proof that the NPE really doesnt help anybody, it only slows how people learn to play the game. smh
lol nice try. No matter what he’d have learned the same thing the way he did it.
there is no nice try.
The OP while playing the NPE never learned anything of value from the new system.it only slows how people learn to play the game.
Pre NPE players had access to all skills and traits, so they could create a build that they learned to play with from early levels all the way to max level.
Now with the NPE players slowly build up their character and in the process learn each new element slowly and never really learn how to sync all of them together for a single build.
NPE=Failure.
Wrong. The OP didn’t learn anything from the new system and wouldn’t have learned anything from the old one. He rushed to 80 without paying attention. Nothing was going to teach the OP.
The NPE wasn’t designed so that every single person in the entire world who ignores everything is going to learn. It was designed for a specific segment of the population. Saying it didn’t help the OP, so it didn’t help anyone is wrong, considering we have seen posts by people who claim they came back to the game and found it easier to get into.
It really is that simple.
…
That said, I’m starting to see more instances of events with no one calling the event in map chat. …
One of the original appeals of GW2 was the fostering of cooperation between players and the friendly community. But that feeling of cooperation and friendliness has eroded somewhat with the changes to the game over the last year.
It started with trait unlocks that depended on events that were triggered by previous events failing and other players being at cross-purposes. And now the ruined pve daily tasks that herd everyone into the same maps all competing for the same events or boss.
It started well before that once the Farm/Fail to Complete and Champion Farming styles play started to get more popular the community started to go downhill from there.
Actually that fun, friendly community is still there. Only a small percentage of loud irritable people ruin it for everyone else…and it really is a small percentage. But it’s like the old addage.
If you add a teaspoon of wine to a barrel of sewerage, you get sewerage. If you add to a teaspoon of sewerage to a barrel of wine…you get sewerage. It’s much easier to tear something down than it is to build it in the first place.
I think it’s a missing element of the GW2 world if a player is, in essence, required to go to a wiki or other site in order to find out what to do at an event. I want a completely immersed world to explore — all the relevant info should be provided in-game.
It’s not being lazy or a desire to be spoon-fed. Think about it: If you were really an Asuran mesmer running across the Silverwastes to the event, are you going to be able to check Dulfy’s website?
How about having some NPCs at the events that can be queried for the event mechanics, or even call out the relevant stages and what to prioritize on? If the info is generally available outside the game, why isn’t it inside as well?
See this makes more sense to me than people insisting everyone should leave the game to look stuff up.
proof that the NPE really doesnt help anybody, it only slows how people learn to play the game. smh
lol nice try. No matter what he’d have learned the same thing the way he did it.
Did this game turn that casual and brainless that everyone is expecting to be carried for free loot?
Well, VaLee, I don’t think I could’ve provided a better answer or example to your question if I tried.
Moving on.
I bet you you’ll find them same in just about any MMO. Except that in most, the hard stuff is squirreled away in instances most people ignore. It’s hard to randomly join a raid in other games. Here you can just wander into stuff.
Playing an MMO takes you online. Using the Internet isn’t the same thing. SOme people still reach for a phone book because they don’t realize you can get the white pages. He’s not even playing an MMO on the Internet. He’s playing an MMO online which isn’t quite the internet. He didn’t have to open a browser to play this game which he likely bought in a brick and mortar store.
Intolerance is intolerance, no matter how you slice it.
Are you serious? I mean . . . really? Are you?
Yes 100% serious. You need to look outside your experience.
A 60 year old gets a game from his family. Might even be his first computer game. They think he might like it. The installs it. He doesn’t surf the web in his spare time. It’s a gift. So he installs the disc and the disc automatically installs the game. The only time you have to open a browser is to register the game, and that could have been done by the kids setting it up for him.
Do you know how many people in my guild know next to nothing about computers in general? Housewives raising kids who don’t have time. Retired people, people who work in non computer related fields like construction and don’t use a computer regularly.
I’m different because I worked in the industry. During that time I’ve dealt with thousands of computer problems some of which you wouldn’t believe. People who grew up with computers get it. My sister is brilliant, but computers confuse and scare the hell out of her. It’s all in her mind. She is easily intelligent enough to do anything on a computer. But she’s computer phobic. Lots of people are. She does play online games though.
Playing an online game isn’t anywhere near the same as using the Internet, or a search engine, or researching something.1
OP by leveling as fast as you possibly could, you cheated yourself out of learning how to play the game and learning how to play your profession.
There is no profession in the game that should have any problems at all anywhere in Queensdale. Group events generally do require groups, but Queensdale isn’t that hard, even on a character that doesn’t have elites and traits.
Most people complain this game is too easy. I’m not sure what you’re doing wrong. Perhaps you’re not paying enough attention to dodging when you need to, or you’re just running into huge bunches of mobs without thought to positioning, or your’e not choosing any defensive skills, which every profession has.
But you didn’t learn how to play your profession and now you’re blaming that on the game. This really is a learn to play issue.
Um . . . Vayne. He’s playing a MMO on the Internet. That excuse isn’t going to fly.
Playing an MMO takes you online. Using the Internet isn’t the same thing. SOme people still reach for a phone book because they don’t realize you can get the white pages. He’s not even playing an MMO on the Internet. He’s playing an MMO online which isn’t quite the internet. He didn’t have to open a browser to play this game which he likely bought in a brick and mortar store.
Intolerance is intolerance, no matter how you slice it.
Then, with all due respect to your friend, he lacked common sense. Not to be obnoxious, but the Internet is for more than games and kitten.
He should look into that.
With all due respect to you, you should be more tolerant of people who didn’t grow up on the net and don’t think in those terms.
Point. But why wouldn’t a player bring their A-game? Wouldn’t it behoove a player to at least look? Heck, there are videos that show how to do such things, step-by-step, with annotations.
I’m not the greatest player in the world, but even I know to look before I leap.
No, really. It wouldnt’ behoove a player to look, if they don’t know there’s something to look FOR.
You know, so to you it’s obvious. I had a guy in my guild who never knew and one day I said to him, did you watch one of the videos or read Dulfy. He was like, ummm there are videos?
He just didn’t know TO look.
Am I the only one finding it ironic that certain players expect someone else to do the research to lead them to success?
“Tell us what to do!”
Um . . . so you want us to do the research, learn the mechanics of the fight, and then type all this out before said fight, and during, because those players cannot be bother to learn the correct methods themselves?
. . .
I’m pretty casual too, but that’s just lazy. Sorry. Even I look to see how best to benefit the raid before specific fights.
Again, bringing this back to topic, that’s just common sense if you want success.
It’s common sense if you know it’s expected or even if that stuff exists. Not everyone does.
I was corrected on the forum the other day about something similar, this game is meant for complete casuals as in logging on one hour every two days. casuals dont have time to actually learn a fight or mechanics, its too hardcore for them.
Or they don’t expect to have to and no one has told them otherwise. It’s so easy to make snarky comments about people. Teaching them is work.
Unided Dyes are worth 50 silver now and it would be out of range of the rewards for such low level characters.
Silly me, of course. That would ruin the prices. How about a random dye from a large pool, instead?
Much better idea in my opinion.
Wow had multiple variations of the same map with lich king depending on how far you were in it. Why can’t gw2?
Did WoW move away from phasing after that because of all the problems it caused?
A lot of it has to do with being able to play with your friends, even if they’re not quite as far along as you.
Other than that I really enjoy the level up rewards. Skill points could maybe come more gradually instead of in chunks? I really like the other rewards. As an alt-aholic it’s really nice to have progressively better gear given to me for free as I level. Means I have to buy less gear myself as my characters level up.
1 skill point per level was ideal, yes. And the rewards are mostly eye-candy, I think, for you get a lot of stuff just from killing mobs. And it will just clutter your inventory since you can’t even salvage the stuff. It is a bit pointless, pressing further on the matter, since you can buy cheap, efficient gear from Renowned Hearts after you’ve completed them.
Oh, another thing, at a certain level (I forget which) you get to chose 1 dye out of 3. After 3 characters it’s trash, since the TP is flooded with those particular colors. Might I suggest an unidentified dye instead of 3 predefined choices?
Unided Dyes are worth 50 silver now and it would be out of range of the rewards for such low level characters.
I tend to find the nodes I expect to in one or two places no matter what the daily is. If they’re not in the first place I think they’ll be they’re almost always in the second.
Nodes are very much like the chests in the Silverwastes. I know every spawn location for those chests, but there’s not always a node in each one of them.
I didn’t like the original dragon ball at all. The one game I loved from the original Guild Wars was roller-beetle racing. But the dodge ball thing. Didn’t find that particularly enjoyable.
I do like the Dragonball in Guild Wars 2, and play it longer than I need to sometimes.
I think people need to think about what common sense means. In a world of shared experience, we all think of things differently.
If you’re a computer gamer, it might be second nature to you to look at sites to see what’s going on, but not everyone comes from the same background or understands that’s necessary. Sometimes what one person calls common sense is only common sense because of the experiences they’ve had in the past.
There are things I grew up knowing as common sense in NYC that would not be common sense where I live now. There are things everyone in Australia knows as common sense that I had to learn when I moved here. To me, the experience was different.
My own experience with computer games from years ago was that there wasn’t anything you could do but figure stuff out for yourself. That became my common sense. Part of playing games to me was figuring out what to do. That’s how we all played games before hint books came out. Before there was a web to look stuff up. We banged our heads against games, got stuck sometimes for days or weeks at a time, until we figured things out.
From my point of view, common sense is part of playing a game is figuring out how to play it. If someone has to tell me how to play it, then I didn’t beat the game, they did. That’s my common sense.
Where is the common sense in believing that in order to play a game you have to go to a sight and have someone tell you what to do, instead of figuring it out for yourself?
Never bought a booster but I have quite a few of them stacked up.
Except WoW expansions come with level and gear bumps, basically setting the player onto the leveling and end game raiding for BIS gear yet again.
Here’s 10 more levels, your current BIS gear that took you a month raiding to get is now worthless compared to basic gear drops as you level and all for $30 plus $12-15 a month. Not a treadmill I’m will to pay through the nose to “enjoy”.
Look, it is a different model. People expect an expansion in WoW to be this way. They like it, they want it, they get it. They won’t be disappointed.
We will have to wait and see on what the GW2 expansion really has to offer. If I am through most of the content in a week and just some artificially gated stuff (by masteries) is not completable, than it is no better than what people get with WoW expansions.
I hardly see any difference in:
A) Get to a higher gear level (which is just a number) to do the endgame content.
or
B) Get to a higher mastery level (which is just a number) to do the endgame content.Artificial gating is artificial. A stretching of content that could otherwise be completed way faster.
On the other hand, an expansion is what I have asked for for two years, so yeah, I and probably many other players will buy it that otherwise wouldn’t spend money on the game. Which will pushing the numbers on those reports in a good way.
To me it would still be better than a WoW expansion.
Because WoW expansions funnel people into a type of content I have no interest in. If this expansion funneled me into open world content instead of raids, to me it would be better….depending on how it’s done of course.
You should give it a rest. You don’t know how many people have “quit in disgust”. It’s like this in every game, including Guild Wars 1.
And I never claimed to know the exact number of people who quit in disgust. Hence my use of “many” and not “all” or “most.”
In Guild Wars 1, every time I started a new character I had to go through the basics of leveling a new character. It wasn’t a big deal there and for more people, it’s not a big deal here.
And GW1’s NPE <> GW2’s NPE. So your point is what exactly?
Do you have any percentages of how many people have left, or care at all? In my opinion, since the first changes were made, most people made peace with this. If you have another opinion, that’s all well and good, but it’s not relevant. Pretty sure Anet knows how many people have left, and how many people are making characters.
And that’s all it is: your opinion. The issue is trying to present your opinion as a fact.
No I stated in my opinion because it is my opinion. But I’m leaving the conversation yet again. This is obviously a hot button issue for you, and I’m sure there are a few others as well.
But I’m relatively certain the rest of us have moved on. Have fun.
GW2 made 17 million usd in Q4 2014. Is that a lot or a little?
That is equivalent to ~377K subscribers paying $15 a month in a subscription based MMO. In today’s MMO market, that is still pretty good.
For a 2.5 year old game that hasn’t had an expansion yet, it’s kitten good.
There are many times in school when the class had to review stuff I already knew. It happened in most classes in fact. And then we got on to new stuff. I’m not even sure what you’re trying to say here.
Oh I see. It’s a couple of days at the beginning of the term. Sorry not seeing the issue, sorry you are.
No… what shadow was saying is more like having to review how to eat, walk, speak, and use the bathroom at the beginning of every year, in middle school, high school, and college.
No, I don’t want a review. Well I played Guild Wars 1 and there was a review every single time I made a new character. I didn’t have a lot of skills and the skills I wanted to use I generally didn’t have. There was always that starter zone. Start a new character in Prophecies, you start in pre.
Well too bad then… because with the NPE, you’re getting a review every time whether you like it or not.
I believe that’s been our point from day 1.
There wasn’t enough tutorial in the beginning, and they added it. Deal with it or don’t, but most people will.
And many people have “dealt with it” by quitting in disgust. Pretty contrary to Anet’s plans for trying to attract more players to the game.
You should give it a rest. You don’t know how many people have “quit in disgust”. It’s like this in every game, including Guild Wars 1.
In Guild Wars 1, every time I started a new character I had to go through the basics of leveling a new character. It wasn’t a big deal there and for more people, it’s not a big deal here.
Do you have any percentages of how many people have left, or care at all? In my opinion, since the first changes were made, most people made peace with this. If you have another opinion, that’s all well and good, but it’s not relevant. Pretty sure Anet knows how many people have left, and how many people are making characters.
Living Story = Story DLCs.
These story DLCs are given for free as a reward for all active GW2 players. Those who aren’t active have to pay for the story DLCs, through in-game gold or money.And what of new players? They’re just out of luck or have to play for a free to play game’s content? I don’t think the GW2 storyline developers and whatnot thought this through before making this decision. It’s unfair to new players and returning players alike.
They would have been out of luck if it were like season 1. At least now they have an option to experience those episodes. They can do it for free if they tag along with someone that does have access. The episodes are also relatively cheap if you buy with money or gold.
The fact that the episodes are cheap isn’t the point. It’s a free-to-play game and newcomers, along with returning players, are being made to pay-to-play if they want to keep up with the storylines. I, myself, missed season 1 (and can’t get it at all), but I got every episode of season 2.
But, perhaps they are better off because season 2 is turning out to not even be worth the effort, so certainly not the expense. Not if you enjoy playing solo, like I do.
I’ve beaten every mission in the living story solo. It’s not only possible, it’s not really that hard…you do possibly have to learn to do things differently than you normally so, but that’s what games are about. You have to figure out what to do TO beat that content.
If you insist on being solo, why not look up how to do the fight on Dulfy or something and get some advice.
You talk about speed of leveling. The first 15 levels are, and have always been, meant to be a tutorial. After those levels you can level as slow as you want with barely any interference at all from the NPE.
It was? For me it never felt like that, at lvl 10 i could already handle the most of stuff on my own. Also, if it’s only the first 20 lvls is meant to be a tutorial why still teaching ppl about stuff at lvl 50, 70 or even 80? Doesn’t it sound like the whole leveling process is now a tutorial?
And why forcing a tutorial down everyone’s throat, even for those who can already understand it quickly or even for those who already learned it like when making a second char?
You can get to both WvW and PvP from level 2 if you want. On your second character after it a lot of stuff isn’t locked anyway.
And…. once again… New Players Experience should be about the first experience, first character.. why we have to deal with a tutorial again every time a new char is made? The unlocks when on a second char seems to be just a way to lessen the whole tutorial experience again, even though the tutorial is still there clearly visible, or just a workaround to give veteran players an option to do their stuff without being disturbed by the tutorial.
As for treating me like a 3 year old, I’m confident enough to know that I wasn’t the target audience for these changes and I’m happy they help other people that might need the help.
You weren’t the target but you were included in it. Imagine you are at the middle school and then they decide to put your class together with a kindergarten one just for management purposes, would you like to go through all those early learning stages again just for someone else’s learning sake? What about being put there again and again and again…
Anyway, enough of pointing fingers. Let’s not derail it and focus on the subject here: issues with NPE and what can be done to solve it. Let’s stop pointing fingers and discussing what opinion matter or doesn’t. Let’s bring up more constructive suggestions instead non-sense and vague arguments.
There are many times in school when the class had to review stuff I already knew. It happened in most classes in fact. And then we got on to new stuff. I’m not even sure what you’re trying to say here.
Oh I see. It’s a couple of days at the beginning of the term. Sorry not seeing the issue, sorry you are.
No, I don’t want a review. Well I played Guild Wars 1 and there was a review every single time I made a new character. I didn’t have a lot of skills and the skills I wanted to use I generally didn’t have. There was always that starter zone. Start a new character in Prophecies, you start in pre.
There wasn’t enough tutorial in the beginning, and they added it. Deal with it or don’t, but most people will.
Shadow, I think you’re far overestimating how many people are affected by this, or feel affected. You talk about speed of leveling. The first 15 levels are, and have always been, meant to be a tutorial. After those levels you can level as slow as you want with barely any interference at all from the NPE.
Yes and no. They were always meant to be a tutorial, yes. But right now, since the leveling for the first 20 levels was hastened, the tutorial goes onto further levels. Which, I just began to wonder, if the level cap is not to be raised, what is the point to make things go faster toward the level cap?
I think most people do see that there was an initial overreaction, and that’s not unusual for this particular fan base.
But unlike the trait changes, most people accept it and have moved on. There are a handful of people that think it’s godawful.
There is no overreaction on being paying costumers at a restaurant and having our half eaten (delicious) meal thrown against the wall, and be forced to eat moldy bread.
The trait change? Are we talking about that OTHER abomination? Nobody moved on with the trait change. Not even bloody close to that. Everyone in their right mind was upset about that. They already made a new thread because the previous one derailed, but here is proof that there will be change: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Game-Updates-Traits/4733414
Time will tell if it’s for the better. I won’t bother linking info regarding personal story screw up, because that one is to be fixed, as well. Official statement. Go ahead, look it up.
So traits and PS botch, both to be fixed. 2 down, 1 to go.
People are making this sound like it affects their entire game forever. It affects a few levels in the beginning, for a short period of time.
Well, maybe because it does affect the game forever. It is a massive game changer and not only were we not asked about it (great idea on all that no disclosing…), but we can’t turn it off, either.
Edit: misquote
See this is exactly what I mean. Ordering in a restaurant and having half our delicious meal thrown against the wall. Crap.
I’ve leveled characters both ways. It’s not half the meal. It’s not 25% of the meal. Due to the leveling speed increase it’s not even 10% of the meal. This is just exaageration to try to prove a point. What’s really changed? You don’t get a few skills as fast as you used to. That’s the main thing. You get traits later.
But as far as the rushing to get to max level, that’s been a rhetoric for part of the community for a long time. There are things locked off from characters at lower levels though. Explorable mode dungeons don’t start to level 35. The living story doesn’t start until 80. You need to be reasonably far along to participate in guild missions too, since you have to be able to get to those places in the game.
The fact is, when the game started and everyone was on even footing, more people were willing to take time, but a lot times now, and see this even in a casual guild like mine, people want to get into the higher stuff because there’s a lot of people doing that content. And unlike other MMOs, you can go back if you want and explore those areas.
In your opinion it’s not an over-reaction. In my opinion it is one.
Shadow,
You are mistaken on one point. It was taken into account how the NPE would affect veterans. Anet decided that the benefits for potential new players outweighed the negative impact on existing paying customers. Companies make this sort of decision all of the time.
Shadow, I think you’re far overestimating how many people are affected by this, or feel affected. You talk about speed of leveling. The first 15 levels are, and have always been, meant to be a tutorial. After those levels you can level as slow as you want with barely any interference at all from the NPE.
You can get to both WvW and PvP from level 2 if you want. On your second character after it a lot of stuff isn’t locked anyway.
For most of it you’re talking level 1-15 on your first attempt at leveling, after which it’s just not that bad. Not bad enough for the size of this response.
I think most people do see that there was an initial overreaction, and that’s not unusual for this particular fan base.
But unlike the trait changes, most people accept it and have moved on. There are a handful of people that think it’s godawful.
As for treating me like a 3 year old, I’m confident enough to know that I wasn’t the target audience for these changes and I’m happy they help other people that might need the help.
People are making this sound like it affects their entire game forever. It affects a few levels in the beginning, for a short period of time.
You can get through it and level as slow as you want after that.
Flat is not good enough in business world. You are either growing or doing something wrong unles whole industry is in some sort of crysis which is not.
what MMO is growing non stop except for WoW and Runescape? Boom happens, then the population slowly falls until it gets shut down years later. Or are 99% MMOs doing it wrong?
WoW doesn’t always grow either. WoW when from 10,000,000 subs to 6.4 million in a couple of years. That means they were going down for two years in a row, steadily until the next expansion comes out. It’s their business plan and they expect that.
Just like Guild Wars 2’s profits will surge when HoT hits again, for a while, until it starts dropping again, and then two years later it’ll be much lower until another expansion hits.
That’s the business plan for most MMOs.
As people finish content, many of them stop playing. It’s not rocket science.
Well I hope these numbers are good wake up call for devs.
What do you mean? It’s been essentially flat for the year. Other than Lineage, their other major games all had income in the 59.5 to 94.4 billion (short) KrW range for the year with GW2 at 85.6.
Flat is not good enough in business world. You are either growing or doing something wrong unles whole industry is in some sort of crysis which is not.
Flat is fine for some business plans. I don’t know why people make these generalizations.
MMOs being flat after two years on the market without an expansion isn’t just good enough, it’s very strong. WoW doesn’t remain flat for that amount of time, and no one says anythign against them.
Youre right that growth is what you look for, but not necessarily every year, depending on your business plan. WoW doesn’t grow every year. Why not go to their forums and tell them they’re not successful. lol
Inb4 a wild Vayne or lordkrall post appears.
Your wall of texts are for blind eyes and deaf ears. Don’t bother. People are, somehow, happy with all those random, intelligent, different language talker mobs.
Seems like more people like it besides just Vayne or lordkrall. Maybe you should stop singling people out, considering most people probably do prefer the megaserver.
There are definitely issues with it, but some posts here are just silly.
For example when you get a LOT of transfer requests in a row, it means there was a mega event on that map, there were a bunch of maps and they’re all going away because everyone has left all of them. If you’re not going to be on the map for more than an hour, which is the case most of the time for most people, transfer once to get the buff and minimize it. It’s not rocket science.
I end up with my guildies more often than not on servers and often run into them randomly. I have a community thanks.
The megaservers saved this game for a whole lot of people.
These changes weren’t meant for you.
Except that they were. They were specifically implemented in such a way as to affect all players with a new character, not just those who struggle with certain concpets due to inexperience or limited capacity. Everyone creating and playing a new character has the new experience rather than the old. That was Anet’s decision. The ability to skip past or speed through a zone/level range rather than play through the experience as it previously existed doesn’t change the FACT that Anet opted to include veteran players as well as novices in the target for the changes.
I dont personally care for the NPE. Hate is too strong of a word but dislike works just fine here. I think that certain aspects go a bit too far (dancing for cows ?) but others seem like a great idea (dodge tutorial).
When I say the NPE wasn’t meant for you, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t affect you. Changes to the game in the NPE were meant to increase the rate at which new players remained with the game. That doesn’t have that much to do with you.
If 1000 old people really don’t like it but 2000 new people stay and play longer, Anet did what they intended to do with it.
If they make it so that you like it, it’s entirely possible it will lose its original meaning.
I’m not saying I wouldn’t be happier having more skills faster. I’m simply saying that to me it doesn’t much matter. It doesn’t change the game for me.
However, if it keeps people in the game longer that is good for me, so I don’t see it as a big deal.
I particularly don’t see it as a big deal because the first fifteen levels pretty much fly (and I still have 20th level scrolls anyway if I find it really bad which I don’t).
It was meant to affect veterans. It was not meant to benefit them. It took aspects of the game away from them.
I get that Anet had a reason for the changes. I think that this is another example of good concept, less good implementation. I think that Anet has some of the best idea guys/gals around. I dont think that their implementation is always on the same level as their vision though. This is an example ofthat IMO.
The changes were meant to help new players, they were meant to ruin the early game for others, they were meant to encourage some to just skip creating/playing alts, and they were meant to be ignored as relatively inconsequential by yet others.
No they weren’t meant to ruin the early game for others and I can’t even imagine why you’d claim that.
They were meant to be a compromise, like so many things are. Anet did compromise by changing a lot of it too.
I’m not sure why a vastly experienced player needs to do the 1-15 at a slowly leisurely pace when they can just move into the game. Surely more skills wouldn’t make it more interested. You never got even a minor trait before till level 11, and then not a major 1 till level 15. Level 15 comes a whole lot faster now.
Just seems like people are arguing to argue. The change was made for a reason. You weren’t a target, even if you were affected. If the change is doing what it was meant to do, your feedback is less significant.
Now if it wasn’t doing what it was meant to do, then you’d have a stronger point.
But there are people with low IQs. You’re probably a smart guy and smart people don’t realize that most people are average. There’s this thread right now on reddit.
You got my point, I won’t get in discussing it and yes, I’m also average. Also, I like to help people then yes, I help them when I see someone needing help.
These changes weren’t meant for you and an experienced player can travel through them very quickly.
That’s why I say that our feedback, saying that we shouldn’t be treated like we’re stupid..well sure, that’s what the most intelligent people would think.
How about we try to be a little more understanding to those that haven’t picked it up so easily.
So why forcing this stupidity down *everyone*’s throat? Helping people who needs help is indeed a great thing and the initiative was great. But why generalize and treat everyone as if everyone needs help? That’s the big issue with it.
It doesn’t take in account what level you are or how experienced you are. It treats everyone as starter in MMOs world. Remember, those who are new to GW2 can also be experienced and veteran in MMO games in general, then why treating them as if they never dealt with MMOs?
Options, free choice, options, free will, options and options… (did I say options?) this is what wrong with it. It feels like you are in high-school but you are forced to go back to kindergarten because they think you aren’t able enough to keep going. Stop defending it so much and analyze all facts too, also stop taking it on personal base when someone disagrees.
And excuse me but… what are you trying to say with “That’s why I say that our feedback, saying that we shouldn’t be treated like we’re stupid..well sure, that’s what the most intelligent people would think.”? Can you complete it as I didn’t get your point?
You’re going to play the first 20 levels of your character for a tiny tiny portion of a character’s life. I mean the longer you play the character, the smaller that percentage gets. If you spent 2 hours going to level 20, assuming you don’t use a scroll, and you then spend 200 hours on that character, it’s only 1% of the character’s life. That’s it.
Now, I don’t know how much work it would take to create these options, but I do know that Anet is giving away leveling up tomes now, just for logging in. It may be the leveling up tomes are less work than what you’re asking for.
People are crying out for new content, people are complaining this change already took too long, but we want to complicate it.
It’s already set up so your second passage through the new system is different from the first. So the worst of if it you only have to endure on a single character.
I can see where it would be a little annoying but not the kind of hatred it’s received. It’s a massive over-reacting and the early part of it is a larger over-reaction. People bought into the disinformation. Some people never tried it.
And a lot of people who did try it realized it’s really not that bad…if it accomplishes that Anet was trying to do, which is the only caveat I can think of.
These changes weren’t meant for you.
Except that they were. They were specifically implemented in such a way as to affect all players with a new character, not just those who struggle with certain concpets due to inexperience or limited capacity. Everyone creating and playing a new character has the new experience rather than the old. That was Anet’s decision. The ability to skip past or speed through a zone/level range rather than play through the experience as it previously existed doesn’t change the FACT that Anet opted to include veteran players as well as novices in the target for the changes.
I dont personally care for the NPE. Hate is too strong of a word but dislike works just fine here. I think that certain aspects go a bit too far (dancing for cows ?) but others seem like a great idea (dodge tutorial).
When I say the NPE wasn’t meant for you, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t affect you. Changes to the game in the NPE were meant to increase the rate at which new players remained with the game. That doesn’t have that much to do with you.
If 1000 old people really don’t like it but 2000 new people stay and play longer, Anet did what they intended to do with it.
If they make it so that you like it, it’s entirely possible it will lose its original meaning.
I’m not saying I wouldn’t be happier having more skills faster. I’m simply saying that to me it doesn’t much matter. It doesn’t change the game for me.
However, if it keeps people in the game longer that is good for me, so I don’t see it as a big deal.
I particularly don’t see it as a big deal because the first fifteen levels pretty much fly (and I still have 20th level scrolls anyway if I find it really bad which I don’t).
Yes, there was a patch that fixed several things. But a big part of it still feels wrong and needs some action. Even after that fixes the system still treats people as having low IQ, things are still dumb and non-sense, it still have too much hand-holding and too much restrictions where it was never needed.
The fix done feels something like when someone holds your hand to help you to cross the street, then you tell them that they are gripping your hand too much and all what they do is only lessen it a very little bit, but still holding it tight as if supposing you aren’t able enough to do it on your own.
But there are people with low IQs. You’re probably a smart guy and smart people don’t realize that most people are average. There’s this thread right now on reddit.
http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/2vqowu/new_player_with_some_questions/
This guy is level 15 and doesn’t know what to do. He just doesn’t. Now I’m not saying he’s not intelligent. I’m saying he could be quite smart, but he’s from other games that give you very clear breadcrumb trails. This game doesn’t.
So any help you can give players that aren’t as quick as you are isn’t a bad thing. Frustrated people do leave games.
These changes weren’t meant for you and an experienced player can travel through them very quickly.
That’s why I say that our feedback, saying that we shouldn’t be treated like we’re stupid..well sure, that’s what the most intelligent people would think.
How about we try to be a little more understanding to those that haven’t picked it up so easily.
Wasn’t Wildstar geared toward hard-cores? Considering how few of them there are overall, why did anyone think that an MMO made mainly for them would be a good idea?
not sure if that is the reason, seeing as eg. Eve has been growing steadily since launch and is very healthy in economic terms. Wildstar felt strangely clunky and was cluttered with a lot of rather unnecessary gating of content. It was also a rather bold move the launch a game today with a subscription only model I guess.
Eve is a sandbox MMO, Wildstar is a themepark MMO.
Hard core means completely different things in those contexts. Even has never had more than about half a million people, which is a pretty big success for a western sandbox game, but it’s still very very niche.
Wildstar’s hard core was meant to mean raids, not PvP battles.
-Add more actual explanation of game mechanics that are “confusing for new players” instead of removing functioning content or level gating content or features. Actual tutorials or even a GW2opedia to reference in-game would be great.
Oh I think I forgot to mention.. I like the ideas you gave and actually GW2 already had some reference in-game, although not complete as an encyclopedia. There was a Help panel that provided very useful hints and tips about the most of basic mechanics. I can’t understand why they got rid of it… Actually, it is still in game. The shortcut key still works and brings that panel back.
By the way, let’s not derail the thread guys. Let’s focus on the main subject instead who is right or wrong on stuff.
I think there’s a point to focusing on the main subject, which is feedback on the NPE. When people, however, claim that everyone or just about everyone hates it, that’s an issue, because it obscures the feedback.
I believe the NPE can be better. I also believe that how bad it is is greatly exaagerated. If the exaageration is going to give a false impression I believe it needs to be discussed.
If people would say how they felt without trying to make it sound like everyone feels like this, this discussion would be far more genuine.
The patch that came out after the NPE fixed a lot of what I felt was wrong with it.
The major thing left for me is the story issue, which is being worked on.
So if you take away the way that the story was basically ruined, and you take the trait system out of the equation, which isn’t part of the NPE and is going away anyway, you’re having a different conversation than some of the people here.
Decreasing revenue and pressure from Nexon to generate returns on their investment are what caused HoT to be a boxed expasion and not what I believe would’ve been season 3 of the living story. The small map increase and no New race which would’ve taken serious development hours for racial city and story are more like an entire season 2 dropping at once.
I’m pleased with a New class and masteries that finally take the RNG out of precursors but would this be a paid expansion if they were still making 2013 gem sales revenue? I doubt it.
The moment you mentioned Nexon you lost credibility. Nexon publicly tried to get more control over NcSoft and NcSoft gave them the finger. Publicly.
Nexon own 15% of NcSoft which is significant. Credibility is important if I claim to state fact, which I did not. The moment you claim that what a company says publicly indicates what is said internally you demonstrate naivety
I know you can’t believe every you read in the media but I just read an interesting article that does indicate that the finger was given. English language article from the Korea Times.
You don’t believe what’s said publicly but there are things that are said publicly that wouldn’t be said under specific circumstances.
For example, if a company says everything is fine, that doesn’t mean everything’s fine. But if a rival company tries to publicly gain control, it really can be assumed they don’t already have control. Because if they did, there would be zero reason to try to convince others they didn’t.
Decreasing revenue and pressure from Nexon to generate returns on their investment are what caused HoT to be a boxed expasion and not what I believe would’ve been season 3 of the living story. The small map increase and no New race which would’ve taken serious development hours for racial city and story are more like an entire season 2 dropping at once.
I’m pleased with a New class and masteries that finally take the RNG out of precursors but would this be a paid expansion if they were still making 2013 gem sales revenue? I doubt it.
The moment you mentioned Nexon you lost credibility. Nexon publicly tried to get more control over NcSoft and NcSoft gave them the finger. Publicly.
Posting due to forum bug.
Why? Just ignore it and your post goes through anyway.
Because you can’t click back to read the other posts when you go to the page. There’s a blank box with no numbers.
I wanted to go back and check something and had to post to do it.
And here is the update to that article and quote (perhaps you missed it, it was at the bottom):
[Update]: Game director Colin Johanson has posted a clarification on the GW2 forums.
Just to clarify a bit, as Mike said there are numerous teams beyond our Living World teams, and some of them are working on much longer term projects which we’ll go into details on much further down the road.
It’s entirely possible some of the types of content which you might traditionally find in expansions would be released through an expansion in the future for Gw2, and it’s possible we’d try something different when it comes to integrating those type of releases.
We have no final plans one way or another about expansions at this time, and certainly haven’t ruled them out, it’s something we’ll discuss more in the future.
yes, and colin johansson also says they had no plans for an expansion. They sent mike out there based on what their current plan was, the plan was being re examined when colin amended that statement, and at some point after, reached the point where they actually had plans.
but it definately wasnt their plan from the go, or else colin is also lying
“We have no final plans one way or another about expansions at this time, and certainly haven’t ruled them out, it’s something we’ll discuss more in the future”my point was expansion has not always been their plan, and colins quote essentially says the same thing. What it suggests is they around that time shifted from a no expansion plan (what they told mike when he went on tour) to a possible expansion plan (what colin corrected some time after that statement) and finally commiting to an expansion (At some undetermined point inbetween colins speech and the announcement.
So we have my explanation, which has both people being truthful
and Vaynes explanation which has both people lying.he could be right, however i doubt it, because honestly, there was no advantage to say no expansion plans, if they had expansions planned, it actually would have been advantageous to say that they would eventually do one.
There is every indication that Anet had different opinions on the matter from the beginning than NcSoft. I don’t think they agree on everything. So Colin could say we have no plans for an expansion even though NcSoft planned for an expansion. It’s not a lie. It’s a perspective. He’s talking for Anet, not NcSoft.
NcSoft probably was the one that made the business plan, because they’re the ones with the investors. So they did have plans.
The game’s success was always going to be based on the business plan. As long as NcSoft keeps saying the game is meeting expectations, then it’s successful.
The Canthan New Year in Guild Wars 1 was one of the most popular events in that game. There are tons of holidays not celebrated in America. This is one of them.
I would think people would welcome a chance to grow their experience of the world they live in.
I think Anet would have liked to stick with just the living story and no expansions released at any point. Earnings dropping every quarter likely gave them no choice but to do the same thing that other mmos have done and release a traditional expansion. What happened to their spiel about changing the way that mmos are expanded upon yada yada yada?
How many MMO expansions have no new tier of gear and no raised level cap. Not too many from my experience.
You can change the way expansions are done and still charge for an expansion.
Again again, NcSoft has been talking about an expansion from the first year. In my opinion it was always the plan.
“setting up a new framework for how an MMO can grow its universe. The Living World was just the beginning.”
All that for no level cap increase and no new gear tier? I was actually expecting something creative and unique. Some kind of expansion that releases a substantial amount of content over a 6 month period or something. Not just no new level cap or tier of gear, which has been done before.
I’m probably just reading too much into it.Either way, I’m happy with how things are going. I can’t wait to explore Maguuma and venture further into the story. The new zone from the PoI looks spectacular.
I think it will be more unique than you think. When you start playing it, I want you to think about other MMO expansions as you go through it. People are looking at a bunch of individual features. I don’t think most people are putting those features together yet.
It’s like the base game. Feature by feature, it’s not something that people freak out about. It’s how you combine those features that make this game what it is. That’s the truth of good design. When the sum of the parts make something greater.
Colin said that’s how the expansion is, and I think I can see it. Of course that remains to be seen.
But I don’t think this is going to feel anything like a traditional MMO expansion.
I think a lot of people did change their views. I know some of them personally.
Day 1 you get a lot of off the cuff reactions. A good number of those reactions were from people who admittedly never even tried it. That’s good research right there.
I’m against this thing based on what everyone else is saying.
Those who tried it often didn’t see what the big deal was.
Unverifiable anecdotal evidence vs actual numbers that someone did the legwork to get.
I think I’ll go with the latter.
If you’re saying that legwork means counting stuff that was a complaint before changes were made and not seeing if the changes make the difference, you can keep it.
It’s really really simple. People complained. Anet made changes. That’s a FACT. It’s not a theory. Changes were made. If you’re going to look at the complaints before the changes were made, you’re not fair-minded. And I don’t think any reasonable person would think you are.
People in this forum get something in their head. There was enough misinformation going on in the early days that some people based their entire opinion on the NPC based on it. If that’s okay with you that’s fine.
That doesn’t make it okay.
And right on cue, just after I made my above post…
But page 1 was before changes were made to the NPC that solved some people’s complaints. This thread started BEFORE the change. A lot of people were complaining about the elite skill unlocking at 40 where as almost no one is complaining about it unlocking at level 31 by comparison. Likewise there were bug fixes where on your second character, you didn’t get locked out of stuff like skill points.
Taking it from the beginning means you’re ignoring changes that people thought were okay. There were even people who said (not sure if in this thread or not) that they were okay with it after those changes.
Even accepting your “people who dislike the NPE instead of hating it don’t really count as not liking it” point, are you seriously suggesting that 178 of the nays (the difference between the yays and nays) are saying that? I’d love to see your numbers supporting that claim.
You have to count from when the changes were made, because it pacified quite a few people, except for the most vocal. You’d also have to exclude people who are complaining mainly about the trait system and saying that’s the NPE which is a bunch of other people.
Still not big on reading posts, I see:
Any posts made regarding only the trait changes was ignored.
I think a lot of people did change their views. I know some of them personally.
Day 1 you get a lot of off the cuff reactions. A good number of those reactions were from people who admittedly never even tried it. That’s good research right there.
I’m against this thing based on what everyone else is saying.
Those who tried it often didn’t see what the big deal was.
I think Anet would have liked to stick with just the living story and no expansions released at any point. Earnings dropping every quarter likely gave them no choice but to do the same thing that other mmos have done and release a traditional expansion. What happened to their spiel about changing the way that mmos are expanded upon yada yada yada?
How many MMO expansions have no new tier of gear and no raised level cap. Not too many from my experience.
You can change the way expansions are done and still charge for an expansion.
Again again, NcSoft has been talking about an expansion from the first year. In my opinion it was always the plan.
@phys
Anet didn’t say they had no plans for expansions. They said that they were working on the kind of content you’d see in expansions and they didn’t yet know how they were going to deliver that content. Expansion type content can be delivered as an expansion, it can be delivered as DLC.
But NcSoft for a long time now, at their stock holders meetings were talking about an expansion. The very first time they mentioned it they said, there would be an expansion when it makes sense to release one.
You will not find an Anet quote where they said there will never be an expansion. All they said was we’re focusing on our living story content for now. That’s all they were willing to talk about.
At the time, I said why too. Because expansion announcements are like gold. They are timed very carefully. Some companies time them so that they overshadow something the competition is doing. Some time it so it comes out in a vacuum of other titles that might detract from it. You don’t just say your’e going to have one, because that takes the wind out of the sales (pun intended). That’s business.
No the business model isn’t a failure, because no one was fired. The business model is a success because it’s self sustaining. If the company is making enough money to support itself and make profit, it’s a success.
How anyone can even conceivably argue that a company that’s laid off no one is a failure, and continues to hire, I can’t imagine.
The strategy was a success, they were always planning an expansion, they did what every business does and timed the announcement to strategically maximize profit.
As for Life the Board game, I’m not sure that game makes significantly or any more money during Christmas than any other time. Do you have some figures on that. Either way, it depends on what the competition is doing.
So if WoW launches their huge expansion in time for Christmas, of course that’s going to affect the sales of other competitors. That’s precisely what I mean by expectation. It’s why Anet waited till they did to even mention an expansion.
yes they did say no expansion, more than once
I pressed him to tell me whether there would be a Guild Wars 2 expansion this year and he shook his head to indicate no. What about next year, I asked?
“If we do this right,” he answered, “we will probably never do an expansion and everything will be going into this Living World strategy.”
from a eurogamer interview in 2013
But what about making money? Guild Wars 1 survived on paid expansions, editions, add-ons, whatever you want to call them – are we to believe that the boxed sales of Guild Wars 2 and micro-transactions are enough to sustain such a large operation?“Yes,” responded Zadorojny. “It absolutely is enough.”
business plans change, people adapt, but no this wasnt their business plan, and no no matter how you slice it that was an underperforming Q4.
These people are just people, like you and me, they cant know the whole future, things don’t always go as they plan, they are not infallible masterminds who never miss a beat. They have setbacks, they have failures, in the long term its not about whether they had a perfect plan, but how well they can adapt.
trust and believe that this is not according to plan. Thats primarily why the plan changed. They needed to do something different and rebrand the product. Renew interest, and show people gw2 has a future, as well as make more money from their existing playerbase.
If it wasn’t their business plan, why has NcSoft been talking about expansions since year 1?
NCSoft probably forced the GW2 team to create an expansion, as they were very unhappy with the financial development of the game and the living story.
The last quarter of 2014 is abysmal in regards to an online game. Holiday season is prime time for micro transactions, and additional box sales.
The living story failed, that is why we get a boxed expansion. It is as simple as that. NCSoft wants it that way. I doubt that it was a free decision of ANet.
For them the boxed expansion is proof that their business plan failed.
I guess the question is WHO made the business plan and what was in it from the start. Business plans are made before projects start. The Living Story wasn’t even a seed then. We know that came later. The business plan predates the living story.
It is completely 100% irrelevant to my argument whether the living story succeeded or failed. The business plan, most likely always called for an expansion and Anet may have wanted to try something else.
That said, the business plan didn’t likely fail because the expansion was likely always supposed to come. Whether the living story was a success or not we’ll likely never know. I’m not so sure the Living Story is over.
Posting due to forum bug.
@phys
Anet didn’t say they had no plans for expansions. They said that they were working on the kind of content you’d see in expansions and they didn’t yet know how they were going to deliver that content. Expansion type content can be delivered as an expansion, it can be delivered as DLC.
But NcSoft for a long time now, at their stock holders meetings were talking about an expansion. The very first time they mentioned it they said, there would be an expansion when it makes sense to release one.
You will not find an Anet quote where they said there will never be an expansion. All they said was we’re focusing on our living story content for now. That’s all they were willing to talk about.
At the time, I said why too. Because expansion announcements are like gold. They are timed very carefully. Some companies time them so that they overshadow something the competition is doing. Some time it so it comes out in a vacuum of other titles that might detract from it. You don’t just say your’e going to have one, because that takes the wind out of the sales (pun intended). That’s business.
No the business model isn’t a failure, because no one was fired. The business model is a success because it’s self sustaining. If the company is making enough money to support itself and make profit, it’s a success.
How anyone can even conceivably argue that a company that’s laid off no one is a failure, and continues to hire, I can’t imagine.
The strategy was a success, they were always planning an expansion, they did what every business does and timed the announcement to strategically maximize profit.
As for Life the Board game, I’m not sure that game makes significantly or any more money during Christmas than any other time. Do you have some figures on that. Either way, it depends on what the competition is doing.
So if WoW launches their huge expansion in time for Christmas, of course that’s going to affect the sales of other competitors. That’s precisely what I mean by expectation. It’s why Anet waited till they did to even mention an expansion.
yes they did say no expansion, more than once
I pressed him to tell me whether there would be a Guild Wars 2 expansion this year and he shook his head to indicate no. What about next year, I asked?
“If we do this right,” he answered, “we will probably never do an expansion and everything will be going into this Living World strategy.”
from a eurogamer interview in 2013
But what about making money? Guild Wars 1 survived on paid expansions, editions, add-ons, whatever you want to call them – are we to believe that the boxed sales of Guild Wars 2 and micro-transactions are enough to sustain such a large operation?“Yes,” responded Zadorojny. “It absolutely is enough.”
business plans change, people adapt, but no this wasnt their business plan, and no no matter how you slice it that was an underperforming Q4.
These people are just people, like you and me, they cant know the whole future, things don’t always go as they plan, they are not infallible masterminds who never miss a beat. They have setbacks, they have failures, in the long term its not about whether they had a perfect plan, but how well they can adapt.
trust and believe that this is not according to plan. Thats primarily why the plan changed. They needed to do something different and rebrand the product. Renew interest, and show people gw2 has a future, as well as make more money from their existing playerbase.
If it wasn’t their business plan, why has NcSoft been talking about expansions since year 1?
@phys
Anet didn’t say they had no plans for expansions. They said that they were working on the kind of content you’d see in expansions and they didn’t yet know how they were going to deliver that content. Expansion type content can be delivered as an expansion, it can be delivered as DLC.
But NcSoft for a long time now, at their stock holders meetings were talking about an expansion. The very first time they mentioned it they said, there would be an expansion when it makes sense to release one.
You will not find an Anet quote where they said there will never be an expansion. All they said was we’re focusing on our living story content for now. That’s all they were willing to talk about.
At the time, I said why too. Because expansion announcements are like gold. They are timed very carefully. Some companies time them so that they overshadow something the competition is doing. Some time it so it comes out in a vacuum of other titles that might detract from it. You don’t just say your’e going to have one, because that takes the wind out of the sales (pun intended). That’s business.
No the business model isn’t a failure, because no one was fired. The business model is a success because it’s self sustaining. If the company is making enough money to support itself and make profit, it’s a success.
How anyone can even conceivably argue that a company that’s laid off no one is a failure, and continues to hire, I can’t imagine.
The strategy was a success, they were always planning an expansion, they did what every business does and timed the announcement to strategically maximize profit.
As for Life the Board game, I’m not sure that game makes significantly or any more money during Christmas than any other time. Do you have some figures on that. Either way, it depends on what the competition is doing.
So if WoW launches their huge expansion in time for Christmas, of course that’s going to affect the sales of other competitors. That’s precisely what I mean by expectation. It’s why Anet waited till they did to even mention an expansion.