Guild Wars 2

Carzor Stelatis.9435:

I did like the epic storyline of Guild Wars 1, the sense that you were actually playing through something (even when just randomly running around Lornar’s Pass with henchies), but Guild Wars 2 is fantastic in its own way. Making the same game over and over again doesn’t work, and ultimately bores fans – see Unreal Tournament 2003 – Unreal Tournament 2004 – Unreal Tournament 3 for an example.

I still hope they create a sequel to GW1 in more than name. If not them, someone. It’s the kind of project where I’d make a $1000 kickstarter pledge to see it happen.

Erasculio.2914:

I don’t believe the Gem Store talks. They sure have golems, but not one like HOBO-tron.

Hehe, but it does, it speaks volumes. If there are two dozen forum threads saying “I’m not a fan of these free-to-play monetization strategies, it feels like you’ve lost your soul.” but they are selling $100,000 a day worth of those items on the gem store, the voice of the gem store wins. The most popular language in use by all cash shop games is not Chinese or English, it’s revenue. DAUs and MAUs and ARPUs.

Erasculio.2914:

In other words, how much stuff sells in the Gem Store is an indirect reflection of many things. Are sales low because players don’t like what is being sold? Are sales low because players have stopped playing, and so there’s no one to buy anything? Are sales low because people have heard rumors of something big coming soon, and so they are saving their money right now?

Yes, what we say here can flavor the voice of the gem store. It doesn’t override it though. If you’re selling a million items a day but every forum thread says it’s a horrible thing to sell and buy, they’re going to make more of those items and put them up for sale. That exact scenario is not rare in free-to-play monetization. What people vocal on the forums say they do and won’t want and what sells and doesn’t sell have only a loose relationship with one another.

Erasculio.2914:

Doesn’t that leave us with the same conclusion? That as far as feedback goes, it’s eat or be eaten as ArenaNet changes the game based on player feedback, and if not yours it will be someone else’s?

Knowing they have both the forums working and gem store data, all we have to do to see what it is they’re learning from the combination is to look at the content they’re producing. What did they learn from Aetherblade Skins that used the ticket/chest system? They learned $$. If they didn’t, we’d have a different way of earning the Zodiac skins that just released.

Vayne.8563:

Changing your expectations doesn’t necessarily mean lowering them…..
Guild Wars 2 is a mixed bag for Guild Wars 1 players…but some of that bag is actually better.

I agree with the first sentence (as has been said a few times here) but found the second out of synch with the advice given unless you’re equally fine saying “Guild Wars 2 is a mixed bag for Diablo III players”. Part of the point is that it’s time to just let go of all comparison to Guild Wars 1. They’re not parent/child. They’re not siblings. They’re not even cousins. They’re third cousins by marriage that speak different languages.

Erasculio.2914:

And so, doesn’t that mean we have almost the obligation to voice our feedback as much as possible, because not doing so would mean passively accepting the changes brought forth due to other people’s feedback?

The feedback that matters are the stats from the gem store. The answer as to what kind of feedback they’ve been getting so far is clear by looking at what they’re releasing.

Voicing any opinion here that contradicts those things may make us feel better, but like the man screaming at the river as it washes over him and carries him downstream, sometimes you have to know to either swim or get out of the water. That’s my advice, swim or find the bank.

Vena.8436:

Unleashed.6195:

If I can get my head out of the expectations I had for this game, expectations put in place by Guild Wars 1, I’m sure I’ll find plenty of fun here while I look for something compelling to move on to in the future.

GW1 had equally kittenty story telling, I’m not particularly sure I see where your expectations are coming from in this regard.

Prophecies was literally Backstabbed the Story x10, for example.

The expectations I was referencing there were not about the story telling quality, but about the attempt to have it feel like some kind of fantasy universe that might exist, somewhere. There were goofy things here and there, but they were held in check by the remainder of the game. EotN added more goofy elements than all previous expansions combined, but it was still not overwhelming.

GW1 made an attempt to immerse you. GW2 doesn’t bother. That doesn’t make it a bad game, just a very different one.

Erasculio.2914:

GW1 wasn’t that special – it has a myriad of rather huge flaws. I wouldn’t say it made people “so impressed”.

I’d disagree. It’s still the most unique online RPG I’ve ever played, and was impressed. I’m just enough (1 mostly whole person) to qualify as people. But, I agree with most of your next two paragraphs.

Erasculio.2914:

For the records, telling people to settle for less doesn’t really make it any better.

Of course not, it also doesn’t make it worse. What it does do, is have it so that you do not complain that the hammer you’re carrying is too poor at tightening bolts. It keeps you focused on either wanting it to be a better hammer, or realizing you have the wrong tool for the job.

Erasculio.2914:

They threw their vision of the game through the window when they began losing players, at the “3 months after release” bleed typical of MMORPGs.

I don’t work there. I don’t know their stats or their decision making process. I only know what the game was like at launch and now, what content exists and what does not. They have a vision now, whether it is the same vision as the old or no, and their decisions are based on that vision.

Fungalfoot.7213:

It has become blatantly obvious to me that they have zero respect for their players.

I couldn’t disagree more. When you see how their service department handles issues, how much they strive to communicate with what is often an extremely hostile playerbase, it’s clear they respect and care about their playerbase.

Not every decision they make will please everyone, they do the best the can in almost every aspect of the game in keeping with their vision of the game.

Rambodacious.7495:

I’m afraid a few, specific instances of “goofiness” do not, your point, make.

I can summon just as many “serious” things about GW2. Look at the personal story. People being murdered, loss of life everywhere, struggles to survive. It was not pokemon bubble bounce bumblekittenery.

Mufasa died in The Lion King. Scar nearly starved the entire Savannah after taking over. Zazu was imprisoned and threatened to be eaten. They had a leopard eat a baby in Tarzan. That doesn’t make either the diary of Anne Frank.

Chorel.1720:

So… you want us to lower our expectations?

Only change them. I don’t lower my expectations when reading “You Are My I Love You” to my 18 month old daughter. I also don’t look for the wit of Tyrion Lannister or the raw honest nature of Ed Tom Bell. They are different expectations, but not lower or higher.

Zindrix.1750:

I’m still surprised how many people were so impressed with GW1.

It was brazenly different in a field of clones. There was no where else you could go to get an experience like GW1. That doesn’t mean that everyone loved or wanted that experience, but for those that did enjoy it (like myself), it remains on a pedestal because it is impossible to get that experience anywhere else.

Shockwave.1230:

The day I stop caring about the quality of GW1 is the day I stop playing online games forever.

I didn’t say stop caring about GW1, I just said to stop using it as a measuring stick for GW2. It’s as though people would measure World of Warcraft by how it’s different from Warcraft 3. They’re not the same game, not even on the same roadmap. I had a hard time with that, calling it Guild Wars 2 added to that difficulty, but found the game much more enjoyable when I just let that go and examined GW2 for what it is, not for what it isn’t.

It took several weeks for this to sink in. I’m happier with the game now than I ever have been (still working out some of the kinks, but it’ll come with time) as a result.

First thing you need to do – Forget GW1 ever happened. It didn’t exist. It’s a dead-end road heading in a direction that will not be taken any further by ArenaNet. You may have loved it, may have seen it as a sign that there is some hope for AAA online RPG games, but those thoughts do not belong here. They drove back to home, started off in a new direction, and GW2 is somewhere down that road instead. No matter how you feel about the difference, if you focus on all that GW2 isn’t that GW1 was, and all that GW1 wasn’t that GW2 is, you’ll never be satisfied here.

Second thing you need to do – Realize that GW2 does not take itself seriously. This is not where you come for deep lore or a sense of doom you’re struggling to overcome. This isn’t where you play to get a sense of being in a typical fantasy novel/movie. GW2 is lighthearted. It’s Disney, not Game of Thrones (the book). The Dreamer will not feel out of place if you look at it this way. GW2 is intentionally goofy. It’s not a mistake. They’re not incompetent. It is too pervasive in all aspects of the game from the writing to the content releases to some of the skins for weapons and armor to be happenstance. They’ve done an incredible job creating a very easy to digest setting where you can goof off with friends and strangers in various ways in a beautifully rendered fantasy world. Though less extreme, it’s like watching an episode of Jake and the Netherland Pirates with your child. It is excellent for what it is. If you approach one of those episodes and expect Pirates of the Caribbean, you’ll be sorely disappointed at no fault of the producers or incredible talent behind the show.

GW2 is a birthday cake, not an elegant desert, by design. By being lighthearted and accessible, it makes it easier to work with the gem shop without affecting immersion because they have already found a way to provide an experience that does not require or offer that immersion. They can provide rewards that appeal to a broader audience. Not everyone wants Twilight. Some people want Dreamer. They want Kudzu and Moot.

If you can approach GW2 like the carnival/theme park it was clearly intended to be and just enjoy taking part in it, you’ll be far happier. I am, and while I realize I’ll have to look elsewhere to get the experience I was originally expecting, I’m glad to spend a little time in their new vision of Tyria while I wait. The game is fun, the graphics are great and it’s still one of the better MMO experiences you can find.

Aurust.8961:

Either way, the core gw2 product had the potential to be the greatest MMO ever made, but has become a sad joke. I feel no connection towards the NPCs, I do not care what Scarlet does to tyria, I dont even care if Scarlet lives or dies. With zhaitan, atleast i sensed the danger as i traveled further south… seeing the corruption of undeath growing more gruesome and appalling, until finally I hit Orr. With Scarlet, all i think is…. meh.

It just strikes me that the game has decided it doesn’t need to even attempt to take itself seriously. Goofy content (8-bit dungeons, drinking games, moa racing, jumping puzzles, stuffed animal backpacks, slapstick badguys, legendaries like Dreamer and Moot) dominates the feel of the game.

It’s difficult to create any content that makes you care about it at all when everything is awash in a sea of carnival games and rewards. Can it be fun? Of course. It may even be a majority of the population that prefers goofy and silly to an attempt at seriousness. If I can get my head out of the expectations I had for this game, expectations put in place by Guild Wars 1, I’m sure I’ll find plenty of fun here while I look for something compelling to move on to in the future.

Silly, like serious, has the most impact when it is set in a sea of what feels like ‘reality’. It’s the contrast that makes it have impact. When everything is either silly or wanting to be super serious, none of it holds together well.

What I’ve found with GW2 is that I need to remove the desire to be immersed or suspend reality for a while. Everything is “on the nose”. It unashamedly presents gameplay mechanics to you, often cash shop mechanics. It has no problem throwing in 8-bit dungeons into a high fantasy world.

This doesn’t make it bad, this just makes it something I hadn’t expected. It’s the difference between a truly terrifying horror movie or novel vs. a Disneyland halloween exhibit. Both serve their purpose, but you need to know what you’re getting on the way in.

Bright.9160:

It’s not like they can do much wrong with the Storm Bow…

Oh wait, it’s Anet we’re talking about… Prepare yourself for either terrible RNG, or an incredibly interesting way to obtain your storm bow: Mystic Forge it! Nothing more fun…

Oh wait, yeah there is, completing challenging content, like we used to do in GW1… I guess throwing 250 charged lodestones and some other crap in the mystic forge is exciting to some people, but I sure as hell don’t like it..

Careful. Ask for it to be attached to challenging content and you may find yourself performing a jumping puzzle or trying to outdrink an 800 pound Norn alcoholic.

Hi, I just wanted to come and share my opinion so you could all realize that if you disagree you’re wrong.

Part of the issue is that your character is mainly defined by the weapons you’re carrying. The cooldowns are normally longer on your optional skills and can’t be relied on for your damage/utility.

This has really diminished everyone’s ability to target a specific niche or come up with innovative builds. If I’m a warrior, and I want to do damage, I’m almost certainly carrying an Axe/Mace and a Greatsword. You now know over half of the abilities I use and how I use them. You can also probably guess the last set of abilities as well.

Yes, there were cookie cutter builds in GW1, but, with seven customizable characters you could bring with you, there was still plenty of room to try out a few things.

I just don’t feel the same attachment to my characters here I did there either. They feel very fungible, both because their purpose is all the same and because there is less customization available.

The next dragon will be defeated by completing a jumping puzzle that allows you to climb up its back, only to have Trahearne shout “You can’t do this alone. I’ll stand with you” before pushing you off the head and finishing the dragon himself by whining it to death.

milo.6942:

you think it will stay? hahahahaha

No. I do not. I also hope that it is not coming back in late August.

Man, I really hope they bring it back and it stays. They could add something else too, like maybe every time you strike a Charr character in game you see a picture of a cat meme. Or maybe during story dialog, characters could refer to #onlyintyria.

I mean, I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m tired of thinking of my games as anything more than funparks with inflatable moon rides.

arjeidi.2690:

I agree. I’m ok with buying vanity items for the sake of appearance as long as they’re reasonably priced. ($2-$4 for a single skin seems ok since people would want multiples for weapons/armors/chars etc). But RNG? They can go diaf. Haven’t, and will never, support such scumbag sales practices. ANet should be ashamed.

We constantly hear about the millions (and millions!) of copies sold at $60 each, yet they have to pull this garbage every month? Disgusting.

Until games like Clash of Clans stop raking in $1million a day from unethically feeding off of addictive personalities, the temptation to emulate those types of numbers will be overwhelming.

It feels like the days are gone where you knew that, even if you disagreed, someone thought the feature/gameplay aspect you were experiencing at that moment was the most fun way to do it. Now, you rightly wonder if it was seen as the most profitable way to tie-in the cash shop.

Your relationship with game developers has in large part changed from “I give you the most fun experience possible in exchange for your money” to “I cleverly trap as much of the experience as possible with cash shop transactions while trying to put in enough fun to keep you around to land on those traps.”

Leuca.5732:

Just spent 20g to get 5 keys and didn’t get a single piece for one of those tickets. Then I actually went and looked at the skins; no way am I wasting any more gold on that.

The best way to train a company out of gambling boxes for $$$ is to not buy them. They, like most every other company, are going to provide what customers show they want with their wallets. Spend your money where you’d like to see more content and discipline yourself to not spend it where you don’t.

Bright.9160:

I hope the guy that came up with the idea to put zodiac weapons in BLC’s steps on a piece of lego. Barefoot.

lol… worth a reply just for this…

Kirschwasser.3972:

This is partly because “best” is pretty subjective and partly because they were just marketing.

It’s also partly because outside of lore and nouns, there isn’t much in common with GW1. GW2 has more in common with RIFT or Warhammer Online than it does GW1 in terms of gameplay.

Without commenting on the overall feedback, I will say that you’ll be far happier with the game if you take everything you loved about GW1 and just forgot about it. GW2 is its own game. It shares lore and nouns, but otherwise there just isn’t much in common with GW1 to make it worth comparing the two. GW2 is a good game in its own right. Several years from now we may be fortunate enough to see a true successor to GW1, but it will be several years if ever.

I have the normal 8 @ 80 to have one of each profession. I’ve always been that way though, I had one of every class in WoW @ Max level for every expansion before MoP (I haven’t been back since trying MoP and just not having the energy to do it all yet again).

The crazy thing is… with how extensive the customization in armor can be in this game and how quickly you can reach max level, I do have to fight that little voice that nags me to have the 40 so that I have one of each race/class combo.

kitten you OCD… kitten you.

1st picture doesn’t even need an explanation, none of them do. I can guest on a server that’s brimming full to the point where Overflows are common and find places where few others are at the moment.

If the world were so crowded where you couldn’t take a screenshot without including a crowd, the game would be horribly overcrowded.

A concept artist is often given a spec to follow as well. They do not then get to toss a few random pencil scratches across the paper and call it a day.

I saw your post. You could rewrite the entire script of the game without impacting setting, gameplay, outcomes and make dramatic improvements to it in the process. Even silly things such as self sacrifice at Claw Island become rewritten as unintentional death where some craven guard closes the gate before allowing everyone to get through.

I would feel infinitely more sympathy for the companions they gave me if I thought some terrified guard doomed them to die so he could close the gate but somehow I made it through ok.

If someone sees those tweaks and says, “No, I want it done the terrible way.”, then the blame shifts but the blame remains. I won’t say I’d ever expect a writer to give up a paying gig, that’s as tough a business as there is, but now the blame is on the person demanding it be done terribly rather than well.

I find that to be terribly unlikely, but also irrelevant. There is no excuse. Tens of millions of dollars spent on development… the story deserved more attention and love.

It is perfectly acceptable to both respect and admire a company and enjoy the game while at the same time leveling fair criticism to the components that are not up to the same quality as the rest. There is no special honor in seeking out every excuse for why the things that are below par can remain that way.

None. The only ability I’ve seen used in any serious build for any type of content are grasping roots form the Sylvari.

I haven’t looked at all of the racials, but those I have are less powerful than their profession counterparts of equal tier.

Motoko.2875:

It is a good and enjoyable game for primarily people who aren’t part of the original GW1 fanbase. (that is a red flag)

None of us have stats on how many play, don’t play, whether it is growing or shrinking. I’m part of that GW1 fanbase. I’m part of that fanbase that is disappointed that GW2 is less GW2 and more Word of Guild Wars or Guild Wars Online. At the same time, I like GW2 for what it is and believe it will continue to be successful, knowing that they likely wake up each day wanting to make a great game and will strive to do so under whatever philosophy it is that is driving GW2.

Walter White is the perfect bad guy. Vic Mackey is the perfect bad guy. They’re perfect bad guys because you can see how they would believe they are the good guys. Not see as in “I can write the explanation”, but see as in understand. You may disagree, may find their morals lacking and get a little under their skin to see that much of what they do is selfish, but then we all see a little of that in ourselves and question “Would I do that?”

Another type of well executed bad guy are the broken bad guys. The people who have a wire loose. They’re loners, less common, but they’re terrifying because they seem to have no reason to do what they’re doing. They enjoy it, or get some thrill from it (perhaps enthralled with guilt afterwards and then self-loathing kicks in, but still).

A mixture of the two are perfect villains to fight against. The first type make you question whether you’re really a hero at all. Maybe the system is broken. The laws are maybe unjust. Maybe they see the world more clearly than you from experience.

The second type are great because they allow you to unquestionably be a force for good.

Both give writers and content creators tremendous room for creativity. I’d like to see more of that.

By the way, please do not take this as some insult that the people who did the writing are “bad people”. They may not even be bad writers, I don’t know what happened there. Maybe writing isn’t their full time gig. Maybe they want to be writers, were given a shot, didn’t work out.

I have tremendous respect for ArenaNet. Much of that stems from GW1, but also from watching people like Gaile who have been with them for years and have been incredible since the first day they started.

I’m certain the staff they had writing for GW2’s elements that are as bad as they are are also incredible people. Either their talent or the circumstances simply did not line up with what should have been required. Nothing more or less.

“You’ll find that with unity, many impossible things can be achieved” Doesn’t require an editor to become “You think too little of yourself and others.”

And neither require an editor to become what an actual published, quality author could produce. Sometimes, things are a matter of talent. If they released concept art like they did writing in this game, you would have a mixture of images done with a trackball and Microsoft Paint rather than the mind blowingly incredible work they have.

Vayne.8563:

I’ve read/seen interviews with the writing team. And I have experience from inside the field as well. I can say how it’s done. And logically writers wouldn’t write this stuff if they weren’t forced to…because the same team writes regional dialogue and personal story dialogue. I’m not sure how else you’d account for the discrepancy.

No, you can’t. If the experience inside the field were something you could point to, it would also point to each studio doing things quite differently. They just said in a recent interview that a team that wrote much of the ambient dialog that did not work on the story dialog is now doing story dialog. Writers frame stories. Gameplay fills in the frame, writers fill in the gaps, gameplay fills in the gaps, writers in the gaps again…

How and where those lines are drawn are different in every studio and even within a studio can change game to game, section of the game to section of the game.

Nothing excuses the poor writing. It’s just as much a part of the world you’re presenting as the gameplay. If you have a gameplay need that means the story must be horrible to support it, you change the gameplay need. Tutorials may be the ONE area where this gets a pass.

lightdruid.7689:

This is where experience in the market and consumer demands comes into play. At the moment, there are a few dozen items that can be crafted to make a profit.

No one disagrees that there on items which make a profit. The disagreement is that the profit is worthwhile compared to say, farming champions or QP.

Caramel Ham.4891:

Whomever wrote the story should be fired, and whomever approved such an abomination should be ashamed.

I’m obviously vocal about the writing being beyond terrible, but calling for someone to be fired is just wrong. People have families, mortgages. You don’t know the reason why it’s awful, just that it is. You don’t know that this person doesn’t have another valuable skillset to offer. Remember it’s a person you’re talking about. Someone’s relative. Someone’s friend. Someone’s Co-Worker that they like and eat lunch with.

lightdruid.7689:

Ummm crafting has always been a good way to make money. Lots of people who don’t understand the demand players have for certain items complain that they can’t craft for money. This is simple wrong. Sure there times where an item you could be making for cash goes poof because of a shift of demand but there are ALWAYS items people want. It’s the crafter’s job to find said items and find ways to get the mats to make them. It’s not hard if you know about item daily and weekly trends.

Not that I’ve seen. Yes, there are always items you can create to make money. But, the time it takes to make 1g compared to making 1g farming in the game elsewhere makes it pointless. There are times when some item can net you close to a gold, but it only takes one or two times having the market shift in the midst of production to eat up those profits. Having a single item with 20g invested in its construction not sell means you’ll either sell at a loss and eat a few g, or hold onto it and potentially lose that or more.

Now your crafting has to make up for that loss.

Killing/farming mobs will outpace crafting in income easily and reliably. It requires almost no homework, is something you can do with other people and has a small chance at huge gains (find a certain precursor and its worth weeks of crafting profits).

I really want crafting to be viable. In fact, there are some weeks where after long days I’d rather come home and make a little gold crafting than running out and beating down champs or running dungeons. Spidy makes it easy to look for opportunities, so long as you’re wise enough to avoid the obvious, but those opportunities provide too little gain compared to time spent.

Trahearne is awful, but he’s just a victim of the writing that is almost universally bad in the game. Someone else pointed out the “Show, don’t tell” rule. Except, they don’t just tell you something. They yell it at you, send you a letter to confirm it, and then tattoo it onto their forehead so you can’t even look at them without being told once more.

Gmr Leon.1846:

To be fair, even GW1’s campaign stories weren’t exactly the best. You could find way more interesting stuff from some of the quests. We almost have that in GW2, the events just need more polish and something to log their encounter to provide more depth to the event, so when you replay them you can have a better connection to what you’re doing. Not the best way of handling it, sure, but better than what we have now, I’d say.

No, but far fewer of them made me groan and wonder how they ever made it live. I never remember feeling like they detracted from the game (there is only one series I remember feeling that “oh come on”, had something to do with a necromancer boss in a jungle… I forget now).

Kirschwasser.3972:

Er… but yeah, the storytelling in GW2 isn’t exactly stellar, but I’ve never played MMOs with the expectation that the story would be amazing moreso than the lore and setting will be interesting.

It’s not that it just doesn’t quite live up to being amazing. It’s that it takes a nose dive off a cliff, pockets lined with lead, and swims full force down to some abyss at times.

Amadan.9451:

as far as games go yes, also for quality story telling like side quests, romance, character development and npc development.

Baldur’s Gate 1 & 2, 2 especially… So very good. Mass Effect… good, not great, but good. When the pretty started becoming more and more important (at the time of BG1/2, hardware acceleration was still a big deal :P), the stories got worse.

deSade.9437:

Unleashed.6195:

My first thought was… Maybe I’ve outgrown the market they’re targeting with these games. Maybe they know that their best customer is under the age of 12 and is looking for something more in line with their Saturday morning favorites.

This is what I think… The target audience is clearly under 16 years old, no other explanation makes sense to me. I really can’t wrap my head around the horrible storytelling.

If that’s true, then it’s sad for another reason. We need to expect more from our children. That any child old enough to participate in GW2 would find that level of story telling acceptable is a sad commentary on what literature they’ve been exposed to.

Reminds me of a show my daughter enjoys (she’s not even two yet, so I cut her some slack). Some small issue comes up, “I made a mess of my brother’s room”. Next thing you know, “Wow Super Readers, I made a mess of my brother’s room and don’t know what to do. This is a super big problem.”

No, it’s not. No, you don’t need to go on an adventure with a pig who thinks spelling is a super power to figure out what to do. Clean the room.

The same with GW2’s story. I don’t need to be called “The Slayer” every minute. I don’t need someone who is supposedly a super heroine in the game’s lore to tell me how much I’ve taught her after she goes off throwing a fit over petty problems. I don’t believe that 40+ ships that can overwhelm a fortress brimming with elite soldiers, stone walls and war machines, by launching near endless waves of undead somehow can’t stomp all over Lion’s Arch because we found the power of friendship.

Lokki.1092:

Just to toss this out here… Guild wars was released in 2005 when the NAAL’s last statistical testing put the American public at a 8-9th grade reading comprehension level.

To be fair, even they admit that the lower scores have over representation by certain groups that are increasing in population % (ESL). I somehow doubt the game’s writing is any less ridiculous in languages other than English.

As for the decline in the quality of the writing between GW1 and GW2, I really don’t know how to explain it. They have set the bar so low, at least there is little chance of it getting worse. So long as they continue to allow cut scene skipping, I can at least enjoy the rest of the game and pretend the text doesn’t exist.

Kirschwasser.3972:

I honestly and sincerely think the voice-acting makes things harder to take seriously, not necessarily because I believe it’s bad (not that I believe it’s good, either), but giving voices to things sometimes just strips something from it.

My two cents an’ all.

It would be difficult, as a voice actor, to take the lines I was given seriously. How this affected the performances is impossible to know, but had to be a factor.

If there is any aspect of Guild Wars 2 that feels like it needs a complete rework, overhaul, worthy of starting a new character to experience the improvement level of change, it’s the writing in the main story.

I always anticipate the writing being bad in a game. Take Battlefield 3 for instance. The story mode for that reads like an episode of 24, but it’s still TV series quality. Guild Wars 2… it’s difficult to see how it was approved for live release.

Trahearne, the entire story after your personal story, is so universally stomach churning that like others, I had to skip the dialog to be willing to continue. Cutscenes I couldn’t cancel were a punishment.

My first thought was… Maybe I’ve outgrown the market they’re targeting with these games. Maybe they know that their best customer is under the age of 12 and is looking for something more in line with their Saturday morning favorites (I say this not to be tongue in cheek insulting, but seriously wondered) than anything subtle.

Spoilers Ahead.

Things that are so “oh… please.. must..hold…down…lunch..”:

- Eir telling you how much you taught her about being a hero (priory companion also thanks you for teaching them so much about self sacrifice…) when, in the case of the brawler story line, you spent most of your time beating up hapless combatants using your full ability set only to in the end, beat the “great champion” who fought you with their fists while you -wasted them with grenades-.

- The need to call you “The Slayer” or “The Valiant” hundreds of times.

- Nearly everything about Trahearne’s story. From the line at Claw Island, “You’re a scholar, not a general, why should we trust you?!” to “You’ll find with unity that many impossible things can be accomplished” to his acting like a middle school child sending you out to ask for candid reactions from his generals so he can see if they “Like/Not Like” him. His lines. His motivation. His “stirring” speeches (which, by the way, for whatever reason the NPCs feel compelled to tell him were stirring speeches.).

- Tybalt. Just… wow. I thought maybe there would be a more serious story with a group like the OoW, espionage, politics and assassinations you must coordinate and take part of. Instead, you’re thrown into the worst B movie level spy humor imaginable with him. When you infiltrate the pirate camp, and he’s just free-styling pseudo-pirate talk… and that boyish “I get to be a real spy now Trahearne, like, asking questions and everything!”.

- Self sacrifice at claw island. Because gates only close from the inside and there is no way after being punished with their companionship for several missions I won’t be relieved that they chose to add another corpse to the mound.

- Completely disjointed story line involving the mesmer pretending to be a vigil soldier. She tries to make you look bad. Ok, I got that. She wants to discredit me. Makes sense, I am doing all the work after all and anyone with any sense can see all Trahearne does is fight a single low health NPC for 9 minutes of every 10 in a mission. Then… you report it to Trahearne. He’s you know, “not really sure”.

Then they ambush the camp. He then makes some comment about how discrediting you was really to get at him…. What? The camp ambush and fake soldier rescue though, that wasn’t enough to make the problem obvious.

Instead, you next seem him chiding other soldiers about the gates being broken “perhaps sabotaged?” Who are there? None other than more fake Vigil soldiers. You finally go with him to slowly confront the mesmer. What’s the most out of place series of lines in the entire chain? Something like, “You seem to smart to be a typical zombie.” Response: “My will is Zhaitans”.

Uhm.. ok

It’s essentially hours worth of telling instead of showing, over emphasis on just how unique and special a snowflake you are while making sure you know that the real special and unique snowflake is Trahearne. Petty squabbles and cluelessness from nearly every other NPC you meet until they become wise enough to submit to a whining Sylvari.

Contrast this to some of the conversation you come across between NPCs in the world, in cities. Some of it is clever, cute. It can make you smile when you hear it for the first time as it’s a little unexpected.

Sorry for the long rant, but like the OP, if I hadn’t found the gameplay as fun as I did initially, I would have quit over the story. It’s bad enough that it severely detracts from the game.

The 5% fee actually helps avoid some of that undercut behavior. If everyone could just pull and relist without cost, or reprice without cost, prices would spiral downward even faster than they do now.

Market price based flipping is also not likely to be very profitable, if profitable at all. One, items to flip are pretty easy to spot. Their buy orders are >15% cheaper than the lowest sell. No rocket science necessary. To make any money with the items you see that do have those characteristics, you need to trade in very large quantities. The risk is high you’ll lose money and would make more spending the same amount of time farming. The best flipping likely comes from correctly predicting fluctuations in materials due to an event or widespread change in player behavior.

If I had one major complaint about the economy in GW2, it’s how useless crafting is as a revenue generator. Farming your own mats doesn’t make it any better, as you’d do just as well selling the mats you farm as combining them into an item and selling. There are items on which you can earn some revenue, but the amount of profit is so small for those that again, farming is faster and more reliable.

I think they had something great and just barely missed it. Think of ways the Mystic Forge and crafting could have been entwined…

Hah… I didn’t realize this was a bug and thought “Well, I’m much worse with this character than I thought, this was cake on previous professions.”

Nike Porphyrogenita.8137:

I don’t think the answer will come on a spreadsheet to the how valuable WWA question is. I find it quite valuable against enemies like Subject Alpha and Lupicus, whereas others may not.

100% Agree. Start with numbers on a spreadsheet, understand the why behind them, then you can make informed decisions on each encounter per weapon and know what works best for you and the situation.

Will throw up that thread this week and be sure to fully credit everyone that participated for helping bring the info to light.

Nike Porphyrogenita.8137:

I admit, I have not tracked the thread very well. I’m glad you’ve come around to recognizing I was right, kudos to you for showing the intellectual honesty required to admit such.

No kudos required, I never cared to be right for the sake of being right, I just wanted the right information with the why behind it rather than just the answers. For people like me it’s critical to see the why because we’re innately skeptical of anything that becomes repeated dogma to copy. Nothing is lazier than finding a build, copying it and moving on without knowing -why- you should be copying it. It also prevents you from making the most of it as you don’t know which are the most essential pieces and which are easily replaced.

Nike Porphyrogenita.8137:

However, in real world game play I found that having the evade from WWA while maintaining DPS worked out better. A 3rd dodge that also does considerable damage turns out to be highly advantageous from a practicality standpoint. I reckon pure axe is 1% better than gs+axemace on paper but to me having the extra evade more than makes up for it.

Getting numbers slightly different in that GS/Axe+Mace can be higher DPS in target dummy scenarios, but yeah, I think in real world situations Axe+Mace is going to be highest DPS. The question of how valuable that evade is I want to try to get my head around. It has a smaller CD than Riposte and I believe there are some attacks you can evade but not block, but Axe+Mace and Axe+Sword would provide most of the DPS of Axe+Mace/Axe+Mace if vuln is already capped.

Puandro.3245:

… I can assure you if you are getting more damage with Pure axe you are doing the GS/Axe rotation wrong.

I’m not, I stated I was getting 2.6% better DPS from my own work and 5.4% before having time to fix up the slight issues with abilities being used before their CDs were available on your sheet.

GS/Axe + Mace is higher DPS. It’s just noticably higher DPS at a level of complexity that does not seem feasible in any normal gameplay setting.