Guild Wars 2

ODB.6891:

Vayne.8563:

spoj.9672:

I dont see how that counters anything i said.

I don’t see how you can’t see it.

The affect that hard content has on casual players isn’t non-existence. It’s a palpable thing. It HAS an effect.

Half this thread is people saying that other people are selfish because they’re trying to stop something that has NO EFFECT on them. That’s simply not the case.

So IF this content is going to be introduced it comes with a risk. You might believe that risk isn’t a large risk and it MIGHT not be. But you can’t say it doesn’t affect those people who aren’t interested in it, because it does.

So it has to be handled very carefully.

My guess is, if Anet puts enough hard stuff in to satisfy the hard core crowd, they’re going to lose at least some of the casual crowd. Again the risk is there.

It’s easy to tell a company to take the risk because you want something…because it’s not your money that’s going to go if that risk doesn’t pay off.

What I get from this whole argument….“If its something I might have a hard time completing….then I don’t want anyone to have it!” This doesn’t seem to be a very mature standpoint.

This argument has gone from the false claim that adding instanced content will somehow take away from open world content….to now being about wanting all rewards to be purchasable/obtainable without earning them.

I’m sorry, but the core of your argument seems flawed. The core of this argument seems to be that you think exclusive rewards…that you have to beat something challenging to obtain…will lead to the abandonment of this game. That’s the opposite of what exclusive rewards do. Rewards that require effort are the corner stone of what gives a game longevity. It gives players something to work towards. People that bail out at even the thought of having to earn something…have weak attachments to begin with and will bail out eventually anyway.

Mature standpoint? A business invests millions in a product. Changing the product, and it would be changing the product, could affect that product…and I’m immature for pointing it out. Are you not even following the argument. Or how about we stop judging point of views and look at the facts.

It’s a fact that every single game company has limited man hours, limited time in which to produce content. It’s a fact that lobbying for specific content means other content won’t be made. It’s a fact that the company who makes the game decides from their knowledge what content to make.

I never came out and told Anet what to make or what not to make. That’s not what I do. I came out for people who say this game needs more of a specific content that I don’t believe most people would be playing and pointed out that I believe that’s the fact.

I never asked Anet to make or not make this content, because I assume they know what people play. When I point that out, people use words to try to say my point of view is immature.

Sure it’s much more mature to think you know what’s best for the game over what the company thinks. It’s more mature to think that your views are worth risking millions of dollars of investments and hundreds of jobs.

There’s no real evidence that more instanced content will mean more players or more money for the company.

I’m responding to people who are saying what the game needs, by responding that a bunch of people are going to be disenfranchised if they can’t do content whether it’s fair or not. That shows an understanding of human nature that other people seem to be unaware of.

Well, I think looking at human nature and how humans react and acknowledging it and how it may affect a businesses bottom line is pretty mature.

I think calling people immature for having another opinion is simply wrong.

At the end of the day, I believe Anet knows what’s going on with their game more than 99.9% of forum posters. They know their resources, their budget, their goals as a company.

maddoctor.2738:

Vayne.8563:

I’m wondering if you ever remember a dev saying that more people harder content over all. Because I don’t recall that ever even being implied.

I think there is a huge misunderstanding here about what “challenging content” might mean. I don’t think their idea of a challenge is what other MMORPGs call “Raids”. For me “challenging content” can mean ANYTHING that is not afkable like the current game. The thing is none-easy mode afkable content might not even be able to be created in the open world, therefore there is a need for instances.

I answered above why I believe the devs are actively looking in ways to have more challenging content in THIS game, it doesn’t matter what the industry does, what Lotro or WoW does or what anyone else might think. And I repeat them all:

They stated they are adding “challenging content”, that’s a fact, some content in HoT WILL BE harder than we currently have. How much more challenging I don’t know, but if it’s anything that isn’t afkable it will be huge plus for the game, doesn’t need to be heroic raid difficulty
The community itself, this easy going/casual community as people claim it is, embraced SW and DT although they are more challenging than the old content
The more invested the players are, like with the PVP tournaments example, the more they stay online, the more they play and the more they pay

Simple facts. There is question if the devs WANT their game to be more challenging, since the first release of LS1 it’s obvious

See this I agree with. My real issue is against instanced content that divides the player base. I don’t mind more challenging content or AI generally. It’s the instanced bit that bothers me.

spoj.9672:

Except there obviously is demand because they are adding “challenging group content”. Whatever that might be. And like i said a 10% group is pretty big. If you divide all the groups up the hardcore community doesnt look so small. You guys are are saying we are ignoring the business side. Thats not really true. If anything you are ignoring some of the most important parts of the business side.

There are other aspects you are completely overlooking. Like who creates the most fan made content and advertises the game through that? Is it the casual players? Nope. Its the big reviewers and the hardcore community that uploads videos of their organised dungeons/raids/achievements. The hardcore community is very vocal. Thats actually a good thing. It means they often have influence and the ability to advertise the game to a wide range.

The casual players that say nothing and dont produce any content certainly dont bring any extra sales in except for maybe the odd friend or two. On the other hand content creators have the potential to bring in hundreds of new players or even encourage current players to try different parts of the game that they previously overlooked.

Also big influencers like MattVisual and WoodenPotatoes arent really part of the hardcore community but they have stated they want things like raids and more instanced content. And they had a surprisingly large amount of support for those comments. There is demand and there are a lot more people who want this stuff than you think.

And yet I suspect those guys would still be here if instanced raids aren’t introduced. As I said, I suspect the new hard content won’t be instanced. If it is, well then you guys win. Then we see how that affects the game’s playerbase over all.

But if I were you, I wouldn’t be surprised if any new hard instanced content ended up nerfed, because too many frustrated people is bad for the game. This is what happens in most MMOs.

maddoctor.2738:

Obtena.7952:

Vayne.8563:

spoj.9672:

I dont see how that counters anything i said.

I don’t see how you can’t see it.

snip

So it has to be handled very carefully.

My guess is, if Anet puts enough hard stuff in to satisfy the hard core crowd, they’re going to lose at least some of the casual crowd. Again the risk is there.

It’s easy to tell a company to take the risk because you want something…because it’s not your money that’s going to go if that risk doesn’t pay off.

I’m going to back this up because it’s a very real thing that people ignore; the business aspect of MMO gaming is something that very few players consider when they request changes. There is a finite pool of resources. Guaranteed that anything that gets developed must get past the muster of the business guys.

Assuming this game doesn’t have a significant potion of people that don’t like hard instanced content … why would business guys approve of adding more of it? Of course we don’t have those numbers but I think it’s obvious from the lack of hard, instanced content that the population doesn’t support adding more of it.

Next argument? Why not add it to get those players into the game? Again, because there are finite resources. Do you add that and not do something else that impacts the present population loyal to the game that may consider that an affront to them? There are very plausible explanations for these things.

I don’t get it. How do you know if there is or there isn’t support for more instanced hard content if there is only so little of it around? How do the devs know if the playerbase will like more hard instanced content if there hasn’t been any new of it to play?

As for difficult content itself:
A) They are adding challenging group content whatever that means, so they DO want to make the game harder. They’ve been revamping bosses and nerfing farms, leading players to harder content. It’s not like the devs want their playerbase to be mindless drones doing the SW chest farm only, that’s hardly healthy for a game
B) Silverwastes and Dry Top (except for the lame Chest farm) are both harder than the Queensdale of Frostgorge trains, or the World Boss trains, yet they attract loads of people, so the GW2 playerbase DOES like harder content, if they didn’t then SW/DT would be empty and everyone would be doing their regular trains only
C) From the very recent Anet presentation about PVP they said that players who play sPVP tournaments are more loyal to the game, they log for more hours than players who do not play in tournaments. It would be interesting to see the average playtimes of players who do regular (daily) dungeon runs and players who just go and farm. We might all be surprised with the results.

Going around and farming won’t keep players interested, they will eventually get bored, good and challenging content will keep interest more. It’s to Anet’s best interest to have players loyal to the game that log for as many hours as possible and pursue more and more rewards rather than simple farmers.

The devs don’t have just one game to go by. They have lots of games to go by. They don’t just have one bit of research, they have lots of research.

The idea that harder content isn’t that popular has been floating around this industry for years and years. This isn’t like new or sudden info. It’s not info I’ve made up.

In all the years I’ve been following MMOs I’ve never seen an MMO dev come out and say our fans want more hard instanced content. What I have seen those, is games like Rift which was centered around raids, having devs coming out and saying, we got it wrong, we see that we need more content for people who are more casual…that’s paraphrased but it’s what they said after the big initial exodus from the game, which I was part of.

They then tried to put these adventures in there which were flawed for all sorts of reasons.

Wildstar devs said, straight out, they didn’t expect so many people want solo content. Scott Hartsman of Rift fame said, that no developer could ignore the solo player base and expect to be successful. Most recently a lotro dev gave up the percentage of people in that game that actually raided, and at one point,. even the head dev of blizzard said less than 5% of the game’s population play the hardest content.

I’m wondering if you ever remember a dev saying that more people harder content over all. Because I don’t recall that ever even being implied.

uhohhotdog.3598:

Jockum.1385:

uhohhotdog.3598:

I didn’t say it has no open world. You’re twisting my words.

My point was:

You should not take every advertisement as truth. They will always exaggerate.
When Anet tells you about “super innovative Events” you will get some kind of events. When Anet tells us about super challenging dungeons we get some dungeon stuff.
I showed you a dungeon interview. So if you want Anet to keep their promises (which is understandable) you should understand, that other players want Anet to keep their promises too. So where’s the underworld like content? There is none. But you don’t care, but you’re using not kept promises as an argument? …………

Anet has exaggerated. For all players. For open world players, for instance players – well…look at “esports PVP”. Should Anet now stop developing open world content until their pvp is good at esports? Should they stop developing open world content until their dungeons are “UW like”? No. No one wants that. But you, you ask Anet to stop developing everything and just develop open world content?

And this is why i twisted your words. To show you: there is open world content. Maybe Anet exagerated a bit, but there is an open world. There are event chains. There is pvp, there are dungeons. So maybe not as good as expected, but all modi are fine.
And all modi should be developed, improved. I’m not asking Anet to stop open world content. Many players like it, so ofc they should add open world content.
So why are you asking for “no instances”? Anet has broken other promises, too.

uhohhotdog.3598:

When a game sells you on the point that it would be filled with event chains that have a lasting affect on the world, they should try that. I don’t want “one time” events. I want event CHAINS.

Chains have no lasting effects on the world. Their effect will be gone in 2 minutes or so. Only one-time events can provide a lasting effect.
SW is a huge eventchain – if you fail to defend you have to invade the camp again, when defending phase is over bosses will spawn, then vinewrath starts.
Orr is full of eventchains. Fireelemental? Eventchain. Centaur events in harathi? Event chain. The game has tons of eventchains. You want improved eventchains? I can understand it. But thats no reason to block instanced content. HoT seems to become SW like, so its very likely Anet will improve their event system. It might not become perfekt, but Anet will try to offer some “better event chains”.
Image I would say “dungeons are not challenging enoug, stop all open world content until Anet brings challenging dungeons of my taste. They promised us challenging content.”. Well…I don’t ask for that. But you do.

I should not take advertisement as truth? Are you serious? It should absolutely be taken as truth. There’s laws about that you know. Not that they’re all well enforced but they exist. When a company advertises content it should deliver on that content.

Your idea of event chain seems to be attack a camp and then defend it. Sorry no that’s not a chain. The Balthazar chain is a pretty good one but it can be expanded on. And I didn’t say there were no event chains in the game I’m just saying there isn’t enough. All events should be part of something larger. Every event. And they can be made to not be over in 2 minutes.

There are quite a few events that chain. And chain doesn’t have to be a long chain. There are events in almost every zone that chain. You may not like that, but that doesn’t mean they’re not there.

Anet said from the beginning, from long before launch, events would be persistent but not permanent.

They also told us, straight out, that not all events would chain.

spoj.9672:

I dont see how that counters anything i said.

I don’t see how you can’t see it.

The affect that hard content has on casual players isn’t non-existence. It’s a palpable thing. It HAS an effect.

Half this thread is people saying that other people are selfish because they’re trying to stop something that has NO EFFECT on them. That’s simply not the case.

So IF this content is going to be introduced it comes with a risk. You might believe that risk isn’t a large risk and it MIGHT not be. But you can’t say it doesn’t affect those people who aren’t interested in it, because it does.

So it has to be handled very carefully.

My guess is, if Anet puts enough hard stuff in to satisfy the hard core crowd, they’re going to lose at least some of the casual crowd. Again the risk is there.

It’s easy to tell a company to take the risk because you want something…because it’s not your money that’s going to go if that risk doesn’t pay off.

spoj.9672:

Vayne.8563:

spoj.9672:

Vayne.8563:

Right it’s based on what I don’t like. Obviously no other group of people could possibly have the same likes or dislikes as me. or the same interests. Obviously I’m not in a guild was a couple of hundred people, many of whom I speak to each week. Obviously I have no power of observation and can’t draw conclusions from what I’ve seen and heard.

Yes, there are people out there frustrated by the fact that they have to do specific content that they don’t like to get rewards they really want. I know this because some of them have actually posted threads about it. They’re usually shot down pretty fast, but stuff has been posted.

And more than that I’ve seen people talking in map chat about stuff, heard people in guild talk about stuff like that, and yes, some people are frustrated. Now that’s not to say they’re leaving, or threatening to leave, but you know, I don’t have to see someone get hit by a car to know that if cars are driving too fast, it’s likely going to happen at some point.

The direction of the game, reward-wise is moving in a way that some people are definitely asking for and some people are definitely disenfranchised by. Not just me.

Now if you have evidence that no one else feels like this, or about numbers, I’d sure be glad to listen. I don’t know how big my group is. What I do believe is the people who want challenging content tend to be a fringe group.

This is a funny thing to bring up. Ive seen the exact same evidence of a huge amount of players wanting new dungeons, new instanced content and greater challenge and even in some cases exclusive rewards to that content. Your side is no less a fringe group than the other groups despite what you may think. You always see less of the groups you arent part of and more of the groups you are part of.

Except that it’s not as likely a fringe group. Devs have been saying across many games for many years all sorts of variations on casuals are the most numerous players of any game but hard core are the most vocal.

You don’t have to believe it, but it doesn’t change what’s been said. The most recent example I can think of is from a lotro dev who said less than 10% of the population of the game raided since launch, but they account for 50% of forum posts.

Yeah but id be willing to bet the group that wants more instanced content is larger than the group that doesnt want exclusive rewards anywhere. Id agree the open world fanbase is larger than the hardcore community. But then you have to consider how many different groups there are in GW2. 10% is a pretty huge group when you consider sPvP, WvW, roleplayers, open worlders and do it all players.

Open world players can be further divided up and you can never appease all of them at the same time. I have seen very casual open world players saying they want to see more instanced content and raids. So yeah… I think appealing to a pretty tight shipped large group like the hardcore community is actually quite a safe investment. Because the other groups seem to have members that would like to dabble in that content as well.

There is high demand for instanced content whether you like it or not. Believe what you want but the numbers ive seen are far from small. And its very difficult to consider it a minority from my observations. If it is a minority, its not a very small one. An example of a very small minority would be speedrunners. But thats only a minority subsection of the dungeon/fractal community.

By the same token, you do have far more people who don’t need harder content than those that do, no matter how vocal that group is.

Because I can guarantee if that group was that big, they’d have that kind of content. Sort of telling that they don’t. Not in most games.

The trend is to make everything easier and dumb everything down for a reason. Even WOW does it. Why? Because it’s where the bulk of the playerbase is.

Now, that’s not to say we can’t have harder content too…but it’s a narrow line to how that can be introduced. What you don’t want to do is change the perception of people playing that the game is too hard for them.

Liadri was done right because it could be mostly ignored by people, but there is a fine line there.

So I’m not against hard content on principle. I’m concerned about how that hard content would be introduced and the affect it might have on the bulk of the playerbase. Keep in mind, the way things have been done lately, I personally feel affected.

And there are certainly less people in my guild that have luminscent armor than those that do. It’s just too much effort for some of them.

You keep doing that and you end up with people FEELING disenfranchised. It’s not right, or fair, or logical. But it is business.

spoj.9672:

Vayne.8563:

Right it’s based on what I don’t like. Obviously no other group of people could possibly have the same likes or dislikes as me. or the same interests. Obviously I’m not in a guild was a couple of hundred people, many of whom I speak to each week. Obviously I have no power of observation and can’t draw conclusions from what I’ve seen and heard.

Yes, there are people out there frustrated by the fact that they have to do specific content that they don’t like to get rewards they really want. I know this because some of them have actually posted threads about it. They’re usually shot down pretty fast, but stuff has been posted.

And more than that I’ve seen people talking in map chat about stuff, heard people in guild talk about stuff like that, and yes, some people are frustrated. Now that’s not to say they’re leaving, or threatening to leave, but you know, I don’t have to see someone get hit by a car to know that if cars are driving too fast, it’s likely going to happen at some point.

The direction of the game, reward-wise is moving in a way that some people are definitely asking for and some people are definitely disenfranchised by. Not just me.

Now if you have evidence that no one else feels like this, or about numbers, I’d sure be glad to listen. I don’t know how big my group is. What I do believe is the people who want challenging content tend to be a fringe group.

This is a funny thing to bring up. Ive seen the exact same evidence of a huge amount of players wanting new dungeons, new instanced content and greater challenge and even in some cases exclusive rewards to that content. Your side is no less a fringe group than the other groups despite what you may think. You always see less of the groups you arent part of and more of the groups you are part of.

Except that it’s not as likely a fringe group. Devs have been saying across many games for many years all sorts of variations on casuals are the most numerous players of any game but hard core are the most vocal.

You don’t have to believe it, but it doesn’t change what’s been said. The most recent example I can think of is from a lotro dev who said less than 10% of the population of the game raided since launch, but they account for 50% of forum posts.

Jumping puzzles might well be my favorite thing in this game. Then again, I played a lot of Tomb Raider over the years.

Eponet.4829:

Vayne.8563:

CureForLiving.5360:

TheBlackLeech.9360:

Vayne.8563:

Gameplay > lore

Why not have both?

Because sometimes you can’t, and in those cases gameplay is given the advantage because people have to play the game.

NPCs are often “OP”, but when you make them playable you have to make them in a such a way that other people will not gravitate to them just because they have something on other race does.

If you could shapeshift and stay in that form, people would gravitate to that, because humans can’t.

Giving them a purely cosmetic transformation as the OP suggested seems like it avoids that.

I dont’ think purely cosmetic would help them be larger than life. I’d consider that watered down.

CureForLiving.5360:

TheBlackLeech.9360:

Vayne.8563:

Gameplay > lore

Why not have both?

Because sometimes you can’t, and in those cases gameplay is given the advantage because people have to play the game.

NPCs are often “OP”, but when you make them playable you have to make them in a such a way that other people will not gravitate to them just because they have something on other race does.

If you could shapeshift and stay in that form, people would gravitate to that, because humans can’t.

Yes the community is the six farmers you had a problem with. Rolls eyes.

Actually, I’ve seen far far more posts saying this is the best community I’ve seen than this is the worst.

There are bad apples in every game. That’s not the community.

Gameplay > lore

This is true for all MMOs. When you buy a driving game, you get the entire game, pretty much in the box. Very little is added. When you buy an MMO you’re buying the game and the history of the game.

MMOs change and evolve all the time, at least the good ones do. So you have a game that keeps on giving.

Since launch there have been 3 new zones, and some new story, and some new items you can get, and some new jumping puzzles and some new PvP maps, and a new map called Edge of the Mists, none of which could have been included in the disc, because they were added after the disc was pressed.

There’s a new wardrobe feature, an account wallet and a bunch of other stuff as well.

Welcome to the game.

dlonie.6547:

Vayne.8563:

dlonie.6547:

Carbine’s staff actually got gutted a while back — NCSoft cut the staff of pretty much all of their studios (save ArenaNet), and Carbine got the worst of it. They’re probably in greater need of people than ArenaNet :-(

Edit More info

Does the rumor of a ANet/Carbine merger actually have a basis to it? I’ve not heard of it outside of some random, info-less posts on this forum.

There’s no basis for this at all. The poster invented it.

Glad to hear it. I can’t see that ending well for either game. Those are two very, very distinct development styles and target demographics!

It would make no sense on any level. Wildstar is going to get more players when they go free to play. Guild Wars 2 is going to have players when the expansion comes out. In what world would combining the companies make any sense at all?

dlonie.6547:

Carbine’s staff actually got gutted a while back — NCSoft cut the staff of pretty much all of their studios (save ArenaNet), and Carbine got the worst of it. They’re probably in greater need of people than ArenaNet :-(

Edit More info

Does the rumor of a ANet/Carbine merger actually have a basis to it? I’ve not heard of it outside of some random, info-less posts on this forum.

There’s no basis for this at all. The poster invented it.

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

I much preferred LS Season One, and it’s design and release cadence. I wasn’t fond of Season 2, at all. I never asked for an expansion, nor for ‘permanent’ content.

I can’t comment on HoT, as it’s not been released yet, but I hope it provides enough to do until the next expansion, if that is the release model we will have in the future.

I don’t believe the expansion will give us enough to do until the expansion after it, but I do believe the expansion after it will come sooner and I believe content will be released between expansions to keep us going.

This first expansion is a bit different because it took longer to start, and because it redesigns so many of the game’s basic systems, which weren’t originally sufficiently to build upon. Anet learned and applied some lessons and moving forward, they won’t have to redesign these systems again, nor should they be experimenting with something like Season 1.

First of all, without a crystal ball, no one could possibly answer that question. However, I don’t see how anyone can take the question seriously.

Almost all MMOs, virtually all of them, follow the same pattern. A group of people play them for a period of time. They run out of stuff to do, they get bored. An expansion comes out, they come back and play.

It’s what happens with WoW which is, of course, the industry leader. WoW almost always loses millions of players between expansions and usually gains most of them back when expansions come out.

But there are games that are pretty old, that aren’t as popular as Guild Wars 2 is now, and they’re doing okay enough to continually come out with expansions, including Lotro, DDO, Star Trek Online, AoC, TSW, there are a lot of MMOs that go through this cycle.

So I don’t really understand where the question is coming from.

When the expansion hits, people will come and play, including some new people. Many people will get bored and walk away, some of whom will come back, plus new people.

This is how pretty much all MMOs work.

Tigaseye.2047:

Have to be honest, this thread reads like a commercial.

You know, one of those ones that is full of glowing “customer testimonials”?

It’s kind of funny to me how that can happen in a single thread, when other parts of the forum are full of constructive criticism (with no developer replies).

It’s easier to reply to a compliment than a criticism, because a compliment asks for no action. If I baked a cake and someone said I really like it, it’s easy to say thank you.

But if someone said they didn’t like it, then the response becomes more complex. Will what they are complaining about actually be changed (It was too sweet). Did they even know what they were complaining about (I don’t like it but I can’t put my finger on why), is their comment even realistic (my mother made this better).

There isn’t any good reply to any of those comments. It’s easier just to remain silent.

In fact, there are very few criticisms that don’t contradict stuff people like. For every person who says the game is too easy, there’s probably a person who thinks it’s not or even that it’s too hard. For every person who says there isn’t enough content, there are people who haven’t finished all the content they want to.

So yeah, it makes sense that this thread would get a response and a complaint might not (and some of them have). One of them requires a response that is less routine and requires more research, more thought, more tact and more consultation.

anx.7549:

I’d like to agree with the opening post.

When I first played this game back in January I was struck by how much bigger (than GW1) everything was. And when I walked in to Divinity’s Reach I was like WTF, where the heck do I go first? Everything was so busy and vibrant!

I admit I also thought it was a bit like WoW, but I quickly got that notion out of my head. (no disrespect to fans of that game, but it really wasn’t my cup of tea)

But so far I am loving the game. Although my one gripe was getting to the Personal Story ending and realizing I needed a group of people to do it with.

They’re fixing that, with the end of the personal story. Soonish even. It’s in testing right now.

How about a clue for those of us who don’t get it.

There’s a chance you’ll make a profit, but a small one that’s not worth it in my mind. Precursor crafting is coming with the expansion anyway, why gamble away good money?

Oh my god. I’m not getting info as fast as I’d like it. I can’t stay excited. So here’s my question.

Why do you NEED to stay excited?

When I was going to see the third Hobbit movie, I looked forward to it. I didn’t have to watch trailers to pysche myself up. I knew when it would be out, and when it came out I went to see it. I don’t understand this constant need to be hyped.

The game isn’t going to be out for months. I can’t see it coming out before August. So why is it Anet’s responsibility to keep you hyped for months at a time? Do you think that’s reasonable?

Since it’s based around support, the odds are it won’t be high DPS. That would make it quite OP.

rapthorne.7345:

Orianna was what first popped in to my mind too, after reading that section of the blog. It seems like an interesting mechanic in GW2’s combat system

I still want to know which of the developers is a fan of League of Legends. more and more I am seeing HoT mechanics directly taken from/inspired by League. The wind wall on revenant (Yasuo), the displacement on Chronomancer (Leblanc, Ekko), and now the ventari tablet, clearly based on Orianna and her ball mechanic

Well I, for one, am not a fan of league of legends, but I wish I had been. Had I know Vayne was a chic, I’d have picked a different account name. lol

Yep, when I feel this game is too annoying to play, I play another MMO. It doesn’t take long for me to make my way back here.

Welcome back OP.

I run my guild. Hang out. Help people who need help with stuff. Today I was helping a newbie in low level zones and also helped a guildie finish the last chapter of the living story. Yesterday I did a fractal with some guildies and actually got the last fractal achievement I needed. Glad those are all done.

Oh and I’m watching a lot of WWE (because yeah lol).

Plenty of people still around. My guess is you went to Lion’s Arch to find people yes?

Bloodstealer.5978:

Vayne.8563:

Bloodstealer.5978:

Lols so you want everything easywin from the content or P2W if you don’t like running said content.. ohh my giddy aunt… compelling argument for not having instanced content much.. I am crying here!

It is a compelling argument if it’s going to affect the bottom line of the game and it might. You seem to be laboring under the assumption that I’m just talking for me and about me. No. I’m talking about a certain type of player that exists in these games in massive numbers. I’m pretty sure there are more people who play the game who want different channels to get to rewards than there are people who want hard content with excluive rewards.

Your argument is I want everything with no work. My argument is you want the game to fail, because you’re advocating something that a minority of the playerbase wants at the expense of what I believe to be the majority.

You laugh at me because you think that I want stuff easily. I’m amazed that you think that a business can survive on supporting the minority and ignoring the majority.

Rubbish, and you know it !! – Everything you said was based on what YOU like or don’t like, what you find disenfranchising not this apparent majority .. btw please supply proof of this if you can because most of what I see, read and hear is of the desire to have more things to do, more meaningful and challenging content (whether it be instanced or openworld) which offers a far greater replay value.. that does not come from giving players like you the opportunity to bypass it and go straight to the gem store and buy it. Its that kind of tripe that ruins any decent MMO imo.
In fact I would not to unhappy with the occasional gear creep and it will likely always happen from time to time, but unlike the many other MMO’s that creep doesn’t need to be gigantic step ups just wee weeny ones and thus far ANET have done a pretty decent job of controlling that aspect.
Further to this some level of exclusive rewards is often a vital component in keeping MMO’s alive while new content is being planned developed tested and patched in.. I am glad it can’t be churned out in a day, loaded up the next and bought by you soon after, but that often dictates the need to include some low hanging fruits but with the occasional carrot dangling with a sharp hook sticking through it to help maintain some level of login consistency. That in no way means that instanced content must have exclusive rewards gated behind it, but sometimes it might just like we have in some of those “epic dynamic events” we currently have in our openworld zergfest.

Right it’s based on what I don’t like. Obviously no other group of people could possibly have the same likes or dislikes as me. or the same interests. Obviously I’m not in a guild was a couple of hundred people, many of whom I speak to each week. Obviously I have no power of observation and can’t draw conclusions from what I’ve seen and heard.

Yes, there are people out there frustrated by the fact that they have to do specific content that they don’t like to get rewards they really want. I know this because some of them have actually posted threads about it. They’re usually shot down pretty fast, but stuff has been posted.

And more than that I’ve seen people talking in map chat about stuff, heard people in guild talk about stuff like that, and yes, some people are frustrated. Now that’s not to say they’re leaving, or threatening to leave, but you know, I don’t have to see someone get hit by a car to know that if cars are driving too fast, it’s likely going to happen at some point.

The direction of the game, reward-wise is moving in a way that some people are definitely asking for and some people are definitely disenfranchised by. Not just me.

Now if you have evidence that no one else feels like this, or about numbers, I’d sure be glad to listen. I don’t know how big my group is. What I do believe is the people who want challenging content tend to be a fringe group.

maddoctor.2738:

Vayne.8563:

dlonie.6547:

Vayne.8563:

dlonie.6547:

I hear ya Vayne, that’s a valid concern, but:

James Quall.6029:

You should be saying “make everything tradeable” instead of “don’t make dungeons”, because unless you follow that up with “…or pvp modes, or wvw maps, or living story episodes, or special world bosses” you’re a hypocrite who just wants to edge out the part of the game you don’t like so nobody else will have new dungeons either.

still this^

And I’d be saying it, if this is what Anet had been doing but it hasn’t. So I don’t want raids if the reward structure doesn’t change, because I don’t suspect it will change.

If everything was tradeable I’d have a lot less issues. But I think it’s more likely we won’t get instanced raids than Anet will change their loot policies of recent months.

So you why aren’t you protesting stronghold, PvP, LS, etc etc? Why just instanced content?

You really think including a few dungeons with HoT would kill the game? You think that would be “catering” to a minority, by adding a few things for hardcore players alongside a ton of casual content? You’re not making any sense.

I think a few dungeons in hot would be wasted, but you know, it’s not my decision. If Anet puts them in, we’ll see what happens. I guarantee you I have no clout with Anet. They don’t listen to me anyway, so what’s the difference what I say.

I’m saying I don’t think ENOUGH instanced hard content will be added to make a difference either way. I think that the hard content that will be added isn’t instanced. If I’m right, and I might not be, then it’s too late to add those instances, because if they’re not in now, they’re not going to be in.

We’re actually arguing about a decision Anet has already made.

Yet they are adding just a SINGLE new map for sPVP, why not add a SINGLE new dungeon as well?

They’re adding more than a new map. They’re adding a new game type, which is considerably different. But let’s say that Anet does add a single new dungeon and lets say that dungeon is received as well as the last dungeon they added. Would you consider that efficient use of resources?

dlonie.6547:

Vayne.8563:

dlonie.6547:

I hear ya Vayne, that’s a valid concern, but:

James Quall.6029:

You should be saying “make everything tradeable” instead of “don’t make dungeons”, because unless you follow that up with “…or pvp modes, or wvw maps, or living story episodes, or special world bosses” you’re a hypocrite who just wants to edge out the part of the game you don’t like so nobody else will have new dungeons either.

still this^

And I’d be saying it, if this is what Anet had been doing but it hasn’t. So I don’t want raids if the reward structure doesn’t change, because I don’t suspect it will change.

If everything was tradeable I’d have a lot less issues. But I think it’s more likely we won’t get instanced raids than Anet will change their loot policies of recent months.

So you why aren’t you protesting stronghold, PvP, LS, etc etc? Why just instanced content?

You really think including a few dungeons with HoT would kill the game? You think that would be “catering” to a minority, by adding a few things for hardcore players alongside a ton of casual content? You’re not making any sense.

I’m not “protesting” anything. I’m responding to a thread that has comments in it, and expressing my point of view. I don’t frequent the PvP sub forum and so I don’t see those threads, or I’d probably respond to them.

At any rate, I’m going to bed. Have fun.

dlonie.6547:

Vayne.8563:

dlonie.6547:

I hear ya Vayne, that’s a valid concern, but:

James Quall.6029:

You should be saying “make everything tradeable” instead of “don’t make dungeons”, because unless you follow that up with “…or pvp modes, or wvw maps, or living story episodes, or special world bosses” you’re a hypocrite who just wants to edge out the part of the game you don’t like so nobody else will have new dungeons either.

still this^

And I’d be saying it, if this is what Anet had been doing but it hasn’t. So I don’t want raids if the reward structure doesn’t change, because I don’t suspect it will change.

If everything was tradeable I’d have a lot less issues. But I think it’s more likely we won’t get instanced raids than Anet will change their loot policies of recent months.

So you why aren’t you protesting stronghold, PvP, LS, etc etc? Why just instanced content?

You really think including a few dungeons with HoT would kill the game? You think that would be “catering” to a minority, by adding a few things for hardcore players alongside a ton of casual content? You’re not making any sense.

I think a few dungeons in hot would be wasted, but you know, it’s not my decision. If Anet puts them in, we’ll see what happens. I guarantee you I have no clout with Anet. They don’t listen to me anyway, so what’s the difference what I say.

I’m saying I don’t think ENOUGH instanced hard content will be added to make a difference either way. I think that the hard content that will be added isn’t instanced. If I’m right, and I might not be, then it’s too late to add those instances, because if they’re not in now, they’re not going to be in.

We’re actually arguing about a decision Anet has already made.

Fenrir.3609:

Or you know, it might just be a very small amount now and then ages (if ever) before any future additions.

The “sky is falling” idea that we will get tons of challenging instanced pve content and thus all the casuals will disappear is somewhat far fetched.

If it’s a very small amount now, what makes you think the hard core crowd is going to be satisfied. I see two pretty much mutually exclusive events.

Either there’s enough hard core content to satisify the hard core crowd for a period of time, which means there’s the rewards problem I fear, or the hard core crowd gets some token hard content and doesn’t really stop complaining anyway.

Not sure why you think that getting a tiny bit of content is going to stop the complaints, or even hard core people from walking away.

Fenrir.3609:

Vayne.8563:

Yep, kittenes me off no end, because with the latency I have in Tasmania, it’s quite a bit harder to get the Liadri mini than it would be if I were stateside. That’s pretty much the only challenge in the game I haven’t managed….but I haven’t tried that hard. When you die in that fight and you’re no where near the black area that’s killed you on your screen, you pretty much know it’s not worth your time.

So there is a precedent for it in the game and oddly enough I don’t see it causing the game to fold.

Adding in some challenging instanced pve (which will comprise of a tiny fraction of the games content) is not suddenly going to see the playerbase collapse and the game shut down.

One reward doesn’t cause the game to fold. Two rewards doesn’t, but you know, everyone has a limit and everyone’s limit is different. I’m okay with not having a couple of rewards I’m never going to see. But the more those rewards increase, the more I start thinking a game isn’t for me. If I’m realistically not getting rewards more and more often, I’m realistically going to be frustrated more and more often. At which point it’s easier and easier to walk away from a game.

I already have people I know who have walked away from this game because of the way the rewards are. Because it’s too much WORK for them to do all the achievements for the Living Story and there’s no other way to get luminscent armor. There’s a llama mini some people are never going to get that some people really want. There’s the fractal tonic which I’m pretty sure I’ll never have.

It’s only a handful now. But as that handful grows, more and more people WILL become dissatisfied and no one really can say how big that group will end up.

Fenrir.3609:

“The game will shut if we add a few challenging instances!!”.

But it’ll NEVER be a few challenging instances. Ever. It’ll be give me one. Then you want one more. Then you want something harder. Than you want something exclusive, than you want better rewards because it’s harder.

The hard core community is a very very loud part of the playerbase. They always have been. That doesn’t mean, necessarily, that they’re a very big percentage of the player base.

So they push and push and push and they get a bit more and a bit more and a bit more. And that means the casuals get a bit less and a bit less and a bit less, until the casuals end up leaving. After which, the game can cl;ose or scale back operations because I don’t believe the game can exist without the casual base.

You guys will get a couple of hard instances, work them out, find them easy and you’ll want more hard instances. That’s how it works. It’ll be a never ending fight for resources.

Games should focus on what makes them strong. Trying to please everyone leaves no one pleased.

dlonie.6547:

I hear ya Vayne, that’s a valid concern, but:

James Quall.6029:

You should be saying “make everything tradeable” instead of “don’t make dungeons”, because unless you follow that up with “…or pvp modes, or wvw maps, or living story episodes, or special world bosses” you’re a hypocrite who just wants to edge out the part of the game you don’t like so nobody else will have new dungeons either.

still this^

And I’d be saying it, if this is what Anet had been doing but it hasn’t. So I don’t want raids if the reward structure doesn’t change, because I don’t suspect it will change.

If everything was tradeable I’d have a lot less issues. But I think it’s more likely we won’t get instanced raids than Anet will change their loot policies of recent months.

Fenrir.3609:

Vayne.8563:

You need to read my argument again. I didn’t say BIS gear. I said rewards. Let’s pretend Anet puts the coolest mini or coolest tonic in a raid. It’s possible. A cool outfit. A cool skin. Now, if there becomes enough of those things that people can’t get, people will feel disenfranchised. That situation doesn’t exist now..

You mean like the Liadri mini.

Yep, kittenes me off no end, because with the latency I have in Tasmania, it’s quite a bit harder to get the Liadri mini than it would be if I were stateside. That’s pretty much the only challenge in the game I haven’t managed….but I haven’t tried that hard. When you die in that fight and you’re no where near the black area that’s killed you on your screen, you pretty much know it’s not worth your time.

Bloodstealer.5978:

Vayne.8563:

James Quall.6029:

Vayne.8563:

This game I like. But if exclusive rewards, too many of them, are locked behind content I’m not enjoying, I can see myself walking away from here too.

One of the things I like about this game is that I can get most rewards doing most things. Not all, but most. I’d sort of hope that would stay the same.

WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? Seriously you’re in shambles here and once again I can’t wrap my head around what it is you’re advocating. First you talk about how we don’t need instanced stuff because it’s possible to make challenging open world stuff, but then you talk about how anything challenging is bad for the community because if it’s hard then only a small amount of people will do it which would automatically create some kind of elitest superculture.

Then you complain that there are exclusive rewards from doing stuff that you might not want to do and that would make you quit. That’s INSANE because that’s how it has been since day 1 and it’s not just from dungeons! There is equipment that only comes from dungeons, equipment you can only get from spvp, a set of weapons that only comes from wvw during tournaments, gear that only comes from specific world bosses like Tequatl and the evolved jungle wurm, and luminescent armor requires that (among other things) you complete all the achievements of living story episodes. The entire philosophy of this game is that getting gear is easy, getting the impressive and cool looking gear (which is statistically not better in any way) takes some time and effort.

So is it just when it’s from instanced dungeons that you have an issue, or do you have a problem with all of those things? Cause to me it’s starting to sound like you want to turn this game into a bland flavorless gray mush where nothing is hard and you can get any item you want without trying anything new or challenging.

Look this isn’t really rocket science, but I’ll break it down for you. The most prestigious weapons in Guild Wars 1 could be bought for gold if you had enough gold. Tormented weapons, celestial compass, voltaic spear, all of them could be bought for gold. So if I didn’t want to run DOA (I beat it once and swore never again), then I could still access those rewards. So it didn’t particularly bother me.

Many of the rewards in Guild Wars 2 however are going account bound which means that I’d have to do content I might not enjoy to get rewards I want.

On TOP of that, there’s the issue of the community. In Guild Wars 1, I didn’t LIKE the community the grew up around DOA and UW. This build or get out is not my idea of fun, particularly in a game about builds. Again, because I had the option to buy most of those rewards, I didn’t have to deal with that kind of annoyance and I could enjoy the parts of the game I enjoyed.

So there is more than a one fold problem. You don’t understand what I’m saying because I’m replying to posts and not writing a term paper. Each post deals with a small piece of what I’m saying.

And you know, if you don’t get it, that’s okay. I’m sure some people do.

Lols so you want everything easywin from the content or P2W if you don’t like running said content.. ohh my giddy aunt… compelling argument for not having instanced content much.. I am crying here!

It is a compelling argument if it’s going to affect the bottom line of the game and it might. You seem to be laboring under the assumption that I’m just talking for me and about me. No. I’m talking about a certain type of player that exists in these games in massive numbers. I’m pretty sure there are more people who play the game who want different channels to get to rewards than there are people who want hard content with excluive rewards.

Your argument is I want everything with no work. My argument is you want the game to fail, because you’re advocating something that a minority of the playerbase wants at the expense of what I believe to be the majority.

You laugh at me because you think that I want stuff easily. I’m amazed that you think that a business can survive on supporting the minority and ignoring the majority.

dlonie.6547:

Vayne.8563:

I’m confused about what you’re confused about.

I’ll spell it out:

Vayne.8563:

Nope, what I’m arguing for is multiple paths to get rewards instead of rewards being locked into specific content, hard or otherwise, but particularly hard content that not everyone is going to do.

dlonie.6547:

Oh look, you just solved your own problem. Now can you stop with the stance that “hard content must lead to exclusive rewards and disenfranchised players”?

Vayne.8563:

If Anet continues the trend of making those rewards account bound than nothing is solved.

You say “I want multiple paths to get rewards”, and then 3 minutes later say “Multiple paths aren’t enough if the rewards are account bound.”

Again, your issue is with account bound rewards, which is fine, but it is not a reason to not make instanced content:

1) Instanced content rewards can be things other than unique, soulbound gear.
2) If you’re going to petition the addition of content that has unique, soulbound rewards, you should be arguing against a lot more things in this game than just instanced content.

Never said that. If I have multiple paths to rewards then it doesn’t matter that it’s account bound but look at what’s been going on lately.

We have single paths to account bound rewards and that’s my problem. Not sure why this is so hard to understand.

If there are multiple paths to get the rewards from something like a raid, OR if you can sell the rewards from raids, most of my (not all of my) problems are solved.

But seeing how rewards are being offered recently I don’t see this happening, so my problem persists.

I’ve spent a lot of money on gems, but how much exactly it would be hard to say, since I don’t keep track.

Easily a thousand dollars between me and my wife, perhaps even a thousand each. Guild Wars 2 is our main source of entertainment and I’m happy to support the game.

I think if the OP wants to leave a game over something like a lemon dye, they couldn’t really have been too interested in the game to begin with.

Of all the over-reactions I’ve seen on the forums, and there have been a few, this, in my opinion, is the greatest.

Anet announced they’ll be removing that set from the black lion weapon specialist. Weapon sets aren’t forever. These will no longer be available.

Lil Puppy.5216:

A simple redesign of the store and someone that can actually run SPECIALS and we wouldn’t have to put up with this – steam does it and makes billions… what’s your excuse Anet?

I can’t wait until the Zunlai come back, then Evon will be out of business cause they at least have infinite magical storage ability and a nice back story.

Steam is selling third party items, not their own items so it’s not the same situation, is it?

I mean if I am advertising OTHER people’s products, particularly if I make a commitment to those people, then it’s a lot harder to take stuff down. And for steam there’s less reason to do it, for a variety of reasons.

But Anet is the only one placing stuff in the shop, so Anet has complete control over it. There’s no contracts with anyone else.

I mean how do you think a publisher would feel if Steam stopped selling their games? Again, different situation.

And I’m pretty sure that Anet makes more money by doing it this way than they would by just leaving everything in.

I can two man most low level fractals, OP, and a lot of people, the really good ones, can solo some of them.

Jerus.4350:

And they did that because of a bunch of threads a year or so ago complaining about the opposite. That the game lacked unique rewards.

I’m with ya though, I like the idea of everything being tradeable.

Don’t see how that has much to do with instanced content though. It’s a trend in all their content over the last few months (basically since season 2 of LS).

I know. And so I’m doing stuff I’m not enjoying, which obviously affects the game for me. Enough of that, and I won’t be playing the game. I played Guild Wars 1 for a long time, because I could get what I wanted from just playing. Admittedly I’d have to just play for a very long time, but it was an option.

Here it’s becoming not an option.

dlonie.6547:

Vayne.8563:

dlonie.6547:

Vayne.8563:

Nope, what I’m arguing for is multiple paths to get rewards instead of rewards being locked into specific content, hard or otherwise, but particularly hard content that not everyone is going to do.

Oh look, you just solved your own problem. Now can you stop with the stance that “hard content must lead to exclusive rewards and disenfranchised players”?

If Anet continues the trend of making those rewards account bound than nothing is solved.

Even if they add:

Vayne.8563:

paths to get rewards instead of rewards being locked into specific content

?

I’m confused, is your point supposed to argue with me, or you?

I’m confused about what you’re confused about. In most of the new content, you have to do specific stuff to get specific account bound rewards. Surely you see this.

If they add this type of thing to raids, if that trend continues, more and more casual players WILL be disenfranchised.

I unlocked the luminescent armor set, but I didn’t have fun doing it. That’s my issue. There’s only so much not fun I’m willing to put up with before I find something more fun to do.

dlonie.6547:

Vayne.8563:

Nope, what I’m arguing for is multiple paths to get rewards instead of rewards being locked into specific content, hard or otherwise, but particularly hard content that not everyone is going to do.

Oh look, you just solved your own problem. Now can you stop with the stance that “hard content must lead to exclusive rewards and disenfranchised players”?

If Anet continues the trend of making those rewards account bound than nothing is solved.

Jerus.4350:

Vayne.8563:

Jerus.4350:

Vayne.8563:

Jerus.4350:

Isnip.

In many games the best rewards are locked into instances. That means that people who want those rewards have to brave those instances. The people who are “good” at those games, band together and farm those instances. The other people try to get into groups, and that’s where the conflict starts.

Now, if you have say 20% of players who love hard content, 20% of the players will be satisfied with that situation . 80% will be broken into two groups. Those who never do it and those who do it grudgingly even though they don’t enjoy it.

Of the groups who don’t do it, that group will be broken up into two groups, those who don’t care about the rewards and those who are frustrated that they’ll never see them. So you have a potential to kitten off a much larger percentage of the player base than you’re helping.

On top of that, the hard content crowd almost always wants if not better, at least exclusive rewards.

So you end up with some people who are really happy and some who are disenfranchised. I’ll probably do the content and not enjoy it. Enough of that and I’ll stop enjoying the game, which is what happens in every other MMO I’ve played to do.

I do enough stuff for rewards I don’t enjoy, I think why am I playing this game to not enjoy it, and I walk away. Happened with Rift, WoW, Lotro, Aion and others.

This game I like. But if exclusive rewards, too many of them, are locked behind content I’m not enjoying, I can see myself walking away from here too.

One of the things I like about this game is that I can get most rewards doing most things. Not all, but most. I’d sort of hope that would stay the same.

Good thing GW2 isn’t most games.

Your entire argument here hinges on the idea of a change in BiS gear, that’d be downright stupid for ANet to do. It’s one of the best things they’ve done keeping the gear treadmill under control and adding better than ascended would be silly.

However, of course people want explusive rewards. But, why is that bad? PVP gets it with balthazar back/glorioius sets, WvW with it’s hero weapons, Dungeons/pvp share gear/weapon styles. Fractals have their weapons. Open world stuff has various things including Luminescent for SW. I don’t see why this wouldn’t get something exclusive too, but just like the other things, do it or don’t it’s up to you. I’m not a big fan of PVP so I only have one glorious piece, couldn’t get myself to finish farming it. I don’t really love the luminescent stuff but I also found most of the achievements to be more annoying than fun or challenging, so I haven’t completed that. But it was my choice and I love that I get to have it even if I choose to ignore it.

But again, you’re implying that ANet would not only add raids but also change their whole stance on gear…

You need to read my argument again. I didn’t say BIS gear. I said rewards. Let’s pretend Anet puts the coolest mini or coolest tonic in a raid. It’s possible. A cool outfit. A cool skin. Now, if there becomes enough of those things that people can’t get, people will feel disenfranchised. That situation doesn’t exist now.

But you start adding raids, and you’ll find the raid crowd will demand more rewards for the greater risk. We’ve seen it in every raid thread around. We are working harder. This is harder content. We want better rewards.

So far the game hasn’t worked much like that. There are still rewards I want that I haven’t gotten, because I don’t like the content.

But this isn’t about BIS gear. It’s about unique rewards. Again, just from my experience in other games, it creates haves and have nots. There’s a lot less of that in this game, so far.

What?

Glorious Armor, Mini Llamas, Hero Forged weapons, Wurm armor, Teq Hoard, Fractal Weapons, Luminescent Gear, Sinister/Nomad Stats…

Unique rewards alraedy exist.

Yep, and I don’t want MORE of them. There were unique rewards in Guild Wars 1 also but most of them could be bought. If I didn’t want to run DOA I could still get a tormented weapon. If I didn’t want to do War in Kryta I could still get an Oppressor weapon. And if I didn’t want to play Eye of the North at all, I could still get a destroyer weapon.

Now as it happened I beat DOA, I beat War in Kryta several times and I beat Eye of the North more times than I can count…but I didn’t have to that’s my point. I didn’t enjoy DOA. I didn’t enjoy the communties that spawned around that area, so I was able to avoid it and still get what I wanted by saving gold.

James Quall.6029:

Vayne.8563:

This game I like. But if exclusive rewards, too many of them, are locked behind content I’m not enjoying, I can see myself walking away from here too.

One of the things I like about this game is that I can get most rewards doing most things. Not all, but most. I’d sort of hope that would stay the same.

WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? Seriously you’re in shambles here and once again I can’t wrap my head around what it is you’re advocating. First you talk about how we don’t need instanced stuff because it’s possible to make challenging open world stuff, but then you talk about how anything challenging is bad for the community because if it’s hard then only a small amount of people will do it which would automatically create some kind of elitest superculture.

Then you complain that there are exclusive rewards from doing stuff that you might not want to do and that would make you quit. That’s INSANE because that’s how it has been since day 1 and it’s not just from dungeons! There is equipment that only comes from dungeons, equipment you can only get from spvp, a set of weapons that only comes from wvw during tournaments, gear that only comes from specific world bosses like Tequatl and the evolved jungle wurm, and luminescent armor requires that (among other things) you complete all the achievements of living story episodes. The entire philosophy of this game is that getting gear is easy, getting the impressive and cool looking gear (which is statistically not better in any way) takes some time and effort.

So is it just when it’s from instanced dungeons that you have an issue, or do you have a problem with all of those things? Cause to me it’s starting to sound like you want to turn this game into a bland flavorless gray mush where nothing is hard and you can get any item you want without trying anything new or challenging.

Look this isn’t really rocket science, but I’ll break it down for you. The most prestigious weapons in Guild Wars 1 could be bought for gold if you had enough gold. Tormented weapons, celestial compass, voltaic spear, all of them could be bought for gold. So if I didn’t want to run DOA (I beat it once and swore never again), then I could still access those rewards. So it didn’t particularly bother me.

Many of the rewards in Guild Wars 2 however are going account bound which means that I’d have to do content I might not enjoy to get rewards I want.

On TOP of that, there’s the issue of the community. In Guild Wars 1, I didn’t LIKE the community the grew up around DOA and UW. This build or get out is not my idea of fun, particularly in a game about builds. Again, because I had the option to buy most of those rewards, I didn’t have to deal with that kind of annoyance and I could enjoy the parts of the game I enjoyed.

So there is more than a one fold problem. You don’t understand what I’m saying because I’m replying to posts and not writing a term paper. Each post deals with a small piece of what I’m saying.

And you know, if you don’t get it, that’s okay. I’m sure some people do.

dlonie.6547:

Vayne.8563:

Jerus.4350:

Vayne.8563:

Jerus.4350:

snip

In many games the best rewards are locked into instances. That means that people who want those rewards have to brave those instances. The people who are “good” at those games, band together and farm those instances. The other people try to get into groups, and that’s where the conflict starts.

Now, if you have say 20% of players who love hard content, 20% of the players will be satisfied with that situation . 80% will be broken into two groups. Those who never do it and those who do it grudgingly even though they don’t enjoy it.

Of the groups who don’t do it, that group will be broken up into two groups, those who don’t care about the rewards and those who are frustrated that they’ll never see them. So you have a potential to kitten off a much larger percentage of the player base than you’re helping.

On top of that, the hard content crowd almost always wants if not better, at least exclusive rewards.

So you end up with some people who are really happy and some who are disenfranchised. I’ll probably do the content and not enjoy it. Enough of that and I’ll stop enjoying the game, which is what happens in every other MMO I’ve played to do.

I do enough stuff for rewards I don’t enjoy, I think why am I playing this game to not enjoy it, and I walk away. Happened with Rift, WoW, Lotro, Aion and others.

This game I like. But if exclusive rewards, too many of them, are locked behind content I’m not enjoying, I can see myself walking away from here too.

One of the things I like about this game is that I can get most rewards doing most things. Not all, but most. I’d sort of hope that would stay the same.

Good thing GW2 isn’t most games.

Your entire argument here hinges on the idea of a change in BiS gear, that’d be downright stupid for ANet to do. It’s one of the best things they’ve done keeping the gear treadmill under control and adding better than ascended would be silly.

However, of course people want explusive rewards. But, why is that bad? PVP gets it with balthazar back/glorioius sets, WvW with it’s hero weapons, Dungeons/pvp share gear/weapon styles. Fractals have their weapons. Open world stuff has various things including Luminescent for SW. I don’t see why this wouldn’t get something exclusive too, but just like the other things, do it or don’t it’s up to you. I’m not a big fan of PVP so I only have one glorious piece, couldn’t get myself to finish farming it. I don’t really love the luminescent stuff but I also found most of the achievements to be more annoying than fun or challenging, so I haven’t completed that. But it was my choice and I love that I get to have it even if I choose to ignore it.

But again, you’re implying that ANet would not only add raids but also change their whole stance on gear…

You need to read my argument again. I didn’t say BIS gear. I said rewards. Let’s pretend Anet puts the coolest mini or coolest tonic in a raid. It’s possible. A cool outfit. A cool skin. Now, if there becomes enough of those things that people can’t get, people will feel disenfranchised. That situation doesn’t exist now.

It doesn’t?

You should read his argument again, paying close attention to the bits about Luminescent, etc gear.

So what I’m gathering is that in your ideal game, you’d be presented with everything the game had to offer as a reward upon rolling your first toon, since nothing should be locked behind content…?

Nope, what I’m arguing for is multiple paths to get rewards instead of rewards being locked into specific content, hard or otherwise, but particularly hard content that not everyone is going to do.

Fractal tonics are a perfect example. I know I’ll not likely ever have one. They’re so rare and I do fractals rarely enough where I won’t see one. It’s only one reward, but it’s a reward I’d like to have. Before that I was collecting everlasting tonics, but it’s not worth ruining my enjoyment of the game to run fractals a zillion times, particularly because there’s no guarantee of getting it. That’s just one reward of course.

As time goes on, if there are too many rewards that require me to do stuff I don’t enjoy, I’ll just give up on the game. This doesn’t mean I want everything without doing any work. It means I want alternate paths to get rewards, so I’m not forced for a reward I want to do something over and over again that I don’t enjoy at all.

I’m not sure why anyone would think that’s unreasonable.