Guild Wars 2

BlueZone.4236:

It’s a fact, and easy to google “wow subscription numbers trends”.

Sure is. It’s absolutely easy. Except even if it was the rest of my argument would stand unchanged. At this time, this report is fine if Anet is coming out with an expansion. That’s all I’m really interested in. I’m a lot less interested in what WoW did four, five years ago.

BlueZone.4236:

Just so we’re clear, WoW did not “always loses a big number of players before it’s expansions.”

Honestly, I can’t really think back that far, so I’ll have to take your word for it, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it’s true. But even back then, I remember when playing WoW, people were bored and stopped playing before the next one game out. My sons were die hard WOW players and the population drop to the end of a cycle was noticable.

BlueZone.4236:

Vayne.8563:

BlueZone.4236:

Shockwave.1230:

BlueZone.4236:

Vayne.8563:

But if they do, then this is about what I’d expect, just as WoW always loses a big number of players before it’s expansions.

That’s wrong about WoW “always loses a big number of players before it’s expansions”. There’s only been four expansions released, the subscription numbers had been increasing up to the end of Cataclysm where it peaked.
Vanilla -> BC = increasing
BC – >WotLK = increasing
WotLK -> Cata = unknown
Cata -> MoP = yes, drop before gaining

I doubt ANet is working on an expansion. They’ve already got their plates full.

The way I interpreted that was WoW does expansions when they’re losing big numbers of subscribers.

COuld be wrong

That still doesn’t make sense since the first two expansion were announced where it showed no sign of losing subscribers.

Yes back when it was the only game in town or almost the only game in town. This is today and I’m talking about MMOs today and what’s happening wtih WoW this days. Much more competition now. So of course, if content gets old, people that like MMOs play another one.

So not always, just nowadays.

I’m pretty sure that Anet didn’t make a business plan for always. They made a business plan for Guild Wars 2, at a time when Guild Wars 2 was being planned out and worked on. That has to reflect the realities of nowadays. That’s a business fact.

This is a business that changes every couple of years and changes drastically every five, six years. What happened to WoW even three or four years ago is old news and doesn’t fit into the argument.

Yes, I’m talking about the CURRENT quarterly report and the CURRENT business plan for a game that launched two years ago. That’s exactly what I’m discussing.

Because nothing that WoW did 6 years ago has 1 lick of relevance to todays situation, accept perhaps in setting the tone for the present.

People look at this business report and claim it’s bad. They didn’t claim it was bad 8 years ago. They claim it’s bad now. I say that businesses often have planned lulls and expectations. No one in the stock world is saying that Guild Wars 2 is performing below expectation and if no one is saying it, it’s probably not.

BlueZone.4236:

Shockwave.1230:

BlueZone.4236:

Vayne.8563:

But if they do, then this is about what I’d expect, just as WoW always loses a big number of players before it’s expansions.

That’s wrong about WoW “always loses a big number of players before it’s expansions”. There’s only been four expansions released, the subscription numbers had been increasing up to the end of Cataclysm where it peaked.
Vanilla -> BC = increasing
BC – >WotLK = increasing
WotLK -> Cata = unknown
Cata -> MoP = yes, drop before gaining

I doubt ANet is working on an expansion. They’ve already got their plates full.

The way I interpreted that was WoW does expansions when they’re losing big numbers of subscribers.

COuld be wrong

That still doesn’t make sense since the first two expansion were announced where it showed no sign of losing subscribers.

Yes back when it was the only game in town or almost the only game in town. This is today and I’m talking about MMOs today and what’s happening wtih WoW this days. Much more competition now. So of course, if content gets old, people that like MMOs play another one.

kta.6502:

Be assured GW2 is not the first MMORPG title to run into problems with the fans either. ESO is having similar problems. Warhammer & Age of Conan had these problems during their run. .

ftfy. Every MMORPG I’ve ever seen runs into trouble with its forum posters.

Sube Dai.8496:

Vayne.8563:

Player.2475:

I had a fair amount of Knight’s stuff, though I guess doing this on my ranger was probably the cause of it. Build was just a kitten hybrid between damage & defense with whatever traits the new trait system allowed this new character to get.
I’ve completed it, though I had to emerge completely naked as victor, seeing as all my armor was broken.

Edit: I picked up on its patterns quickly – the adds were what just got me down almost instantly.
I was just wondering if every class had as many problems with this as my ranger did – or if it’s advised to do this with a party rather than alone.

Rangers don’t have a lot of condition removal and almost all of those guys use poison. If you have a lot of toughness, that doesn’t help against poison at all. Only vitality would. Your best bet is still to kill things fast in there.

My ranger used greatword and shortbow in there, jumping in when I could get a bunch of vines at once.

When the Modrem thrasher or leecher spawns, you need to get that down as fast as possible.

With the wolves you have to make sure you’re always facing them. They once shot you. If you see a wolf prioritize it and face it until it’s dead.

There’s a corridor where some attacks won’t hit you as much, a longer arm off the main strip. It’s a good place to retreat to avoid taking on more than you can handle at once.

Ranger’s have heaps of condition removal…EB, SoR, HS, SoTF, Brown Bear…

I guess I got used to my guardian, which removes conditions every time I shout.

BlueZone.4236:

Vayne.8563:

But if they do, then this is about what I’d expect, just as WoW always loses a big number of players before it’s expansions.

That’s wrong about WoW “always loses a big number of players before it’s expansions”. There’s only been four expansions released, the subscription numbers had been increasing up to the end of Cataclysm where it peaked.
Vanilla -> BC = increasing
BC – >WotLK = increasing
WotLK -> Cata = unknown
Cata -> MoP = yes, drop before gaining

I doubt ANet is working on an expansion. They’ve already got their plates full.

We’ll see. The guy from massively came to the same conclusion I did.

phys.7689:

Vayne.8563:

Genlog.4983:

Vayne.8563:

Genlog.4983:

SWTOR have a better model what i like to see here to players that are premium get more out of this game but then again that game is F2P with allot of restrictions

so you are forced in a way to be a premium and it seems allot do that
so its rely up to how players how they want to spend there real cash ??

GW2 is B2P they sold many copies but will they stile gain money after that ??

Yes, they’ll still gain money after that. If you go the way SWToR goes you’ll have a much smaller player base. People will, rightfully, see it as a betrayal and walk away.

true but its always hard for a companie to keep it good running its not cheap
to run a companie with so many pll that work there

It’s why they have a business plan and it’s why they have contingency plans. NcSoft and Anet aren’t new companies. They’re doing fine. Not spectacular, but fine. The way it is now, if they could keep this up, it’s maintainable.

But if they’re working on an expansion in the background, as some of us suspect, fixing the core game now (as in this feature patch) is really something important and takes on another context altogether.

I used to manage a store that made most of it’s money in five months out of the year. Seven months out of the year, we did quite badly, particularly over the summer months. Any quarterly report over the summer made us look really bad. Doesn’t meany anything because companies have to think ahead to longer than quarters.

what quarter do you expect to pick up revenue? for anet i mean. Barring an expansion my guess is it will soon fall behind blade and soul.

It doesn’t work that way.

Let’s say that Anet is planning an expansion to be released in March of next year. They don’t NEED to make more and more profit until then. They need to make enough profit to get TO them.

In my old business it was a quarter by quarter thing. For MMOs it’s a release to expansion type thing.

For a two year old game that has no expansion even announced, this game is doing fine. I mean during five years of development they had high expenses and no income until the preorder, right? That was four years into development.

So now they’re doing fine, and have to last with the income they have until the expansion whenever it is.

If they don’t have an expansion planned, or some big plan to get new players in/old players back, then you’re right. But if they do, then this is about what I’d expect, just as WoW always loses a big number of players before it’s expansions.

The numbers don’t work unless an expansion is coming. If there is one coming, they work fine.

Genlog.4983:

Vayne.8563:

Genlog.4983:

SWTOR have a better model what i like to see here to players that are premium get more out of this game but then again that game is F2P with allot of restrictions

so you are forced in a way to be a premium and it seems allot do that
so its rely up to how players how they want to spend there real cash ??

GW2 is B2P they sold many copies but will they stile gain money after that ??

Yes, they’ll still gain money after that. If you go the way SWToR goes you’ll have a much smaller player base. People will, rightfully, see it as a betrayal and walk away.

true but its always hard for a companie to keep it good running its not cheap
to run a companie with so many pll that work there

It’s why they have a business plan and it’s why they have contingency plans. NcSoft and Anet aren’t new companies. They’re doing fine. Not spectacular, but fine. The way it is now, if they could keep this up, it’s maintainable.

But if they’re working on an expansion in the background, as some of us suspect, fixing the core game now (as in this feature patch) is really something important and takes on another context altogether.

I used to manage a store that made most of it’s money in five months out of the year. Seven months out of the year, we did quite badly, particularly over the summer months. Any quarterly report over the summer made us look really bad. Doesn’t meany anything because companies have to think ahead to longer than quarters.

Genlog.4983:

SWTOR have a better model what i like to see here to players that are premium get more out of this game but then again that game is F2P with allot of restrictions

so you are forced in a way to be a premium and it seems allot do that
so its rely up to how players how they want to spend there real cash ??

GW2 is B2P they sold many copies but will they stile gain money after that ??

Yes, they’ll still gain money after that. If you go the way SWToR goes you’ll have a much smaller player base. People will, rightfully, see it as a betrayal and walk away.

Kurrilino.2706:

Glory.1493:

Kurrilino.2706:

Ok.. here is some break down from someone who comes from the financial sector.

A downgrade from 30 to 25 million is not slight downgrade.
It is a little under 5%

For people who don’t care it is not looking too much.
But if we keep in mind that the chinese launch created at least 6 million more accounts
this number is devastating.
I don’t know how many of them are really active but the fact that GW2 accounts almost doubled and create 5 million $ less is a horrible sign for the financial
aspect of the game and raises red flags.

I agree with most poster here who say the Gem Store items are incredible bad
and even if you want to spend money you can’t find something you like.
The game taking the opposite direction to what the fans want isn’t helping either.

if u check the report again u will find the chinese launch does not account in the 25million of Q2, its account for loyalty fee which is prepaid to ncsoft maybe in 2013.and report did say thanks to Wildstar in EU/NA and gw2 launch in china blah blah blah.there is a growth in whole of gw2 for ncsoft but not in the 25million cuz it doesnt make sense if they put china release into 25million and said thanks to it we get 25million from gw2 and it help us increase revenue but its not as much as it sold in Q1

Wait a minute… maybe i haven’t been clear.

This report DOESN’T include Chinas box sales.
But it includes all transactions made at the Gem Store.
And that also includes chinese accounts buying there.

So it’s not ajust a slight drop in gem store sales, it’s also dropping wiht having more active accounts.
That is what i tried to point out.
And if the number who are rumored are correct and NC-Soft just sold 1 million
accounts in china we are in trouble.
I expected at least around 6 millions

We are NOT in trouble. We’re not even close to being in trouble. Considering we’re at this point probably the second most profitable product in NCsoft’s stable, there’s no problem.

There’s a huge difference between being a runaway success and being in trouble.

It’s like saying we don’t have 7 million subscribers like WoW, so we’re in trouble.

We’re hit expectations, and that’s what matters in business. And if this really just laying the foundation for an expansion as I suspect it is, then there’s no problem at all.

Tachenon.5270:

Vayne.8563:

I don’t really see how that affects my enjoyment of the game, because I don’t really know a difference. It’s a bow, it fires an arrow.

One guy was complaining that pine is a soft wood not hard wood and we shouldn’t get hard wood from pine. He’s undoubtedly right.

Do most people care? I don’t think so.

Edit: Keep in mind you can kill a deer and get armor and weapons from it.

Once upon a time in STO, people (myself included) pointed out that a particular Starfleet starship didn’t have the proper red (port) and green (starboard) navigation lights. It was fixed, because the devs working on the ships at the time actually cared enough to want to get it right.

Star Trek is it’s own thing. Odds are a big percentage of the player base are trekkies, as opposed to this game where a big percentage aren’t archers.

Had to compare the situations.

phys.7689:

morrolan.9608:

The big surprise of this report is how badly Wildstar did on startup, seemingly only 500K players bought the game (compared to GW2s 3m and swtors 2m), and it has had significant population decline since then. GW2 has held up probably due its free to play status and the disappointments of WS and ESO. For all that swtor is doing better than it financially.

honestly gw2, and swtor were way higher than what is generally expected from MMOs in general.

if wildstars earnings are only showing for part of june, it may not have done too bad earning wise. Future earning reports will give a better picture.

I don’t think so. They’ve opened up free transfers until they can create a mega server.

Wildstar play hours are significantly down in July compared to June according to Raptr.

morrolan.9608:

The big surprise of this report is how badly Wildstar did on startup, seemingly only 500K players bought the game (compared to GW2s 3m and swtors 2m), and it has had significant population decline since then. GW2 has held up probably due its free to play status and the disappointments of WS and ESO. For all that swtor is doing better than it financially.

Sure because SWToR is basically a subscription game. You can’t do most of the game without actually subscribing. The “optional” subscription is pretty much a necessary subscription for anyone who doesn’t play it as a single player game. If you’re going to continue on with it, you’re subscribing.

Comparing a game with even an optional subscription to a game that has none is really not that good, which is why the meta data people always put SWToR and Guild Wars 2 on separate lists.

However if you factor in GW 2’s profit from that report into the sub game, we’re roughly the #5 MMO in profit at this time.

Stiofan.6720:

Same ol Vayne, Man you love them arguments, Every one of your posts is basically you arguing with someone else haha. Do you never win any arguments with the misses you have to come on here and take out all your arguing frustration on us poor folks on the forums. lol

That would imply I’m winning arguments here.

I do enjoy a good debate. But that’s not really my point here. I don’t argue just to argue.

I say that Anet has metrics. I say this because I’ve seen them say it and because we’ve seen them demonstrate it.

I say that Anet has a better idea of how many people do stuff than we do.

I say they probably make decisions at least in part using that data.

If there’s anything here you’d like to contradict, feel free..

Oh and I’m too smart to argue with my wife. lol

Stiofan.6720:

Windsagio.1340:

Stiofan.6720:

I can’t remember arenanet doing a poll asking players if they like hard content or not.

A poll would automatically be ccorrupted. Beyond campaigning, the other piece is that these groups are far more vocal than the other groups.

~~~

A few points though:
1) Anet knows who does what, and how often.
2) Anet is de-emphasizing further development of this kind of content.

They want their game to be successful and to get the greatest return of improvements for their investment. The fact that they’ve decided to not focus on that stuff right now shows they know what players want to do based on their actual actions as compared to forum noise.

So you are saying arenanet actively monitors what everyone is doing all the time (doubt it) even if that was true you are missing something important, in gw2 there is no real hard content apart from fotm 50, so everyone is always doing easy content (its basically the only content there is), so then anet looks at the data and it says oh look nearly 100% of all the players are always doing easy content that must mean they love it.

If it was 50/50 hard/easy content and nobody ever did they hard content then you’d have a point. But since guild wars 2 is almost 100% easy content your argument is flawed.

Maybe arenanet is playing a some sort of sick joke mimicking the de-evolution of man?

Guild wars 1 has challenging content that made you think about strategy.

Guild wars 2 has simple content that makes you think about all the pretty colours.

Guild wars 3 will probably be cartoons.

You guys should watch the movie ‘Idiocracy (2006)’ its seriously like looking into the future.

First of all they don’t have to monitor it “at all times”. They have software which tracks it at all times. They get numbers and totals.

They have put harder content in the game. My guess is even new hard content is under-utilized. What if they put in TA Aetherblade path and only 20% of the game’s population ever finished it and only 25% have ever attempted it.

That’s a lot of resources when 75% of the population hasn’t entered at all. Yes I’m making these numbers up, they could be completely wrong. But my point is that Anet DOES have those numbers and if you think they don’t, you don’t know Anet.

Illuminati.2431:

Vayne.8563:

But I bet I’ve spent as much time in Tyria as most people in this thread.

Standing AFK somewhere in Tyria while ranting and preaching on the forums isn’t spending time in Tyria.
Ranting and preaching in[insert random map here]chat, isn’t spending time in Tyria.

I play actively with my guild during the day and barely post here. But at night (I’m in Australia) most of my guild is sleeping and I post here a lot while doing other stuff.

You can do that when you’re retired.

Player.2475:

I had a fair amount of Knight’s stuff, though I guess doing this on my ranger was probably the cause of it. Build was just a kitten hybrid between damage & defense with whatever traits the new trait system allowed this new character to get.
I’ve completed it, though I had to emerge completely naked as victor, seeing as all my armor was broken.

Edit: I picked up on its patterns quickly – the adds were what just got me down almost instantly.
I was just wondering if every class had as many problems with this as my ranger did – or if it’s advised to do this with a party rather than alone.

Rangers don’t have a lot of condition removal and almost all of those guys use poison. If you have a lot of toughness, that doesn’t help against poison at all. Only vitality would. Your best bet is still to kill things fast in there.

My ranger used greatword and shortbow in there, jumping in when I could get a bunch of vines at once.

When the Modrem thrasher or leecher spawns, you need to get that down as fast as possible.

With the wolves you have to make sure you’re always facing them. They once shot you. If you see a wolf prioritize it and face it until it’s dead.

There’s a corridor where some attacks won’t hit you as much, a longer arm off the main strip. It’s a good place to retreat to avoid taking on more than you can handle at once.

If he’s doing that he’s 80. You can’t do that if you’re not. Yes, this can be done with a party and it’s a lot more fun. My guild does living story stuff together, and even personal story stuff together.

Keep in mind stuff does scale when more people are in the mix.

Also what profession are you and what is your build?

tigirius.9014:

Vayne.8563:

Zardul.3952:

Vayne.8563:

Zardul.3952:

i would suggest Anet open up a public test realm. where we can test out new maps and traits and content.

the amount of feedback can give Anet a Plan of attack for bugs and problems before it has rolled out..

which in the long run.. keeps players… which keeps profits.

you really need to think outside the box to retain players

Actually it wouldn’t work for this game for a lot of reasons. First among them is that there’s no real time in the schedule for it.

how would you know if it did or didn’t work.
you dont work at ANET.

i think it would be a very good idea to test things that need feedback. and it would stop all the exploits before they roll out.. players wouldn’t moan as much and people would actually enjoy the game a little better.

which is all good for profits.

I don’t have to be a dev to see logic. They’re putting out content relatively quickly even if you think they’re not. They dn’t have time to get fans to test it and react to that testing without completely altering their schedule.

Everyone wants content NOW. Not three four months later. It will not work for this game, and I don’t have to be an Anet employee (even though I wish I were lol) to know this.

Actually that too is false, plenty of games out there with the F2P models have 3-4 month schedules for content releases, have PTA systems of testing to emphasize quality rather than quantity, AND still maintain a very large international playerbase without having restricted every single aspect of the new patches coming out. I suggest that you take a look at those systems so that you too can see since you claim that you have a grasp of logic, why these systems have not only been successful but been repeated over and over again throughout the lives of these games and game systems.

Yes, all those free to play games that use them are massively successful. Every one of them.

There’s no doubt in my mind that successful games use PTRs. There’s also no doubt it my mind that some unsuccessful games have used them.

I’m not really sure what you’re trying to prove, but it’s not going to work here, and it’s not going to happen here, and it sure as hell didn’t help EotM which was my point. It was tested to death by WvW people who are now trying to disown it.

I don’t really see how that affects my enjoyment of the game, because I don’t really know a difference. It’s a bow, it fires an arrow.

One guy was complaining that pine is a soft wood not hard wood and we shouldn’t get hard wood from pine. He’s undoubtedly right.

Do most people care? I don’t think so.

Edit: Keep in mind you can kill a deer and get armor and weapons from it.

Zardul.3952:

Vayne.8563:

Zardul.3952:

i would suggest Anet open up a public test realm. where we can test out new maps and traits and content.

the amount of feedback can give Anet a Plan of attack for bugs and problems before it has rolled out..

which in the long run.. keeps players… which keeps profits.

you really need to think outside the box to retain players

Actually it wouldn’t work for this game for a lot of reasons. First among them is that there’s no real time in the schedule for it.

how would you know if it did or didn’t work.
you dont work at ANET.

i think it would be a very good idea to test things that need feedback. and it would stop all the exploits before they roll out.. players wouldn’t moan as much and people would actually enjoy the game a little better.

which is all good for profits.

I don’t have to be a dev to see logic. They’re putting out content relatively quickly even if you think they’re not. They dn’t have time to get fans to test it and react to that testing without completely altering their schedule.

Everyone wants content NOW. Not three four months later. It will not work for this game, and I don’t have to be an Anet employee (even though I wish I were lol) to know this.

Zardul.3952:

i would suggest Anet open up a public test realm. where we can test out new maps and traits and content.

the amount of feedback can give Anet a Plan of attack for bugs and problems before it has rolled out..

which in the long run.. keeps players… which keeps profits.

you really need to think outside the box to retain players

Actually it wouldn’t work for this game for a lot of reasons. First among them is that there’s no real time in the schedule for it.

tigirius.9014:

Vayne.8563:

tigirius.9014:

Tachenon.5270:

Vayne.8563:

Zenith.7301:

Goldberg.4831:

While I may have had my ups and downs in the last 2 years of this game, and may not always agree on the changes within the game or the gem store. I have to say as a consumer and one who has tried a wide range of MMO’s (I get bored easy), Areanet has the best subscription model hands down. Thank you for respecting me as a gamer first and a consumer second. If you don’t believe me check out what Trion is doing to archeage, 15/dollars a month for patron status, and locking crafting mats behind the p2w store.

So let’s hear it for all those happy the b2p model.

You mean this game isn’t p2w with precursors doubling in price from when I left at 600g now to 1200-1400g? lol

You’re pathetically deluded, they just put in a metric ton of gold grinds that are a roundabout way of getting people to buy gems to convert to gold on their store.

All new skins on this game have not come from content but the gem store as well. I’m willing to bet this model makes them a lot more money.

Do you live on some basement? 15 bucks a month is chump change. 2 visits to McDonald’s by yourself will cost you more, and that’s money you crap down in a couple of hours as opposed to a sub game whose content you enjoy for thousands of hours.

If you feel getting a legendary is winning, you’ll feel this game is pay to win. But there are a whole lot of cool skins you can get a lot easier than legendaries.

The pay to win, in this case, is strictly a matter of perception.

I really don’t get the I must have a legendary to play this game crowd.

Yeah, there are quite a few ‘mundane’ skins I like better than many of the legendaries, plus they don’t leave behind those silly footprints!

Same here. I could care less about legendaries I like the open world champ/boss models and the reputation ones. Those were the most fun on my Guardian for example!

However, even though there is a problem with previous promises concerning precursor acquisition I’m more concerned about the ongoing lack of rewards in the overall game. The majority of players login because of the carrot on a stick, and I’m one of them. If you don’t have goodies that are reachable in a reasonable time frame then it becomes boring a chore or a second job none of which is positive.

So there is ample room for improvement regarding sigils/runes, rewards, and loot changes.

I know a lot of people log in because of the carrot on the stick but I’m no way sure it’s a majority of the players.

Everything else you said I pretty much agree with. The rewards need to be more interesting.

I’d like to introduce you to a game, it’s called World of Warcraft. They keep players coming back because of said carrot. If that carrot was not there, there would be no millions of players. Psychologists and sociologists have written dozens of papers on this game for years because of it’s system.

Yep and this game is different for a reason.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Vayne.8563:

Zardul.3952:

in 2015 , without any changes for Gw2. the profits will decline further.

you cannot expect people to stay interested when Change is not occurring at a certain level of interest to players time invested in the game.

Anet really need to think about Expansions and Real NEW content that holds up.

MAYBE… Public BETA tests could better help this game improve and thus improve Profits.

They had a public test of EoTM and look where that got them.

The most popular and populated map in the game?

That the WvW people absolutely cant’ stand and rail against. They created it and tested it with WvWer’s and no one saw what it would become.

WvWers will say they’ve got no content since launch. I say, what about an entire map. They all just laugh.

EotM is not really serving the function it was made to serve.

tigirius.9014:

Vayne.8563:

tigirius.9014:

Vayne.8563:

Zardul.3952:

in 2015 , without any changes for Gw2. the profits will decline further.

you cannot expect people to stay interested when Change is not occurring at a certain level of interest to players time invested in the game.

Anet really need to think about Expansions and Real NEW content that holds up.

MAYBE… Public BETA tests could better help this game improve and thus improve Profits.

They had a public test of EoTM and look where that got them.

That’s a farse. You can have a restricted public test complete with an NDA and not have a single issue. STO is doing that right now with their newest ships to prevent the new stats from being released prior to when they have them complete. Just because Anet chooses not to use the tried and true method in no way makes their system superior.

Or have your forgotten the number of “balance” patches they’ve released that have had draconian systems put in without a single actual player testing them prior to release which incidentally broke some aspect of the game. ie. Kit Refinement.

They had a public test of EotM with thousands of of people, dozens of guilds. I was part of that test. They had their own forums and they invited WvW guilds to that test. They made changes to EoTM based on fan comments.

You can say all you want that it wasn’t public..but opening up a WvW test to like Joe Pve probably wouldn’t have done much good. And even then, my guild is mostly a PvE guild and we were there.

I don’t have to say anything, the entire history of mmo development speaks volumes for itself as using the PTA is always superior to having closed testing with less than 100 people from inside the company who couldn’t possibly say anything negative or give concerns lest their job be threatened. It’s always been like that.

I can’t argue with that. Not because you’re right, but because you’re so locked into your opinion that there’s not much point.

I don’t agree that it makes a better game, though it probably removes some bugs. It also ruins things by taking away anything that might surprise.

tigirius.9014:

Vayne.8563:

Zardul.3952:

in 2015 , without any changes for Gw2. the profits will decline further.

you cannot expect people to stay interested when Change is not occurring at a certain level of interest to players time invested in the game.

Anet really need to think about Expansions and Real NEW content that holds up.

MAYBE… Public BETA tests could better help this game improve and thus improve Profits.

They had a public test of EoTM and look where that got them.

That’s a farse. You can have a restricted public test complete with an NDA and not have a single issue. STO is doing that right now with their newest ships to prevent the new stats from being released prior to when they have them complete. Just because Anet chooses not to use the tried and true method in no way makes their system superior.

Or have your forgotten the number of “balance” patches they’ve released that have had draconian systems put in without a single actual player testing them prior to release which incidentally broke some aspect of the game. ie. Kit Refinement.

They had a public test of EotM with thousands of of people, dozens of guilds. I was part of that test. They had their own forums and they invited WvW guilds to that test. They made changes to EoTM based on fan comments.

You can say all you want that it wasn’t public..but opening up a WvW test to like Joe Pve probably wouldn’t have done much good. And even then, my guild is mostly a PvE guild and we were there.

Illuminati.2431:

Vayne.8563:

Illuminati.2431:

Vayne.8563:

But I bet I’ve spent as much time in Tyria as most people in this thread.

Standing AFK somewhere in Tyria while ranting and preaching on the forums isn’t spending time in Tyria.
Ranting and preaching in[insert random map here]chat, isn’t spending time in Tyria.

Check the achievement point total and then comment.

Sarcasm mode was on. Sorry, should I have said that literally?
And achievmentpoints say absolutely NOTHING in this game.

But if you have 19,500 achievement points, it’s hard to say I’m only on the forums and not playing. And if you watch them for a week at a time, you’ll see them go up by more than the daily. How does that not tell you something?

tigirius.9014:

Illuminati.2431:

Vayne.8563:

But I bet I’ve spent as much time in Tyria as most people in this thread.

Standing AFK somewhere in Tyria while ranting and preaching on the forums isn’t spending time in Tyria.
Ranting and preaching in[insert random map here]chat, isn’t spending time in Tyria.

It really doesn’t matter how much people play the validity of their arguments their points or their concerns are not determined by the number of times or how long they stay logged in each weak. That’s a weak and fallacious argument at best.

This is true to a point. However, if a person is removed from the game for a longer period of time, and the conversation has moved on and the game has moved on, their comments eventually are less relevant.

For example, someone who hasn’t played since the middle of Season 1 might be complaining about temporary content. That’s not happening now. The content we do get is permanent.

Yes, it’s annoying that it happened then, but complaining about it now has a whole lot less relevance.

Illuminati.2431:

Vayne.8563:

But I bet I’ve spent as much time in Tyria as most people in this thread.

Standing AFK somewhere in Tyria while ranting and preaching on the forums isn’t spending time in Tyria.
Ranting and preaching in[insert random map here]chat, isn’t spending time in Tyria.

Check the achievement point total and then comment.

holodoc.5748:

B2P (“buy to play”) is essentially nothing more than clever marketing. It tries to clearly distinguish the product from the over-saturated and often hated F2P market by rebranding it but B2P has been actually around for ages. Every game you ever bought was and still is B2P but when you say “an MMO is B2P” it sounds classy and better. And that’s the whole point of the marketing strategy for games like GW2.

What exactly is GW2? It’s B2P but only for the initial content you get served once you buy the game. Everything after that follows a clear F2P model which aims at keeping players in-game for the sole purpose of giving them more incentive to use the Gem shop.

“But, but, but… In Guild Wars 2 you get free content!?” Well you get free content in F2P games too, don’t you? There are literally dozens of F2P games which have regular patches and content additions. So how exactly is B2P superior to the F2P model? It is superior, but only for the publisher which not only gets all the benefits of the F2P model but also earns an extra bit with putting a price tag on the game itself.

Is it wrong to do it then? No. The content you get when you purchase the game is clearly worth the money. However, people do need to realize that after a couple of months they should not consider the game as B2P anymore because it starts to show all the characteristics of a classic F2P.

P.S. Subscription based games do have their share of advantages. I.e. if you play Eve online once you log in you will actually feel like a first-class citizen. Nothing is withheld from you. You don’t have to buy anything although you have a choice to use real money in order to get some vanity stuff (which almost nobody does anyway). And that feels great. Additionally developers have a steady income of money which they can use to regularly release new patches and expansions. You don’t feel like playing or get bored? Simply pause your subscription and resume paying it once you feel the need to play.

I’m with you on the Eve Online thing. Thank goodness that $90 monocle didn’t work out, huh?

VOLTCIEAGE.3029:

Vayne.8563:

Stiofan.6720:

Vayne you make alot of bold claims about the gw2 playerbase saying things like most players hate hard content and that most players would never do it, I would love to know where you get your facts and figures from.

Long long experience with MMOs. The hardest core MMOs always have the lowest populations. Devs over the years have said tons of things on this subject, including some Guild Wars devs.

The most recent quote was from a lotro dev who claimed less than 10% of the population PvP and raided…not just recently but since inception. It’s not much different than many devs have claimed over the years. Maybe not exact percentages, but we’ve always had some idea that the hardest content is only finished by a small percentage of players.

For every competitive person out there, there’s someone just banging around in the open world killing stuff.

Logically speaking, if it were otherwise, why would MMOs keep dumbing things down more and more over the years.

10% of population but is it playerbase which plays everyday or 10% of people who bought game ? cause in every MMO around 50% people are gone after 3 months from release . I play now more dc universe and I will never agree with your 10% , it is much easier to find group on t6 content then on t3 . But anyway all stats in gw2 right now dont make any sense .all players who wanted content,challenge left this game 1,5 year ago and only casuals are left . Anet will never ever fix this game becasue 1 hardcore dung without rewards is not gona bring thousands hardcore players to their game .

I appreciate your point of view. I simply don’t agree with it.

The 10% population quote from from EQ. He said 10% of people did PvP and raids, and 50% of the forum posts were about raids. That tells me something.

This was a dev who no longer worked for the company, but he was explaining to people why the company didn’t include the usual raids in the current expansion. As he was no longer working there, he had less reason to lie, even though he was defending what the company did.

The devs of the company said, look just forget about that figure, we support all our players…but they never actually said the figure was wrong. But this only applies to Guild Wars 2.

Now, when it comes down to harder or easier to get a group for the current raid or an old raid, or instance, that’s not really the point. The point is is that many people simply don’t raid at all. It’s always easier in a game to get a group for current content, because the raiding people are actually concentrating on that, so they’re all in the same place.

But a big percentage of players solo and never group at all. Don’t go into dungeons, don’t go into raids. They don’t even PvP.

Not everyone is looking after a day of work to be ultra challenged. The age of the average gamer is going up, not down. People have families and lives and responsibilies and tend, eventually, to play more casually. The age of the average gamer is over 30 now. I’m 52. I don’t raid. I have raided. It’s not something I enjoy, so I don’t do it.

But I bet I’ve spent as much time in Tyria as most people in this thread.

Aliven.4056:

@Vayne
Oh i know they are aware lots of people dont like the new traits, they are not blind. Im just saying they dont give a crap about this as long as people play. Hell i see posts here that say “i dont like it but will play regardless”. So they get a message “we dont like it” from this topic and yet nearly everyone is still playing, and sometimes even make a new character to play. Spend gems. What that say to them?
Hmm they dont like it but nothing changed, 5 months and they still playing.
Actions, not words will make a difference.

Sure if people don’t play, they’ll change SOMETHING, but if they don’t know what that something is, the action becomes meaningless.

Suppose a bunch of people lay down in front of city hall, self-gagged and never said what they were protesting.

Then their protest would gain no traction.

Not playing won’t specifically help your cause. It will only indicate that Anet has less people playing without knowing specifically why they’re not playing.

Since Anet is looking into fixing the new system (or they said they will), I don’t see the point of not playing. It won’t aid the cause because Anet will never know that’s why you’re not playing.

Doggie.3184:

Vayne.8563:

Doggie.3184:

“Not Viable” in this context means that it’s weaker/not as useful as other builds and weapon sets.

The actual definition of the word viable is: capable of working successfully

Since you can use all manner of builds to successfully complete content (albeit less efficiently), viable is the wrong word to use. That’s all.

I understand what people mean when they use it. It’s still the wrong word.

A word’s meaning can change depending on how the person is using it. Specific people who share their interest or know that person well enough will understand their meaning and it wont be wrong to them. This is one reason why Urban dictionary exists. =/

This is true and not true. I keep trying to explain this very point to people.

The whole point of language is to get a point across. If you’re using a word that can be interpreted more than one way, you simply can’t expect people to run to dictionaries to look it up. Therefore if there’s a better or more preferential way to use a word, you’re better off using it that way.

We can clearly see from this thread that when you use the word viable, you’re not necessarily saying the same thing than if someone else uses it. That makes it the wrong word to use, not because it can’t possibly mean what you want it to mean, but because the entire meaning of what you’re trying to get across will suddenly come into question.

Illuminati.2431:

Vayne.8563:

Since you and are won’t agree on this, I guess we can just leave it up to other people to decide what they believe is the truth.

Agreed.

But do you know what the problem is? You add absolutely NOTHING to a discussion. I’ve read your comments on several topics, and the only thing you do is bluntly said: You say this, I think you are wrong and this is why. And then you rant about everything. That adds absolutely NOTHING to a discussion. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely don’t mind it if someone doesn’t agree with me. It’s only human for people to not agree with each other. But this is a discussion. I see other people that don’t agree with me, they give counterarguments and then come up with different solutions to the issue where this topic is created for. You think everything is fine just the way it is, and you have to say it to everyone. From the first post we noticed you don’t agree with ‘us’ that like to see some changes in the game. Post about it 1 time, thats fine. but now the only thing you do is counterargument EVERYONE who likes to see a change. You add absolutely nothing to a discussion, the only thing you are doing is stop a healthy discussion., you only counterargument, and thats it.

It’s funny because some of the devs think I do add to discussions. It’s just that I don’t necessarily add what you want to them.

There’s certainly no doubt that a percentage of people want harder content in this game. It adds to the discussion to discuss how big a percentage that is, whether or not you believe it does.

Because otherwise, people might just be left with the idea that everyone wants hard content, and I don’t believe that’s true.

I’ve also made points in threads about rewards being inexplicably linked to hard content. The TA Aetherblade path is hard content but people don’t do it because it doesn’t reward enough.

I pointed out that in other games, the highest rewards are given to the hardest dungeons, making people force themselves to do content they don’t really enjoy. I’ve seen it happen.

So I don’t believe the devs are going to want to provide much better or more desireable rewards for hard content. If they make it too valuable they pressure people to do that content.

But I do understand that you feel I add nothing to the conversation. I’m glad other people have felt I do, including some people who disagree with me.

There are eight dungeons with at least four paths each, but no one really counts story mode, so figure 3 paths each…in addition to Fractals.

The dungeons are layered to around 1 every 10 levels starting at level 30 with explorable mode opening on the 5.

So at level 30 you can do Ascalonian Catacombs story mode and at level 35 you can do Ascalonian Catacombs explorable modes (but I’d way till you’re higher to try it in explorable mode).

At level 40 you can do Caudecaus’ Manor and at 45 you can do explorable mode of the dungeon.

It goes like that all the way to level 80.

Fractals generally take longer to run than most dungeon paths. How much time depends on what level fractals you’re running as do the rewards. But if you’re playing this game just for rewards, you’ll probably end up having a hard time.

The hardest dungeons outside of the fractals are Arah, all four paths, and the Twlight Arbor Aetherpath all of which are level 80.

Illuminati.2431:

Vayne.8563:

Stiofan.6720:

Are you seriously trying to tell me that most players in gw1 ignored the hard content like uw,fow,deep,urgoz,hm? LMAO remember im a real gw1 vet. gw1 was the only game I played for almost 6 years straight. Vayne be honest did you really play gw1 before gw2 was released. Also It would of been nice if arenanet made it more clear that gw2 would be aimed soley at casuals before release. But to be honest I don’t really care anymore I have stopped playing gw2, I’ll check these forums every so often to see if they make any real changes before trying it again. vayne please never compare gw2 to gw1, any real gw1 vet can see that gw2 is just a money grab on gw1’s good name.

Look at my Hall of Monuments, or would you like me to show you my GWAMM title in game.

Yes people played those areas, but how many by percentage? How would you know how many people didn’t play those areas.

It’s so easy to go into Temple of Ages and see all the people standing around finding parties. But what percent of the population did those people actually represent.

I would never compare Guild Wars 2 to Guild Wars 1. That’s because one of them is an MMO and one of them is a CoRPG.

However, I will generalize that in most games from what I’ve seen, most people don’t do the hardest content.

And if you don’t want to believe it, that’s okay with me. It seems to be widely accepted by a whole lot of people.

I heard Wildstar isn’t doing so well. And apparently it has good raids and dungeons. I wonder why.

So when a game has good raids and dungeons, but it’s doing bad, you automaticly assume that is the reason?

There are 10 million other factors if you like an MMO. I don’t like the style. Alot of my friends don’t like that style either. I am not fond of the classes. There are so many different things involved to determine if a game is doing good or not.

And yes, in GW1, the ‘hard’ content was the core. And even if it wasn’t the core, the basic things in GW1 were already 10x more challenging, ‘harder’, replayable than all this kitten we have in GW2. Like Stiofan said, if you really are a gw1 veteran you would know this. If you say otherwise, you cannot call yourself a veteran. That’s as a clear as that you can’t call yourself a gamer if you play farmville.

I beat every single instance in Guild Wars 1. Once. Well Fissure of Woe a few times. The Deep a couple of times. The other ones once. My wife and I beat DOA with six heroes (Three of hers, three of mine). I vanquished every area in hard mode.

But that wasn’t what kept me in the game and that’s not why I played it. So you’re saying I can’t call myself a veteran? And you can because you played different content.

Since you and are won’t agree on this, I guess we can just leave it up to other people to decide what they believe is the truth.

Zardul.3952:

in 2015 , without any changes for Gw2. the profits will decline further.

you cannot expect people to stay interested when Change is not occurring at a certain level of interest to players time invested in the game.

Anet really need to think about Expansions and Real NEW content that holds up.

MAYBE… Public BETA tests could better help this game improve and thus improve Profits.

They had a public test of EoTM and look where that got them.

Zardul.3952:

like most people have said.
its a steady decline and i would imagine its because of the content and updates being underwhelming and serious issues still in the game that need bug fixing.

the onyl way to stop a decline is to change your approach. the Cheese(money) is not always going to be there.

read the book " who moved my Cheese " its about how to deal with losing profits and money.

very common and popular business book

How much do you know about business plans?

It seems people think that every business has a plan where they continually make increased profits. This, however, isn’t the case.

My field was publishing. A book was expected to make most of the money it ever made in the first 90 days of sales. Most games are very similar. They make most of their money up front.

Of course subscription games make money every month based on the number of subscribers. Guild Wars 2 makes money on new sales, which should be relatively few after two years and the cash shop. That’s it.

It would be anticipated that sales would slow until some kind of expansion came out.

That’s more than likely what the business plan looks like.

Stiofan.6720:

Are you seriously trying to tell me that most players in gw1 ignored the hard content like uw,fow,deep,urgoz,hm? LMAO remember im a real gw1 vet. gw1 was the only game I played for almost 6 years straight. Vayne be honest did you really play gw1 before gw2 was released. Also It would of been nice if arenanet made it more clear that gw2 would be aimed soley at casuals before release. But to be honest I don’t really care anymore I have stopped playing gw2, I’ll check these forums every so often to see if they make any real changes before trying it again. vayne please never compare gw2 to gw1, any real gw1 vet can see that gw2 is just a money grab on gw1’s good name.

Look at my Hall of Monuments, or would you like me to show you my GWAMM title in game.

Yes people played those areas, but how many by percentage? How would you know how many people didn’t play those areas.

It’s so easy to go into Temple of Ages and see all the people standing around finding parties. But what percent of the population did those people actually represent.

I would never compare Guild Wars 2 to Guild Wars 1. That’s because one of them is an MMO and one of them is a CoRPG.

However, I will generalize that in most games from what I’ve seen, most people don’t do the hardest content.

And if you don’t want to believe it, that’s okay with me. It seems to be widely accepted by a whole lot of people.

I heard Wildstar isn’t doing so well. And apparently it has good raids and dungeons. I wonder why.

Stiofan.6720:

I can’t remember arenanet doing a poll asking players if they like hard content or not.

No Arenanet made a second game, after making a first game. The amount of hard content in the second game is far less than the first game.

Do you think they made it that way because most people in the first game enjoyed hard content? Or did they learn lessons from the first game and apply what they learned to the second?

Which do you think is more likely?

Stiofan.6720:

So you have a reliable source saying that in ‘guild wars 2’ (I don’t care about other mmos like lotro etc) only a very small minority of players like hard content? Can you link it pls.

I don’t have to link anything. I’m venturing an opinion that traditionally as in most MMOs, including games like Guild Wars 1 (which isn’t a true MMO) most of the hard content was ignored by most of the player base. It is possible Guild Wars 2 is a massive exception to that rule.

After all, this game was obviously designed for a hard core audience, testified too by all the quaggan backpacks and hylek hoodies that are sold in the store.

This game was aimed more at a casual audience. If you don’t believe it, look at what Anet is focusing on. So if the game is aimed at a casual audience, what are the odds, do you think that this game is the exception.

People make educated guesses all the time. I’m making an educated guess that most players who play Guild Wars 2 don’t play the hardest content.

Feel free to disagree if you wish, you’re certainly entitled to. There’s absolutely zero evidence I’m right.

Conversely there’s also zero evidence that I’m wrong.

Stiofan.6720:

Vayne you make alot of bold claims about the gw2 playerbase saying things like most players hate hard content and that most players would never do it, I would love to know where you get your facts and figures from.

Long long experience with MMOs. The hardest core MMOs always have the lowest populations. Devs over the years have said tons of things on this subject, including some Guild Wars devs.

The most recent quote was from a lotro dev who claimed less than 10% of the population PvP and raided…not just recently but since inception. It’s not much different than many devs have claimed over the years. Maybe not exact percentages, but we’ve always had some idea that the hardest content is only finished by a small percentage of players.

For every competitive person out there, there’s someone just banging around in the open world killing stuff.

Logically speaking, if it were otherwise, why would MMOs keep dumbing things down more and more over the years.

In some ways it’s easier to make money now than it was back then. But instead of coming back and thinking, must get a legendary, just get back into the game and play around and get some mats and gold and see what’s going on. People are farming foxfire clusters and making food. They’re farming Drytop and crafting clay pots. They’re running a range of dungeons.

No matter what you do, it’s going to be a long slog to get a legendary. So instead of making it THE focus of what you do, just work toward it slowly and see what happens.

A legendary is not the be all end all of this game. Making it so will mean when you get it you have nothing left to do.

Aliven.4056:

Just one more thing. If you dont like the new traits after april patch DONT PLAY. Really this is the only way we can show the company that we dont support their decision, its not like 47 pages and 2333 posts do any diference.
So if you dont like it, dont play. Show your lack off support. Dont make traffic.

This is an interesting suggestion with a couple of major flaws. By not playing after the April 15th patch, you give a clear message that you don’t like something (or you’ve decided to play ESO, which came out around then). Anet doesn’t necessarily credit the trait patch for the change in numbers and probably wouldn’t. Maybe people left over the megaserver after all. Some people hated it. Maybe they left because of other games.

And now, five months later, telling people not to play will tell Anet even less. It’s certain that if someone stops playing right now based on your post, Anet won’t automatically assume a change made five months ago is the reason.

If you think Anet doesn’t know people don’t like the trait changes, I don’t know what to tell you.

cheshirefox.7026:

seeing how arena net knows their agenda “a year in advance” i’m hoping they have something lore inspired and not just easter egg changes that a large number of players are simply going to overlook..

You could have lore drop from the sky in a heavy crate marked lore that kills your character and large numbers of players will still ignore it, in the same way they skip every cut scene they come across. Some people don’t care about lore at all.

I’ve been many players stumble over something interesting, after which they pick themselves up and continue on as though nothing as happened.

The best lore to me is the stuff that’s not in your face.

hannah mee.7925:

Vayne.8563:

Doggie.3184:

“Not Viable” in this context means that it’s weaker/not as useful as other builds and weapon sets.

The actual definition of the word viable is: capable of working successfully

Since you can use all manner of builds to successfully complete content (albeit less efficiently), viable is the wrong word to use. That’s all.

I understand what people mean when they use it. It’s still the wrong word.

Thanks for the replies, Vayne. I was just afraid I was being pedantic when I see people using the word, but apparently I’m not the only one who’s caught it. I know what they’re trying to say, but I feel like misusing a term like viable could really hurt a casual player who’s looking for simple advice without the fluff of marginalized gameplay tactics that are only situationally relevant.

The problem is that I’ve edited for a living and so word choice is really important to me. Everyone else’s mileage may vary.

As I’m often reminded, not everyone uses language formally or thinks about the nuances of words. I do all the time. So if you agree with me, you could still be pedantic. lol

tigirius.9014:

Tachenon.5270:

Vayne.8563:

Zenith.7301:

Goldberg.4831:

While I may have had my ups and downs in the last 2 years of this game, and may not always agree on the changes within the game or the gem store. I have to say as a consumer and one who has tried a wide range of MMO’s (I get bored easy), Areanet has the best subscription model hands down. Thank you for respecting me as a gamer first and a consumer second. If you don’t believe me check out what Trion is doing to archeage, 15/dollars a month for patron status, and locking crafting mats behind the p2w store.

So let’s hear it for all those happy the b2p model.

You mean this game isn’t p2w with precursors doubling in price from when I left at 600g now to 1200-1400g? lol

You’re pathetically deluded, they just put in a metric ton of gold grinds that are a roundabout way of getting people to buy gems to convert to gold on their store.

All new skins on this game have not come from content but the gem store as well. I’m willing to bet this model makes them a lot more money.

Do you live on some basement? 15 bucks a month is chump change. 2 visits to McDonald’s by yourself will cost you more, and that’s money you crap down in a couple of hours as opposed to a sub game whose content you enjoy for thousands of hours.

If you feel getting a legendary is winning, you’ll feel this game is pay to win. But there are a whole lot of cool skins you can get a lot easier than legendaries.

The pay to win, in this case, is strictly a matter of perception.

I really don’t get the I must have a legendary to play this game crowd.

Yeah, there are quite a few ‘mundane’ skins I like better than many of the legendaries, plus they don’t leave behind those silly footprints!

Same here. I could care less about legendaries I like the open world champ/boss models and the reputation ones. Those were the most fun on my Guardian for example!

However, even though there is a problem with previous promises concerning precursor acquisition I’m more concerned about the ongoing lack of rewards in the overall game. The majority of players login because of the carrot on a stick, and I’m one of them. If you don’t have goodies that are reachable in a reasonable time frame then it becomes boring a chore or a second job none of which is positive.

So there is ample room for improvement regarding sigils/runes, rewards, and loot changes.

I know a lot of people log in because of the carrot on the stick but I’m no way sure it’s a majority of the players.

Everything else you said I pretty much agree with. The rewards need to be more interesting.

Ian.1349:

Illuminati.2431:

I THINK, that is because it was the first serious hard content. You had to find out with trial and error. I think you get that point. GW2 players are so used to that everyone is said for them, they get explained EXACTLY what to do, and most of the times, when they have to do something, its spamming 1. Don’t get me wrong, I’m NOT saying you are one of those players. I’m just saying that MAYBE people got used to that easy bullkitten we get, and once there was something hard like world 2 tribulation mode, where the game doesn’t hold your hand anymore and you really have to find out the hard way, they don’t know what to do anymore. And yes, then you would feel like you needed to watch a tutorial. I’m not saying everything needs to be that hard, but just harder than the general content(on those rare occasions we actually get new content) we get right now.

Myself, and everyone I know that agrees with me we need more challenging content that can’t be done in 1 run, loved SAB world 2 tribulation. Not for its jumping, not for its 8 bit style, but because it was trial and error. It was diffecult and challenging, and we wouldn’t mind seeing more content that follow these principles.

I one hundred percent agree with you, which is why I am one of those people who is incredibly opposed to the recent changes to the downed state and weapon swapping levels. Instead of dumbing the game down for the player base, we should let people learn things the hard way. This game holds your hand basically the entire time you play it, with the exception of a few things, and as soon as things get tough, people don’t know what to do.

Vayne.8563:

Ian.1349:

I really don’t understand why this is even a debate. More challenging content should = higher rewards, less challenging content should = lesser rewards. It’s such a basic concept, anyone who is defending the current reward structure (which for whatever reason relies heavily on RNG for the more challenging content in the game, FoTM/Aether path/Teq/Wurm) is straight up stupid.

It’s a debate because it’s not written in stone. It’s how it’s done elsewhere. Doesn’t mostly seem to be how it’s done here.

That’s why it’s a debate.

One would assume it was done here for a reason. To put less pressure on people not to do content they don’t want to do.

I’m sorry you can’t understand something as simple as that. It’s really straight forward and it works for a reason. I don’t know what you have against trial by error and finally succeeding and being rewarded for your difficult efforts. It’s such a simple content.

You’re reminding me of why I don’t browse the forums often…

Well you should definitely stay away from any online forum if you don’t like to see disagreement because different people have different opinions about different things. A forum where only one thing is said and everyone agrees would probably get dull pretty soon.

Yes I understand the whole trial and error thing. I don’t enjoy the whole trial and error thing. And if it’s trial and error I know I’ll eventually get it, and it’s foregone conclusion.

I prefer puzzles to hand/eye coordination exercises but you don’t see them that much in most MMOs because once they’re up on Dulfy most people just look them up. They spend a couple of minutes, and give up.

I’d bang my head against a puzzle for hours until I solved even days sometimes…if I think the puzzle is an interesting one.

What I don’t like is dying and running back to try something, fighting through the same easy stuff over and over again to get to the point where I have to try it. I don’t like long runs back from waypoints in dungeons. They’re just there to punish. So if you die you have to run back but there’s no reason to make players do this. We know they can get that far, they already did.

So what’s acceptable to you is frustrating to me. I hated corpse runs in older games and didn’t play many because I hated corpse runs.

Some guy on reddit did a photo album of stuff that’s been changing all along. It’s very gradual, but stuff is definitely changing.