Every place that measures anything puts Guild Wars 2 pretty high up the chain. Raptr, Xfire, Overwolf…Guild Wars 2 is almost always in the top twenty and usually the second or third most popular MMORPG.
I’m sure the game is doing okay. They may have thought it should be doing better, though.
Guess it depends on what you enjoy. I enjoy the open world more than the ktrain that is EoTM. So for me, open world leveling is the fun part of the game, more fun than EotM. It may or may not be the fastest way to level, but I level pretty kitten ed fast in the open world anyway.
Well the game will never “die” in the sense that Matrix Online died, purely because of the revenue stream they’ll be getting from the Asian (read: Chinese) market. So worst case scenario is they pack up and move the the land of Chairman Mao. It won’t die though.
I don’t know why you think the revenue stream from the Chinese market is bigger than the revenue stream from the US/European market. I’ve seen no evidence of this yet.
Even not counting the Chinese market the game seems to be profitable. It ranks about fifth when compared to subscription MMOs, which is pretty kitten ed good…or at least did a few months ago.
Anxiety and PvP don’t mix. Find a nice casual guild and run around the world more. That’s what I do.
Yeah, Anet should probably tell us more, but the fact is, every minute spent pacifying the forum (sometimes over very little) is another minute not doing something else.
Isn’t that why they have the forum GMs? All the devs would need to do is shoot an email to the forum GMs and then they could relay that info to us.
So the forum GMs have to stop and interupt the devs, how many times a day? It’s amazing that people think this is so simple. Like there’s one dev that knows everything, has already made every decision and we can just go to that guy. It doesn’t work like that.
If a decision has yet to be made, or they’re discussing a number of options NO DEV will know, because a decision haven’t been made.
So you’ll get a message as a dev from a community manager saying, “The people they’re really up in arms about traits, what do I tell them?”
That dev might go and say, no decision has been reached but we’re talking about it. So now, the forum guy says that. Doesn’t mollify the forums at all. Not even a little. Next day the forum is up in arms so the forum person goes back to the dev and says “Any decision yet.”
The dev says no.
But every time the dev has to go to his email to tell the forum guy we have no new info is time they’re breaking their chain of thought on what they’re working on.
There’s no real good reason to tell people you’re going to do something but you’re not sure what yet more than once.
And how many times have you seen on these forums, I’ll use the traits thread as an example, where all people want is SOMETHING from the devs? It doesn’t need to be specifics. Hell, I’d be happy with “We’re looking into it and will let you know when we make a decision”. And I’m pretty confident they have weekly meetings discussing what’s being worked on also what the playerbase is saying. All it would take would be the lead dev making notes on the meeting and then passing along what info they would like to share with us to Gaile Grey(Community Manager) who would pass it on to the Forum GMs to relay to us.
I’m sure the devs have said they’re looking into it. The question is how many times should they say it? Should their be a dev macro that only says we’re looking into it.
Or just nicely in map chat tell the zerg that you need the achievement. My wife and I both did that at separate times and it worked.
Vayne, I’m sorry, you’re entirely too reasonable to be playing this game.
Truthfully, I think most people are reasonable. I sure meet a lot of reasonable people in game. But the unreasonable ones are so loud, sometimes it’s easy to believe they’re the only ones around.
Yeah, Anet should probably tell us more, but the fact is, every minute spent pacifying the forum (sometimes over very little) is another minute not doing something else.
Isn’t that why they have the forum GMs? All the devs would need to do is shoot an email to the forum GMs and then they could relay that info to us.
So the forum GMs have to stop and interupt the devs, how many times a day? It’s amazing that people think this is so simple. Like there’s one dev that knows everything, has already made every decision and we can just go to that guy. It doesn’t work like that.
If a decision has yet to be made, or they’re discussing a number of options NO DEV will know, because a decision haven’t been made.
So you’ll get a message as a dev from a community manager saying, “The people they’re really up in arms about traits, what do I tell them?”
That dev might go and say, no decision has been reached but we’re talking about it. So now, the forum guy says that. Doesn’t mollify the forums at all. Not even a little. Next day the forum is up in arms so the forum person goes back to the dev and says “Any decision yet.”
The dev says no.
But every time the dev has to go to his email to tell the forum guy we have no new info is time they’re breaking their chain of thought on what they’re working on.
There’s no real good reason to tell people you’re going to do something but you’re not sure what yet more than once.
OP, I can understand your frustration and I do think a confirmation dialogue would help, but pristine fractal relics aren’t some rare, hard to get currency. This particular change was instituted because prior to Mawdrey the only thing you could get with pristine fractal relics were ascended rings which most fractal runners have far too many of. The change was implemented because pristine fractal relics were too prevalent. They’re easier to get now than they were back then, since finishing a fractal run at any level gives them to you.
And it does say double click to convert them on mouse over. Using something is always the same as double clicking it.
If you use an essence of luck it’s the same as double clicking it. You didn’t read the text.
So the people who are rudely telling you that you did something wrong aren’t necessarily wrong in what they’re saying, even if they are possibly wrong in how they are saying it.
Or just nicely in map chat tell the zerg that you need the achievement. My wife and I both did that at separate times and it worked.
It’s not a problem OP. It’s certainly not the problem you’re making it out to be. You’re concerned because the forum community is larger dissatisfied. If you took a snapshot of this community every six months or so, almost since launch, you’d find the same thing.
When we were getting content every two weeks, the forums were furious that it wasn’t permanent content. When ascended game out the forums were furious that the game now has vertical progression. When the NPE came out, the forums are furious that the game is now being dumbed down and that they’re leveled gated. In six months the forums will be furious about something else.
The forums are always furious about something.
To be fair, some of the stuff is more reasonable than other stuff, but I’m not too worried about the content. Halloween is around the corner, and just after that we get more new area to explore.
I’m sure other stuff is in the works as well.
How much do you want to bet the Matrix Online forums looked the same way?
As I’ve said before, almost every MMO forum looks like this. I could almost copy and paste the Rift forum here and no one would even know the difference.
Eye of the North, by far, had the best characters for me in Guild Wars 1. I really resonated with Pyre. But I didn’t particularly care much for Jora or Livia. I liked Vekk quite a lot. Hayda and Anton, not so much. Not sure if I ever really connected with Ogden either.
Vekk, Pyre, and Gwen were the ones that I favored in EotN, although I didn’t always use them as heroes. The guy who did Vekk’s voice – had to look him up: Maurice LaMarche – really did a great job bringing that character to life, especially considering the limited animation back then. I wish there was more Vekk in the GW2 asura.
I liked Zhed Shadowhoof from Nightfall, too.
Don’t know how I could forget Zhad and Gwen. Two of my favorite characters.
But you see, in Guild Wars 1 those characters traveled with you all the time. Constantly. You not only did missions with them, but you could take them with you if you wanted. In Guild Wars 2, you do a five minute story and don’t see them again for an hour.
So I don’t know how anyone could be expected to be as attached.
I mean you run through Factions and Menhlo and or Togo are with you almost 100% of the time.
Vayne, all your logic aside, but for the past two years you’ve made so many assumptions about how ANet thinks that someone might think you are actually working for them.
I make some assumptions. I make a lot of educated guesses, which aren’t assumptions, they’re educated guesses. It’s not illogical to think that businesses don’t make decisions willy nilly. So while some people say, there’s no possible reason for them to do this, I think of the possible reasons. But I also don’t out of hand dismiss what devs say. Take the NPE.
Colin came straight out and said why it exists. People choose not to listen or not to believe. Listening to what someone says (and seeing that it’s probably reasonable) isn’t making assumptions. It’s believing something someone is saying.
Group 1: They dumbed down the game because they think we’re idiots.
Group 2: They altered the game based on tests that they ran that said it kept people playing longer.
I’m having trouble picturing a meeting where devs say to each other, you know, our players are idiots, let’s make the game dumber. It’s not likely to have happened. People who are offended by the NPE are simply taking offense at something that was a logical business decision.
You don’t need to work for a developer to believe what they say.
You don’t think you can pick apart Guild Wars 1 the same way? How about the stupid Black Tide Den mission, where your character, for no reason whatsoever, is suddenly looking for Rinkhail monitors for the bonus, running away from the guy you’re supposed to be follow (which is an important plot point) to do something that you’re never given any reason at all to do.
I never go into any MMO expecting “great writing”. Therefore I’m never disappointed.
Guild Wars 1 could have been a lot better. Guild Wars 2 could be a lot better. But there are some pretty cool things in Guild Wars 2, as there were in Guild Wars 1. If you want to ignore those things, go right ahead.
They’re still in the game.
How is that any better with living story achievements? Why would you let Duke Barradin’s ghost to get stronger normally? I don’t see any difference.
Also GW1 had his fair share of cool things as well, if not more than GW2.
I’m not saying, nor did I ever say Guild Wars 2 was better. If you can find where I did say that, by all means produce some evidence. I’d love to see it.
All I said, again and again, was that people are overestimating Guild Wars 1. Both games have strong and weak points. Particularly with regard to writing, both games are roughly equivalent. Both of the games are the same. That WAS my point.
I was responding to people who keep claiming the Guild Wars 1 writing was so much better.
You know, it’s not just seeing people are unhappy and thinking about doing something about it. It’s about specifically what to do about it.
So Anet first makes an update and people are unhappy about it. About half the time that happens, most people see it’s not that bad after all, and the problem goes away…because it’s not. The story I remember a dev telling was when DOA was first released in Guild Wars 1 and everyone said it was too hard, it was impossible and there were almost universal calls to nerf it. Same happened with Triple Thread and Tequatl. Lots of calls to nerf. But the community got through it.
Anet has to wait to see the longer term reaction, before they decide there really is a problem and then, they have to determine what the problem actually is (because it’s not always clear) and then they have to decide what to do about it.
There will be meetings, discussions, and you know, everyone may not be in agreement. Some people may want to change things one way and some may want to change it another way. These differences have to be worked out.
Maybe the fans are asking for something that ultimately doesn’t fit into whatever else is being worked on. Maybe there are changes Anet is willing to make, but other changes have to be made first.
For example, we know Anet is working on something for altoholics, but we don’t know what it is. Maybe that thing will make other changes unnecessary and so there’s no reason to work on some of the complaints.
Yeah, Anet should probably tell us more, but the fact is, every minute spent pacifying the forum (sometimes over very little) is another minute not doing something else. There’s been more communication on the forum, a single thread gets deleted that was all over the place and suddenly people feel Anet isn’t communicating again?
The need for constant communication from developers here is really over the top.
I ding level 30 on my Engineer and finally have access to Traits!
I open up the Trait Panel….I have 1 POINT…1 Trait Point to spend.
Yeah, after 30 levels and a handful of Traits Unlocked…I get 1 Point to spend.
Yep…in the old days, one trait point didn’t actually get you anything. You needed five to actually unlock a point. That 1 point is like five of the old points.
kitten Vayne, how about you can only defend this every 7th post, that OK with you?
Actually there are plenty of posts I don’t comment on at all. Just the ones that I disagree with. There’s a post on the main page right now about a guy who’s bored with the game. Not a single post in that thread.
Complaining about 1 trait point, and unlock one trait at a time…that’s how it’s always worked, except in the old days you needed five of them. Why do you have a problem with me pointing that out?
Nah, you have some decent arguments, how would you feel if you could only post on every 7th posts though?
That would cripple your involvement in the forums..Why would that be, because it’s new and good or just tedium forced upon us.
I wouldn’t feel anything, I’d find something else to do. This is my hobby, so I devote time to it. Before this hobby, I had other hobbies. After this hobby I will have other hobbies again. I like to keep busy.
The traits thread, SAB threads, megaserver threads and hobosacks thread (off the top of my head) are in need of attention.
That said, Gaile is trying to keep us informed as well as Chris.
SAB threads are what exactly? Anet said right now it’s not coming back, during this season of the living story. That’s all they’re going to say. There’s no need for more communication on this. If people don’t want to accept it, there’s nothing anyone can do. That’s the decision.
Megaservers are being worked on, we’ve even seen some changes recently to guild missions and they said they’re working on stuff for larger guilds. The mega server isn’t being repealed. It’s not happening. What is there to say?
Traits and hobosacks are legitimate ongoing issues. I can almost guarantee they’re working on traits. I guess they could come in every few days and say we’re still working on it, but programming takes time.
Hobosacks, no idea if they’re working on it or not. I suspect it’s low priority, though.
I don’t know why people think that we need someone to constantly come into threads saying we know about this and we’re looking into it. Things in big companies don’t get changed over night and programming takes time.
It’s not a problem OP. It’s certainly not the problem you’re making it out to be. You’re concerned because the forum community is larger dissatisfied. If you took a snapshot of this community every six months or so, almost since launch, you’d find the same thing.
When we were getting content every two weeks, the forums were furious that it wasn’t permanent content. When ascended game out the forums were furious that the game now has vertical progression. When the NPE came out, the forums are furious that the game is now being dumbed down and that they’re leveled gated. In six months the forums will be furious about something else.
The forums are always furious about something.
To be fair, some of the stuff is more reasonable than other stuff, but I’m not too worried about the content. Halloween is around the corner, and just after that we get more new area to explore.
I’m sure other stuff is in the works as well.
I ding level 30 on my Engineer and finally have access to Traits!
I open up the Trait Panel….I have 1 POINT…1 Trait Point to spend.
Yeah, after 30 levels and a handful of Traits Unlocked…I get 1 Point to spend.
Yep…in the old days, one trait point didn’t actually get you anything. You needed five to actually unlock a point. That 1 point is like five of the old points.
kitten Vayne, how about you can only defend this every 7th post, that OK with you?
Actually there are plenty of posts I don’t comment on at all. Just the ones that I disagree with. There’s a post on the main page right now about a guy who’s bored with the game. Not a single post in that thread.
Complaining about 1 trait point, and unlock one trait at a time…that’s how it’s always worked, except in the old days you needed five of them. Why do you have a problem with me pointing that out?
I ding level 30 on my Engineer and finally have access to Traits!
I open up the Trait Panel….I have 1 POINT…1 Trait Point to spend.
Yeah, after 30 levels and a handful of Traits Unlocked…I get 1 Point to spend.
Yep…in the old days, one trait point didn’t actually get you anything. You needed five to actually unlock a point. That 1 point is like five of the old points.
I love when I read the posts now claiming GW1 stories across all 4 games were a masterpiece work of art compared to GW2 story (in some ways GW1 story was better) when good chance they were the same people complaining about how the GW1 stories where dull and boring across all 4 games.
Eye of the North, by far, had the best characters for me in Guild Wars 1. I really resonated with Pyre. But I didn’t particularly care much for Jora or Livia. I liked Vekk quite a lot. Hayda and Anton, not so much. Not sure if I ever really connected with Ogden either.
I hated how all the dwarves moved like Christmas elves though, and how everyone’s breathing was massively exaggerated throughout the game.
Whether its the NPE or something else, something feels very off to me.
I ran into the same thing in Champions Online. If I recall, you got to select a new super power every three levels or something like that. The other two offered “boring” things like incremental stat increases. So in effect the “fun” rewards only occurred after three levels and it felt sloooooooooow.
That’s how GW2 feels to me now. I’m getting next to no rewards to keep me motivated to get to 80, where the real character building has been shuffled.
Add on top of that other design choices: limited weapons, fixed skills per weapon. So quickly you grow familiar with it all. Very few interesting gear and weapon drops during the normal course of leveling. No real impact or importance to starting character story choices.
Anet needs to stop worrying about the stupid Living World for a moment and start worrying about helping players build Living Characters.
Oh? What rewards did you get leveling after launch, before the April 15th patch. I’m very interested to know.
You got 1 skill point, 1 trait point and some stats which they never told you you got.
If you didn’t have all your 1 point skills by level 50 or so, they must have been really crappy skills. Most of the skills you’d have been missing by then would be six, ten or thirty point skills.
Back then, a single trait point gave you a few stats. If that excited you, I don’t know what to tell you. They barely made any different at all.
You didn’t get to put points into a minor or major trait but every five levels.
No it is near a kin to false advertising. However it isn’t really working. Of course they are able to dupe a few people. To be honest it’s okay the first or maybe the 2nd time through so it’s worth the box price. There are games on steam that you can spend the same on and get a lot less entertainment out of.
That being said once you’ve done everything once or twice the game becomes completely unrewarding. Like the OP mentioned the precursor. The game advertises play as you want. There is no way to obtain a legendary in game without extreme luck or using gems (pay to win) to buy it. To save up to that with the unrewarding loot droops in game is just not worth the boring in game content vs doing things in RL. This effectively makes the game free to play but pay to win.
If this is what most free to play games are like then pay to play is the way better option. I know it is not. LoL from talking to the people i know who do play that game it’s pretty much all cosmetic for cash shop. Again don’t necessarily know 100% for that game because I don’t play it. However I do play WoW and gladly give them 15 a month. If I want a legendary I can go do it. It’s a long list of things to do but it can be done in a reasonable amount of time. The old adage definitely applies, you get what you pay for.
Give me a break. The precusor “advertisement” only affects people who already own the game. People who have yet to buy the game aren’t affected by a precusor scavenger hunt. Odds are most of those people don’t even know what a precusor is.
You already own the game, so it’s not false advertisement.
There have been hundreds, perhaps thousands of statements made about this game by Anet. A tiny percentage of them have not actually eventuated.
Umm.. It was advertised to the existing player base. We the people whom already purchased the hype aren’t concerned about people whom have yet to purchase the game. Our pockets aren’t going to be filled by them. We are simply asking for and about things we have believed to already purchased. “as advertised”. Hop off any time.
Something that is “advertised to the existing player base” isn’t being advertised at all.
They informed us of the intention to do this thing. They revealed a plan to us. Advertising is trying to get you to buy something. We’d already bought the game.
They made a plan, the plan fell through. It happens in businesses all the time.
In reality, no person could possibly live up to the expectations that fans have for Anet. It’s not reasonable to expect plans won’t change…particularly in an MMO. Particularly in an article that said nothing is set in stone.
Advertising to the existing player base is a thing because you want to keep them interested in playing. Fail to do that and you won’t have a player base for long.
Plans change – priorities shift but not keeping the players in the loop is always a bad idea. They basically shut us down and didn’t bother to tell us anything about anything in a number of situations.
I’m not disagreeing with you. I think Anet needs to be much clearer on what’s being worked on. Keep us posted. Let us know.
None of this, we can’t talk about it right now crap, because that’s not really working for them.
Sorry I liked Ceera.
Well, don’t be sorry that you liked her. People like all sorts of things.
Moreover a whole lot of people like Tybalt, and I really like Forgal. For every good character in Guild Wars 1, there was one that you wanted to kill. Rurik was absolutely a cardboard cutout. People complained about Komir incessantly. Most people didn’t seem to like Koss much (though I did).
HERE THERE BE SPOILERS for anyone who has not yet been to Claw Island.
The Claw Island dramatic last stand stuff was bad, mm-kay. I mean, what’s the point of shutting the big doors and making a dramatic last stand there when there are already risen on both sides and mass quantities of risen loitering around in the vicinity of the ship the dramatic shutting of the big doors is supposed to give us time to escape to?
Besides, the whole danged assault was just plain wrong. Zhaitan knows what his risen minions know, right? Well, were there no naval officers in his band of merry risen? No pirates? Surely, if even a mere guitarist like myself knows that when assaulting an island, one of the primary objectives should be to lock down the docks, then an elder dragon with the brains of countless risen at his disposal should have known that as well. There should have been no handy dandy ship there for us to escape to, or in.
A lifeboat, maybe, in which we cast off from some other point not quite as overrun with risen. That would have been a good place for a dramatic last stand.
“Fly, you fools! Er, I mean, row! Row!”
One last desperate battle at sea, perhaps, and then…
“Ah, thank the writers, a ship approaches! We’re saved!”
There is plenty wrong with the stories in both games, but it’s not as dismal as it’s made out to be. There’s certainly not the depth of difference that people are implying.
There sure is.
You don’t think you can pick apart Guild Wars 1 the same way? How about the stupid Black Tide Den mission, where your character, for no reason whatsoever, is suddenly looking for Rinkhail monitors for the bonus, running away from the guy you’re supposed to be follow (which is an important plot point) to do something that you’re never given any reason at all to do.
I never go into any MMO expecting “great writing”. Therefore I’m never disappointed.
Guild Wars 1 could have been a lot better. Guild Wars 2 could be a lot better. But there are some pretty cool things in Guild Wars 2, as there were in Guild Wars 1. If you want to ignore those things, go right ahead.
They’re still in the game.
A little more information would be useful.
Are you a brand new player who hasn’t chosen any server yet or an older account trying to get on that server for some reason?
As to the comment about “barren wasteland”, I’m not sure what you are referring to.
Brand new player who hasn’t chosen any server, have friends who I want to join on TC.
I didn’t know at all about the megaservers, and looking at the link you provided how being from the same homeworld accounts for 6% weight of if the other person will be from the same server as you? Ahahaha. So 1 in 20 will be from your home server in the first place anyways.
Well, thanks for clearing this up. WvW is something I may be interested in later on, but having the friends and guildies are what’s far more important.
If you’re on a different server, you can still play with them in PvE, in Dungeons, in SPvP, that’s the point.
You just group with them, right click on their portrait and join them on their server.
I think GW2 is always going to be the the little game that almost was. It was almost THAT game.
Certainly be interesting to see what happens if a better MMO actually comes out. It’s obviously easier to say an MMO is going to be great than to make a great MMO.
No it is near a kin to false advertising. However it isn’t really working. Of course they are able to dupe a few people. To be honest it’s okay the first or maybe the 2nd time through so it’s worth the box price. There are games on steam that you can spend the same on and get a lot less entertainment out of.
That being said once you’ve done everything once or twice the game becomes completely unrewarding. Like the OP mentioned the precursor. The game advertises play as you want. There is no way to obtain a legendary in game without extreme luck or using gems (pay to win) to buy it. To save up to that with the unrewarding loot droops in game is just not worth the boring in game content vs doing things in RL. This effectively makes the game free to play but pay to win.
If this is what most free to play games are like then pay to play is the way better option. I know it is not. LoL from talking to the people i know who do play that game it’s pretty much all cosmetic for cash shop. Again don’t necessarily know 100% for that game because I don’t play it. However I do play WoW and gladly give them 15 a month. If I want a legendary I can go do it. It’s a long list of things to do but it can be done in a reasonable amount of time. The old adage definitely applies, you get what you pay for.
Give me a break. The precusor “advertisement” only affects people who already own the game. People who have yet to buy the game aren’t affected by a precusor scavenger hunt. Odds are most of those people don’t even know what a precusor is.
You already own the game, so it’s not false advertisement.
There have been hundreds, perhaps thousands of statements made about this game by Anet. A tiny percentage of them have not actually eventuated.
Umm.. It was advertised to the existing player base. We the people whom already purchased the hype aren’t concerned about people whom have yet to purchase the game. Our pockets aren’t going to be filled by them. We are simply asking for and about things we have believed to already purchased. “as advertised”. Hop off any time.
Something that is “advertised to the existing player base” isn’t being advertised at all.
They informed us of the intention to do this thing. They revealed a plan to us. Advertising is trying to get you to buy something. We’d already bought the game.
They made a plan, the plan fell through. It happens in businesses all the time.
In reality, no person could possibly live up to the expectations that fans have for Anet. It’s not reasonable to expect plans won’t change…particularly in an MMO. Particularly in an article that said nothing is set in stone.
The premise is wrong. Guild Wars 2 needs no “end-game”, because Guild Wars 2 simply has “game”. Other MMOs have numerous maps and activities that become obsolete once you outlevel them. Content is called “end-game” if it is still relevant at max level.
In Guild Wars 2, all content is still relevant at all times. There could not possibly be more end-game content than this.
Now this I’m with you on. This quest for mythical end game, created by other games to convince people they’re actually progressing has never ceased to amaze me.
So once you hit level 80 and are fully outfitted in exotics, go back to Queensdale and kill bandits in the bandithaunt caverns.
Tell me how challenging it is.
I don’t find Orr that challenging either. I didn’t find most dungeons in Guild Wars 1 that challenging once I built up and runed my heroes. Hard mode was pretty much a walk in the park.
The open world in most games is just that…a walk in the park. There are very few exceptions to this.
But in most other games, you don’t get XP or drops at level in older zones. There’s no rewarded events like the Maw, or the Wurm or the Fire ele.
There are reasons to go back to early zones in Guild Wars 2 that don’t exist in other games.
I’m glad more people are coming to realize how stale GW2 has become. ANet seriously needs to reconsider the Living Story idea because it’s not panning out. Now if that means hiring more people (yes we know your resources ate strained) then do it. NCSoft is posting huge profits so ask daddy for a loan if you need it.
(4) I don’t think I even need to mention how superior the writing and content in GW1 was compared to GW2. it simply goes without saying. in order to make another “me too” MMO, they had to throw in additional races, and instead of making one race with one solid, compelling story (GW1), they made five races with mediocre, forgettable stories.
The Nightfall campaign inspired me to become a writer. One published book and two more manuscripts in the works I’d say it’s been a very positive change. GW2’s writing is anything but. It feels commercial, overly simplified and not well thought out. Story drove the missions in GW1. You were immersed in the world, and you cared about your character. In GW2 you run kitten-boy errands for Trahearne. Your character means nothing in the personal story nor the Living Story. Now if you can’t connect with your character are you going to care about the world?
For a professional writer, I question your judgement. Saying that the story in Guild Wars 1 was some great story is more than just a little stretch. Most of the writing was okay. Many of the characters were completely cliche cardboard cutouts, and the plots really weren’t anything to write home about. I don’t know where this great writing came from, but through all of Guild Wars 1, all I remember is running around doing what someone else told me to do.
In the beginning it was Rurik, then the White Mantle, then the Shining Blade. Did I want to give the Scepter of Orr to the cheesy bad guy with the foreign accent. Or course not. He was the stereotypical bad guy with the Spanish accent. The stereotype made me laugh. Of course, at the time I was actually a writer, and saw these things. When you go back and look at that writing, you won’t find “great” writing. You’ll find enough writing there to drive the story forward.
Guild Wars 2’s writing is larger the same. In games like this, the writing always serves the story. The story doesn’t server the writing.
In Nightfall, first Sunspears told us what to do, then the Order of Whispers told me what to do, and in the end it wasn’t much different, don’t to following Komir around the Realm of Torment. We did all the work, she becomes a god. I’m thinking, wait a second, isn’t she the one that started this whole ball of wax. What’s so special about her?
In Factions we followed Togo around for the entire game and every step of it he told is what to do.
Maybe you’re not remembering that story as clearly as you think you are.
Well, Guild Wars wasn’t Finnegan’s Wake, of course, but it was light years beyond GW2 (and, of course, a much better love story than Twilight) because it had heart and it had soul and while it had its moments of whimsy it never collapsed under the weight of its own silliness.
GW2, on the other hand, has this bizarre theme running through the early portions of the game that’s all about mistreating cows. We ‘entertain’ them instead of feeding them. There’s that silly rancher in Queensdale who in one breath exhorts the cows to fight the bandits, and in the next extolls the joys of brisket. Mm-mm. Meanwhile, over in Ascalon, we stand by and do nothing as cow after cow is hurled from a catapult. Oh, moooooooo – splat. Crunch. We dress up in cow costumes and train cows to fight. That’s sane.
I sure do hope LS3 is about a cow revolution. To heck with the elder dragons. The cows are mad as heck and they’re not gonna take it anymore. Mooooving on.
Compare: Vekk and Ceera. I felt Vekk’s pain. Ceera, on the other hand, got a ‘Oh, come on. Really?’
Sorry I liked Ceera. Moreover a whole lot of people like Tybalt, and I really like Forgal. For every good character in Guild Wars 1, there was one that you wanted to kill. Rurik was absolutely a cardboard cutout. People complained about Komir incessantly. Most people didn’t seem to like Koss much (though I did).
There is plenty wrong with the stories in both games, but it’s not as dismal as it’s made out to be. There’s certainly not the depth of difference that people are implying.
The premise is wrong. Guild Wars 2 needs no “end-game”, because Guild Wars 2 simply has “game”. Other MMOs have numerous maps and activities that become obsolete once you outlevel them. Content is called “end-game” if it is still relevant at max level.
In Guild Wars 2, all content is still relevant at all times. There could not possibly be more end-game content than this.
Now this I’m with you on. This quest for mythical end game, created by other games to convince people they’re actually progressing has never ceased to amaze me.
No it is near a kin to false advertising. However it isn’t really working. Of course they are able to dupe a few people. To be honest it’s okay the first or maybe the 2nd time through so it’s worth the box price. There are games on steam that you can spend the same on and get a lot less entertainment out of.
That being said once you’ve done everything once or twice the game becomes completely unrewarding. Like the OP mentioned the precursor. The game advertises play as you want. There is no way to obtain a legendary in game without extreme luck or using gems (pay to win) to buy it. To save up to that with the unrewarding loot droops in game is just not worth the boring in game content vs doing things in RL. This effectively makes the game free to play but pay to win.
If this is what most free to play games are like then pay to play is the way better option. I know it is not. LoL from talking to the people i know who do play that game it’s pretty much all cosmetic for cash shop. Again don’t necessarily know 100% for that game because I don’t play it. However I do play WoW and gladly give them 15 a month. If I want a legendary I can go do it. It’s a long list of things to do but it can be done in a reasonable amount of time. The old adage definitely applies, you get what you pay for.
Give me a break. The precusor “advertisement” only affects people who already own the game. People who have yet to buy the game aren’t affected by a precusor scavenger hunt. Odds are most of those people don’t even know what a precusor is.
You already own the game, so it’s not false advertisement.
There have been hundreds, perhaps thousands of statements made about this game by Anet. A tiny percentage of them have not actually eventuated.
Have you ever even looked at another MMORPG forum. They all look just like this one, unless the company deletes all negative posts.
Well, look at GW1 facebook page for example.
Facebook page ain’t a forum. lol Guild Wars 1 had no official forum and many of the types of people who post on forums never look at facebook.
Guild Wars 1 isn’t an MMO and even if it was, at this point, I’m sure most of the population isn’t posting about negative stuff, because the game is in stasis. Nothing happens there TO post about.
It’s like saying look at the forums for any older game that hasn’t been updated in a couple of years. What is there to post about?
I said Facebook page because if you look at the GW2 facebook page you often see the general attitude towards GW2.
And sure, it didn’t have an official forum, but there were plenty of non-official, and even devs posted there. Look at this for example:
http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/domain-anguish-t10083002.html
This thread was created when anet announced the release of DoA,meaning it’s a valid comparison to GW2 forums since it was created during active development.
I don’t know what is a valid comparison or not a valid comparison. My comment was about forums for MMORPGs. I should have said official forums, though because that’s what I’m talking about.
If you look at any major MMORPG (and Guild Wars 1 wasn’t), you’ll see almost the exact same threads you’ll see here. The more popular the MMORPG the more of these threads you’ll see.
You won’t necessarily see them on dying or dead games, though or games that aren’t MMORPGs, or in fan forums, because those tend to be moderated differently. For example, Reddit, which is fan moderated tends to be far more positive than the official forums. People have even complained about it.
My comment was meant to compare MMORPG official forums with this official forum, since people seem to think that this sort of hostility toward the publisher is something other than normal.
WoW, Rift, AoC, Lotro, DDO, SWToR, Archeage, Wildstar, ESO, Warhammer Online all have the same types of comments on their forums. That’s what I’m saying.
It’s easy to pick apart a game. It’s not so easy to make one.
Yeah it’s intended and it’s stupid.
Leveling up is more rewarding now, didn’t you know?
Calling something stupid simply because it’s different from what you’re used to is really childish. As Vayne has said, had this been the way it was from launch, you wouldn’t even bat an eye lash at it.
Also, leveling rewards are more than just skill points. You get actual items now (and ones that you can use and most that you can choose the stats for). So yeah, leveling IS more rewarding now.
Level 21 rewards you with nothing but a level 20 amulet.
The game is being turned into a fancy looking whack-a-mole. Please can either you or Vayne turn the lights off when you finish.
The game isn’t turning into whack a mole. You just choose to play whack a mole. Big difference.
GW1 had the business design of “releasing an expansion every 6 months”. It was nice, but it also had insane drawbacks. It took ArenaNet way longer than planned to release their first expansion, and then after the second expansion it was already clear that this constant overload of new mechanics was absolutely not maintainable.
What they’re doing in GW2 is much better, in my opinion. They’re not adding mechanics at GW1’s crazy speed, but they are adding much more content. All those Living Story episodes, the extra story packs (which I paid 600 gems for yesterday, and was not disappointed by), new areas such as Southsun Cove and Dry Top… It keeps the game refreshing and interesting, without overloading it with nifty and fancy features that nobody was asking for in the first place.
If you’ve been away, it seems like they’re adding a lot of stuff. But the amount of stuff is less than it immediately appears unless you’ve been away.
For those people here two years without that break, there’s not much new content…at least partially because a lot of the content has been removed.
One of the most valid criticisms of the game, in my opinion, is that the Living Story season one gamble failed and we have had the best part of a year with relatively few updates.
I think over time that will be compensated for (I’m cautiously optimistic) but people who are complaining definitely have a point.
The living story at its best — with new content every two weeks — was definitely a high amount of new stuff at a steady pace. Unless you play 16 hours a day and play through everything at lightning speed of course, but I do like to think that those people ruin the game for themselves by doing that.
Look, some of my favorite content is no longer in the game, and if you weren’t here, you didn’t get to experience at all.
So the new story, at this point, it’s fine. It’s great for what it is. But it’s not, and I don’t see it ever becoming, The Nightmare Tower.
It’s just a very different type of content. Content you can no longer play.
I have one, go to another sever.
Boo-hoo some guy on the internet told me to cease my biological functions.
This is precisely the reason this will be fixed. Do you think you’re helping farmers by saying stuff like this? No. You’re only proving the OP’s point better than anything he could have said or done. So I guess we should thank you.
On topic: It’s not a bad idea OP, I don’t really see a problem with it. Anet has been moving in that direction anyway, with having no drops in personal stories and getting your rewards at the end.
GW1 had the business design of “releasing an expansion every 6 months”. It was nice, but it also had insane drawbacks. It took ArenaNet way longer than planned to release their first expansion, and then after the second expansion it was already clear that this constant overload of new mechanics was absolutely not maintainable.
What they’re doing in GW2 is much better, in my opinion. They’re not adding mechanics at GW1’s crazy speed, but they are adding much more content. All those Living Story episodes, the extra story packs (which I paid 600 gems for yesterday, and was not disappointed by), new areas such as Southsun Cove and Dry Top… It keeps the game refreshing and interesting, without overloading it with nifty and fancy features that nobody was asking for in the first place.
If you’ve been away, it seems like they’re adding a lot of stuff. But the amount of stuff is less than it immediately appears unless you’ve been away.
For those people here two years without that break, there’s not much new content…at least partially because a lot of the content has been removed.
One of the most valid criticisms of the game, in my opinion, is that the Living Story season one gamble failed and we have had the best part of a year with relatively few updates.
I think over time that will be compensated for (I’m cautiously optimistic) but people who are complaining definitely have a point.
So – they reset our levels in order to “start an earnest competition” that never started. And they never said why.
Unfortunately only 50 levels isn’t a high enough number for a proper leaderboard. Top 1000 players on the leaderboard will all be at Fractal level 50 so what’s the point?
What they should do is have a fractal leaderboard for each fractal, with a best time on it. So you’d have the best time for your team on the Swamp Fractal, etc.
There’s no such thing as making the game “right” the first time. Because different people have different rights. You’re so vested in your disappointment you can’t see that some people are disappointed and some aren’t, even even those who are, aren’t necessarily disappointed by the same thing. What percent of the playerbase was affected, do you think, by the Fractal reset?
Have you ever even looked at another MMORPG forum. They all look just like this one, unless the company deletes all negative posts.
It’s not the reset itself. It’s the lies. It’s the “we need to do this reset in order to implement leaderboards” which implied they had a system thought out and ready to implement.
It’s the fact that our progress was reset for nothing and leaderboards were just an excuse. That’s what I’m disappointed about.It’s the fact that they promise and don’t even bother to say " we won’t be able to do it, stuff has come up".
It’s the fact that they have good ideas in the past which they magically forget about only to add them back 2 years later after much player demand and act like they’ve reinvented the wheel.
Was it a lie or did the leaderboard get scrapped for a reason we don’t know about, or did it get put on the back burner? When it was said, was that the reason? Everyone always wants to say lie, but you know, sometimes situations change.
Either way, Anet should make a direct statement about it.
Yes – the reset was due to the leaderboards. That’s what they claimed.
Announcing Fractals of the Mists Leaderboards
Soon you can earn the envy and adulation of your friends and total strangers through our new leaderboards, which show off the players with the highest fractal levels! As part of the introduction of leaderboards, everyone whose current personal reward level for the Fractals of the Mists is above 30 will be reset to 30 so the competition can begin in earnest.Source : https://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/releases/november-26-2013/
So – they reset our levels in order to “start an earnest competition” that never started. And they never said why.
So either:
1)They lied from the get-go – knowing full well this wouldn’t happen.
2)They didn’t lie – but something came up with the leaderboards idea – which is not unheard of but then this begs the question : why didn’t we hear anything about it? Why didn’t they tell us anything?I understand at one point they said they were finding it difficult to find criteria for the leaderboards – which means they reset our progress first and thought about it later. That’s sloppy. They didn’t have a working solution for a leaderboards but still used it as an excuse to reset our levels. And then didn’t bother with it anymore.
And didn’t say anything either.Now you tell me which one is worse.
I seem to remember other threads and comments from Anet, but I can’t be certain of them and it’s not an important issue to me personally. Among what I remember is someone from Anet saying that from level 30-50 the experience of doing the Fractals has completely changed and that it wouldn’t be appropriate all things considered to allow people to just have the entire new experience unlocked. Something along those lines anyway…it was a while ago and I wasn’t particularly tuned into it, since it only affected one person in my guild (who didn’t care by the way).
(edited by Vayne.8563)
I would like to have our actions actually be reflected in the world over time.
IE. Zhaitan is dead, over time (2-3 years) we should see fewer risen in the game.
If certain events aren’t done then we get a spontaneous raid event related to it such as if we don’t do the centaur events in Kessex then a large group raids Queensdale. Or vice versa if over farmed.Maybe tie this into a meta map system similar to what Dry top has so people realize it’s going on?
I agree with this. My question then is, shouldn’t the personal story be abandoned at some point? Why would anyone need to run the personal story IF the quest line is in the past, the area has been renovated into ‘not Zhaitan’? My point is, everyone wants repeatable content in a ‘living world’. Sorry, but you shouldn’t be able to. If the world changes, stories change and become unavailable. You can say something different, but in a world that moves on, you cannot do that. You can’t fight the wars of your grandfathers, so why, in a game that was advertised as such, should a new character?
Are you really suggesting at this point that Anet remove content from the game?
For those who think it’s great to wait until you gain 7 levels before spending any skill points, let’s see you apply this to real life. From now on you must wait until you’ve acquired 7 paychecks until you can spend any of them! Let’s see how that works out for you, after all it feels like more of a reward right??
Best analogy ever. After all without the skill points you can’t eat and you’ll starve and die. You won’t be able to pay your rent and you’ll be on the street.
I have a better analogy. How about you can have a spoonful of ice cream every day and that’s it…or you can have a bowl at the end of the week. That’s a whole lot closer.
Edit: You know pay already works like that. Many people get paid by the hour…but they don’t get paid every hour. They get paid once a week. Here in Australia most people get paid once a Fortnight, not when they actually earn the money. Sometimes one pay period won’t pay the entire rent and you have to wait to get paid again to pay it. People do it all the time.
More like, how bout a bowl of ice cream every day, or 7 bowls on Saturday. See how I did that? Enjoy your 7 bowls, the rest of us do it differently…
But the one skill point had limited use, much like a spoon of ice cream. So my analogy more appropriately reflects the actual situation.
You didn’t get a skill point at 67 and buy a skill and then a skill point at 68 and buy another skill. They were just spoons of ice cream. Trying to prove me wrong by making bad analogies isn’t likely to get you very far.
Your analogy only appropriately reflects your own slanted views, nothing else. The rest of the player base can recognize silly game changes when they see them, regardless of the implanted cheerleaders that attempt to prop them up.
The rest of the forums can recognize a really bad analogy and a less bad one. Most analogies are flawed, but yours are completely disingenuous. You won’t be winning any arguments using those. They simply don’t reflect the situation well enough to be used.
Anyway not much to argue about. You’re entitled to your opinion, as is everyone else and everyone will make it their own mind.
For those waiting for their elite, if you don’t want to hunt skill points at level 31, you get 8 points at level 32. Here’s the breakdown.
Levelling up:
8 skill points are earned at levels 20, 26 and 32.
7 skill points are earned at levels 38, 44, 50 and 56.
6 skill points are earned at levels 62, 68, 74 and 80.The moment this “thrill of the surprise” thing falls flat is when you make plans. You have plans for what you want to do with those skill points. But you’re left waiting for the SURPRISE YOU FINALLY GET IT instead of being able to take control and be using that skill, learning and growing as it changes your experience.
This game is so much deeper than cookie clicker “You did a level! That means the dispenser gives you a treat pellet and we added a RAAINNBOW to make it more exciting! Keep clicking!”. There’s a really good, complex, satisfying combat system (littered with bugs, glitches, and server instability…), there’s absolutely gorgeous environments, vast explorable landscapes, so much amazingly great stuff that, instead of fixing the serious problems in existing stuff, that they are preoccupied with the most basic, well established, and stable of features shows an issue with priorities.
We’re sitting here arguing about whether excitement is more valuable than reliability while teleports and leaps regularly fail, wvw is hemorrhaging guilds from lack of support for gvgs and boredom due to a flawed matchmaking system (draining the only “end game” this game really has), and the economy is so inflated it naturally increases the need for the kind of grind/farm that this game was never meant to have. I know they can only work on one thing at a time but this cosmetic change seems unnecessarily convoluted and wrought with new issues to pile on the other glaring problems. Instead of meaningful improvement it’s like they’ve been spending their time on putting the same thing in a different wrapper, and that, more than the fact that it’s different than I remember, is what I find frustrating.
Sure this is a different argument. There are a lot of bugged skills that should be fixed, a lot of traits that are either bugged or useless.
Nothing to do with the current argument and no disagreement from me.
For those who think it’s great to wait until you gain 7 levels before spending any skill points, let’s see you apply this to real life. From now on you must wait until you’ve acquired 7 paychecks until you can spend any of them! Let’s see how that works out for you, after all it feels like more of a reward right??
Best analogy ever. After all without the skill points you can’t eat and you’ll starve and die. You won’t be able to pay your rent and you’ll be on the street.
I have a better analogy. How about you can have a spoonful of ice cream every day and that’s it…or you can have a bowl at the end of the week. That’s a whole lot closer.
Edit: You know pay already works like that. Many people get paid by the hour…but they don’t get paid every hour. They get paid once a week. Here in Australia most people get paid once a Fortnight, not when they actually earn the money. Sometimes one pay period won’t pay the entire rent and you have to wait to get paid again to pay it. People do it all the time.
More like, how bout a bowl of ice cream every day, or 7 bowls on Saturday. See how I did that? Enjoy your 7 bowls, the rest of us do it differently…
But the one skill point had limited use, much like a spoon of ice cream. So my analogy more appropriately reflects the actual situation.
You didn’t get a skill point at 67 and buy a skill and then a skill point at 68 and buy another skill. They were just spoons of ice cream. Trying to prove me wrong by making bad analogies isn’t likely to get you very far.
Yeah it’s intended and it’s stupid.
Leveling up is more rewarding now, didn’t you know?
Calling something stupid doesn’t make it stupid.
It’s fine the way it was. It’s fine the way it is. If it had been this way from launch, no one would question it.
The idea is, and this works for most people I can assure you, is this…if you give someone the same thing every single level, it becomes invisible. It may be a reward but it doesn’t feel as rewarding. By getting a skill point at level 48 when you need 6 points or 10 points or even 30 points for every skill you want, it’s completely pointless. There’s no reason not to give you 6 or 8 points at a time in that number of levels.
It was just as pointless as getting a trait point every level that did almost nothing for you until you have five of them.
I won’t disagree that how they organized the trait points was good. But it’s silly to make it so you can only get a few skills points every few arbitrary levels. Especially when there are skills that only cost 3 skill points to get.
As someone who comes into this game without any knowledge of it that would just be confusing. Why do I have skills that I can unlock at any time, but only get skill points every 5 or 6 levels?
And yes I know that there are skill challenges but it doesn’t change the fact that it’s still a strange design decision.
See I really disagree with this, because I’ve never played an MMO that didn’t show skills and gate some of them. Ever. TSW doesn’t even have levels and gates skills. It’s just normal to gate certain skills.
Skills were always gated. Leaving skill point challenges aside, you need give 1 point skills, whether you liked them or not to even try a 3 point skill. You needed five of those to even look at a six point skill.
So you needed 20 skill points just to look at your six point skills. You got them before starting at level 5. So by level 25, without skill point challenges, you could get your first six point skill.
But then, you only had 5 levels before you got your elite. Many people bought six point skills when they unlocked and didn’t have enough points left for their elite. It happened to me a couple of times even.
For those waiting for their elite, if you don’t want to hunt skill points at level 31, you get 8 points at level 32. Here’s the breakdown.
Levelling up:
8 skill points are earned at levels 20, 26 and 32.
7 skill points are earned at levels 38, 44, 50 and 56.
6 skill points are earned at levels 62, 68, 74 and 80.
For those who think it’s great to wait until you gain 7 levels before spending any skill points, let’s see you apply this to real life. From now on you must wait until you’ve acquired 7 paychecks until you can spend any of them! Let’s see how that works out for you, after all it feels like more of a reward right??
Best analogy ever. After all without the skill points you can’t eat and you’ll starve and die. You won’t be able to pay your rent and you’ll be on the street.
I have a better analogy. How about you can have a spoonful of ice cream every day and that’s it…or you can have a bowl at the end of the week. That’s a whole lot closer.
Edit: You know pay already works like that. Many people get paid by the hour…but they don’t get paid every hour. They get paid once a week. Here in Australia most people get paid once a Fortnight, not when they actually earn the money. Sometimes one pay period won’t pay the entire rent and you have to wait to get paid again to pay it. People do it all the time.
(edited by Vayne.8563)
Offhand focus with Reflect and Feedback for the win.
Reflect and vanish.
Which is fine, I know i’m not the only person in the world. But this game used to fit me like my favorite jeans and with continuous changes they’re being made to fit someone else. I like to think I matter and that whoever had me in mind when making the game is still there, and might think of me still.
If not, oh well. I guess I had my fun and it’s not my turn anymore. Doesn’t mean I don’t want to talk about it.
I can appreciate this. But I still believe if you’d started with this system, it wouldn’t have been an issue at all. The issue is the change.
Because in Guild Wars 1, it was used to scam pretty frequently. Right now, trading is a gold sink in the game, since it’s done through the auction house. Taking gold out of the system slows inflation.
I felt more rewarded when I was getting one per level, it meant each level got me a little closer to the thing I was wanting, rather than just being another empty WHOOSH and sitting on my hands for another six levels.
Not to mention the arbitrary numbers awarded at random levels is confusing and counter intuitive. One per level is very simple and easy to know when you’re getting what.This is exactly the point. Knowing what you’re getting every level means there are no special rewards. No surprises. Nothing exciting, though yes, it’s predictable.
You might think most people want to know exactly what they’re getting every level. I’m pretty sure that’s not true.
Let’s say one year for my birthday, I get a pair of socks. The next year, I get socks. The year after I get socks. I might like socks and need socks, but I’ll never find more socks surprising and I’ll never feel oh yeah that’s cool when I get them.
Unfortunately it’s hard to divorce your previous experience playing the game from those who are new to the game who don’t have the expectation of getting a point a level.
At best, it’s just a matter of opinion, but I think you’d find that given two groups of people starting both games together, this one would be more exciting for more people.
Considering I can’t speak for these hypothetical “I want seven years of nothing then eight pairs of socks all at once” people I can only put forward my opinion and how this has negatively affected my experience with the game, and why I felt the previous system was stronger.
Hypothetical raining sock people or no.
It’s not just socks. It’s a bottle of wine. It’s anything. If you get something and know what it will be it takes away the surprise. That’s all. If you don’t want to acknowledge that some people like to be surprised, or feel that’s really cool I didn’t expect that, that’s certainly your prerogative. I just disagree. I think most people, given no expectations of getting the same thing will feel more exciting getting things.
I’ve been leveling characters and I appreciate getting the other stuff, even if I can’t salvage it, like rare and exotic armor while leveling.
I’m not having a problem with the skill points I get just from exploring and then I get that boost of seven or eight and I think, cool I can buy another skill.
You end up with the same number of skill points (though someone told me you get 2 more than you used to while leveling), and you end up with the same number of skills.
I’m still going to say this would be more exciting for a bigger percentage of the population.
The idea is, and this works for most people I can assure you, is this…if you give someone the same thing every single level, it becomes invisible. It may be a reward but it doesn’t feel as rewarding.
Bullkitten. Steadily watching numbers grow is a time-tested, well-loved staple of rpgs. It only becomes invisible if you have no agency in making it grow – i.e. if the raise is automatic. If the distribution is yours to chose and comes with each level, it becomes something to look forward to. Under the new regiment, however, I have no idea what to look forward to in the next few levels, because it may be anything, and follows no discernable patterns. I have no intent to study and memorize the wiki page as an entry level exam to enjoy playing.
This becomes especially jarring considering the skill point daily achievement. Previously, if you made one or two levels and got one or to skill points via map, you could usually get this in a short, after-work burst of play without straining yourself too much.
Now, unless you are close to one of the skill point levels (or have scrolls to spare), you need to explicitly seek out three skill point challenges on the map. This means no more completing an almost complete map, this means no more aiding a friend in a lower-level, already known area.
And so it is, along with the trait crucible, another step in the “One True Path of Playing Guild Wars 2”. You want the skill point daily? Play in a new area, or farm for scrolls.
Which is fine, I suppose, if you like your activities to be structured, if you like someone taking you by the hand and telling you what is wrongbadfun and what is the good and true way to play. But some of us get that in their job aplenty, and GW2 has always been a nice way to unwind, playing the way one feels like for an evening.
Guess we better say goodbye to that liberties.
But skill points aren’t a number that steadily grows, because presumably as you level you’re spending them. So the number goes up and down. If you need a daily skill point while leveling (after level 13) it’s easy to find one while you’re out in the world without even leveling. They do appear on your map. There’s even an arrow that points you to then now.
It’s now a conscious process of something you can look at and do, instead of thinking, meh, I’ll get it anyway, I don’t have to think about it. I’m not 100% positive your way is better.