange ones. So it’s either insert & destroy old rune/sigil OR salvage, buy new gear, re-insert (and reapply skin if neccessary).

NOT SO SOLID STUFF:
Outfits, helms and tonics, OH MY! - probably my biggest beef with the wardrobe is the loss of my old, freestyle clothing. And at first I thought it was probably better overall until the announcement that the retired parts were being turned into tonics… and this is despite the fact they were all turned into COMPLETE outfits.

Now I got lucky in that one of these actually matches my old casual outfit, the khaki shorts were given the layered vest, but the others got matched up with riding pants and make me look like Toad of Toad Hall. I just don’t get why these had to be tonics. The themed outfits override every armour making everyone look the same so it can’t be about armour/class-identification and having been made into complete outfits it can’t be about “clipping issues”. Unless there’s some future plan to make them outfits and this is a stop-gap measure to avoid missing the release date; it seems to me either short-sighted or uncaring to those who actually purchased them when they were just town clothes and lacked ANY functional usage outside of fluff or RP.

While I’m not disappointed yet, as I’ve yet to see what the rest of these tonic outfits will have, I find it entirely curious as to why specific pieces have been given full body tonics, full sets converted to outfits and the remainder get the armour skin treatment.

As I understand it; the outfit slot overrides armour entirely so why couldn’t all the town clothes use this outfit slot?

I have one of the shirts, the leather hoodie and the khaki shorts. The original colours were hideous so being able to dye them really sold it for me as did combining them, avoiding the Charr open-chest frills shirt and the belly dancer pants (and incidentally what happens to the old default town clothes too?).

Wouldn’t surprise me if he was at least plotting a murder…

… and some of these Lionguard are kittenbags. Heirlooms and Belongings are literally dropping in my inventory and they go “Hand it over THIEF and we’ll go easy on you” except the nice Sylvari on Bloodtide. I make a point to visit him just because of this.

$12.50 for a fastport to the Vigil Keep. Plus you can spit over the side at the hills below. 20 points if you can actually hit someone.

Deified.7520:

Hello,

I’m creating this post to ask you what got you hooked to Guild Wars 2. What about it made you think this game is awesome?

Here is mine : http://imgur.com/a/bi0yw

I am doing this thread because I hope that the developers for the LS read it and perhaps find the popular things and carry them over into the LS more. I’m interested in what everyone else’s features caused them to love Gw2 like I do.

From your album there

Deified.7520:

It is to no surprise that Bazaar of the four winds and SAB are the two most popular LS updates of the year. Both present new zones, each that touched on those feelings that got players hooked on Guild Wars 2 in their first leveling experience. They presented areas to explore, people to talk to, secrets to find, and enemies to conquer. New environments both dangerous and beautiful. I hope that the living story returns to this feeling. This design that it takes place in a world. A world where you’re not looking at a time limit. A world where you’re not thinking how many more times can I do this today? A world where exploration, wonderment, and adventure is in no shortage. Just like those days when you leveled your first 80.

I started a year ago, right when Flame and Frost was just getting going. I didn’t know enough about it so I went exploring, finding my own way and I agree that the environments. A certain amount of danger and trepedation in exploring these lands. I hadn’t fully explored till mid-September but I had many memorable encounters along the way. The Charr certainly got me here (on viewing the female model and thinking ‘wonder what the females look like?’ and then going ‘[POOP], really?’) but it was the world that kept me here.

Then I started trying to get the LS story stuff and at first it seemed alright but after doing it for the last four months (not counting Jan-Feb as I’ve barely logged in) I’m ready to just walk away. The intangible timing of “will this one be four weeks or just two? Or maybe more?” and the relentless grind if you want the reward pieces have just slowly worn me down. And Scarlet… has just infuriated me.

Bored and bitter. The more I’ve got into the story, the less I’ve cared to the point where I’ve only logged in twice this month.

Why would anyone want to keep doing an event or being on the map that kills you when it fails?

Options are always good but you can de-tag, right?

Psientist.6437:

I think the only problem is that the icon clashes with the environment, like a clown nose on the Mona Lisa.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Quick note to say that I am up to date and that there are some awesome ideas here.

If someone wants to do a macro summary of the main ideas that would be awesome (if they haven’t already. I haven’t seen one). If not I will do one tomorrow morning.

I will then call out some of the suggestions I personally really like. Also as per Colin’s question in the previous thread (one which has been asked again by some posters in this thread) feel free to discuss Horizontal Progression systems you have enjoyed in other games.

Chris

The best one was Bases in City of Heroes.

Building something that was your own from the parts you had and later from parts you could merge together. An entire sub-culture within the game; it was something that kept me going in times when I was bored of the content or waiting for the next installment or Issue to drop.

Seeing all those creations, sharing ideas and tips, being brought in to help new starters and even being “hired” to build places for others; it was the sandbox of the metaphorical park where the rest of the game was the otherwise functional grass verges, carousels and swingsets.

I nominate my good friend Kallandra.2610

For the last 4 years she has put herself out and organised playermeets firstly when we were all City players and now as most of us have scattered to play other games, mostly GW2. She’s never asked for anything in return and espite the great turnout; she always worries that we won’t show or have a good time which we always do.

She’s already earmarked the day for the next meet and I’m sure she’ll be worrying about it in the new year

Yes. You’re both in the same region (and I think Gem Cards are universal anyway).

Not the “Dear John” I was expecting…

I’m glad the Tower of Madness came out before I decided to post.

Shockwave.1230:

1. DVR
Being able to jump to different parts of a story and watch at our convenience, and go back and watch the story again. This is not a main feature of the living story, I’ve been out of the loop for a while, so I’m not sure if this exists at all currently, but it didn’t when I paying closer attention to the living story. This also doesn’t exist for the personal story, but that’s a separate issue.
.

2. On demand
Being able to view whatever story we want whenever we want. This has challenges with the combination of having on demand temporary content and a persisting world, because that combination does not mesh well together. Without putting in much thought, there are a couple of options to resolve this, but the development effort seems huge:

A. Create Party Instances for “On demand” content (previous 2 week content releases)
B. Create separate persistent versions of areas players can join
.

3. The best T.V. Shows provide context
This may be easier to accomplish now that these living story filler stories going on with the main storylines have created their own context. However, having more cutscenes and dialogue to properly introduce characters and story components, or summarize previous happenings in the stories would be extremely helpful. When a new content release happens, sometimes this lost feeling comes over me, and things seem disjointed.
.

These are high level things, and likely require A LOT of work, but I really feel like they are important to the demographic that is playing your game, which is likely largely Gen Y and Gen Z. A big reason I stuck around so long in GW2 after even with the issues I had with the game is because in my experience with GW1 those three ideas above were executed pretty well, I fell in love the characters and stories of Tyria through Guild Wars and stuck around because 1) you already had me, and I trusted you as a company, but 2) I had context during the personal story (the Dragon’s from Guild Wars: Eye of the North were awakening and going to destroy the races, organizations, and cities of tyria I had fallen in love with). So it would be my job to repay Primordus in full for the struggles he inflicted to tyria and my HoM honored hero (furture achievement maybe? defeat Primordus with HoM armor). I wanted to fight an unfrozen Drakkar, and turn Kralkatorrik back into some harmless scenery while avenging Glint, and seeing what her Baby Dragon has been up to.

This; I like. I dislike the temporary nature of the content because ‘once it’s gone; it’s gone’ which detaches me from the LW. As stated above – ‘context’.

Having callbacks and/or progression makes the world feel big. Experiences shaping future events (ToM – Kessex Hills change, reference to the ‘Molten Alliance’ and who was leading who).

The TV analogy is a good one. Shows considered great are ones with continuity. Overall it gives us a reason to watch them in order because events lead from one to the next and so on. As quoted; you can always go back and rewatch shows because of advances in programme distribution. You can’t here. It’s rush-rush-rush for the reward and then on to the next ‘epsiode’.

1) Guild Halls/Player housing
I spent a lot of hours just building in City of Heroes. In the end; I was throwing inf at the conversion system because I had so much. I like to build and was even taking on other bases that I could pride myself in helping build for others. Currently I get that fix out of minecraft and GW2 players get into an uninstanced Salma for their RP needs.

I’d like to be able to build keeps or locations for GW2 as well

2) Living Story improvements
I can’t really enjoy them for two reasons. First the rotation in-and-out means I find it hard to do them because second they can be difficult to solo.

I actually enjoy story but I enjoy it more when I can take my time and read it all in. I’d also like to see more ‘real-world’ permanance to these events. When the Molten Alliance was beaten; an odd facility added here and there to the world map to show that it happened (just like the Aetherblade JP in Gendarren Fields).

Failing that; I’d like to be able to replay the content even it didn’t come with the rewards similar to the City of Heroes Ouroboros system. It could even be another avenue for a new ally/enemy group to integrate into the world.

3) More to do with Professions besides Legendary/Ascended
When I first picked my professions I picked Tailor as one as I presumed it would allow me to make town clothes. I was a little disappointed when I found out it didn’t and that the only new ones you could get had to be bought from the Gemstore. It’d be nice if there were some plain items available through crafting or if we could build our own tools as well (why can we harvest copper ore but not make a copper axe/sickle/pick?).

Another thing is if they could become account-wide progress. If we get 400/500 in a discipline on one character it would be nice if other alts could either earn it themselves or buy into that craft’s progress for an extra fee from the account-wide progress.