Guild Wars 2

BlaqueFyre.5678:

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Epic rewards should be gated behind epic content and similarly epic content should unlock epic rewards. On that basis, I think it’s reasonable to link raids and legendary armor.

However, I don’t agree with ANet’s choice to do so: they took one of the most requested rewards in the game and deliberately hid it behind content that already inspires controversy, because it already gates content & rewards behind a particular style of play.

They have done that since release…… the problem is now they didn’t gate the Rewards behind massive amounts of open world Pve

Open world PvE can be done by anybody. And people who came to this game that aren’t awesome gamers, or don’t have a lot of time, were able to get, pretty much, all the rewards. Maybe they miss a skin here or a minipet there, but not something on the level like legendary armor, which has no corresponding match in the game. There’s nothing else like it.

And this isn’t really a big deal to me. I used to think this game was tailored to me, and now I don’t. It’s not a big deal. I’m happy to go find other games to play. It doesn’t particularly bother me to move on from a game that changes. All games change over time. I’m just one guy.

The issue is the expectations were set by Anet for three years and the experience has now changed. Ask any writer, and they’ll all tell you the same thing. Change your genre, or tone or the type of story you’re writing late in the peace holds the greatest risk of losing the largest part of your readership. That’s just how it is.

I used to think that Anet felt the same way about the genre that I do. I no longer think that’s the case. Is that because I’ve been wrong all along? Maybe. Is it because the direction of the game changed? Maybe. Is it because of different devs coming in as the original devs are getting hired away by Amazon? Maybe.

The point is at one point the devs and this game were talking to me, and now they’re not, whether they say anything or not.

I’m not complaining or yelling or screaming. I’m calming stating that I’m just beginning to feel disenfranchised and I’m not going to be the only one who feels this way. How much it’ll affect the game will be determined by how many people feel like I do and the depths of those feelings.

iHeartbound.3074:

Black Iris Flowers.3418:

I never understood people that kittened about all the things HoT players get that they don’t as a free account. Literally the game is FREE, be happy with what you get when it’s practically a gift. As for the restriction being removed on holidays despite RMTs, holiday events are when they’d be the most active and would swarm.

I never understood why people like you don’t understand that I’m not complaining about what HoT does or gives. I said when they BLATANTLY make you try to buy it. That’s when it gets annoying is when it’s shoved on you. Besides that I don’t care. I own the game, but thanks for your concern. And if they swarmed that’s easy banning for Anet seeing as how they are rly active around festival time.

But since you can access the Labyrinth through the doors in the world, which is the main attraction of Halloween for most people and since leveling in the labyrinth is super fast, I still don’t feel the complaint has merit.

Edit: By the way, all advertising is blatantly trying to get people to buy your product. It’s when people do it covertly that there’s a problem. Of course a company is going to try to get you to buy their product.

But they still manage to somehow give access to the labyrinth from the open world that you can get to as a free player.

Priscitia.4235:

I am sorry for reviving this topic but I am stuck with the wyvern too. I’ve taken a break for a few months and wanted to get the wyvern today. I found the place where to get him but I am really worried about the event. Is the DS Event even actively played anymore or is there a trick to unlock the waypoint I need for the wyvern with a small group (max. 5people) of friends?

The event is run consistently. Just go to a timer site, show up 10 minutes early, join a squad and tag along.

cranos.5913:

Vayne.8563:

cranos.5913:

It’s ridiculous rly, had they not called this armor “legendary” but just raid armor instead, no one would be threatening to quit and in general there would be so much less whining about it.

I believe you’re incorrect. The graphic quality makes a serious step up whether you raid or you don’t raid. If it were more like a stat set like agony resistance, no one would care. But if you put something visually different from anything else in the game with no chance of anyone else getting something like that, in a game centered around image (they don’t call it Fashion Wars 2 for nothing) people would still complain, loudly and for a long time.

Not like this, ppl complained when they first heard about it long before actually seeing a skin for it. Funny thing is, what you describe about legendary armor is how I feel about the new weapons. I made nevermore and it nearly made me uninstall. It’s not just the poor PvErs that deal with stuff like this. Everyone will have rewards they will either never get, or force themselves through it to get it.

That being said I really can’t relate to you about the armor. My norn will keep her skimpy armor and will not star in the next Transformers movie.

Yep, I was one of those people who complained. Sometimes you can see writing on the wall.

When I started this game, there was very very very little I didn’t feel I could get. Everything was in reach. It made it, for me, a good game. The stuff I liked doing gave me the stuff I wanted.

The problem when you change the direction of a game, and this has always been a problem, is you leave some people behind.

Now, in my opinion a majority of the playerbase are PvE’ers, and of those, most of them are relatively casual, and focus on the open world more than anything else. Dynamic events, meta events.

Some do fractals, and probably less do raids. In addition some do WvW and some do PvP.

Where the bulk of the population is, that’s where it’s dangerous to change your focus, particularly where cool rewards are concerned. No company should want to disenfranchise the bulk of their player base. Now I believe the kind of content I enjoy is probably represented by the bulk of the player base.

And yes, I do Tier 4 fractals, and I’ve done every dungeon and I do some WvW, but by and large, I’m not looking for the most challenging content most of the time.

Anet had to go back and redo parts of HoT because too many people wouldn’t go there on a bet. The redo helped. I wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t eventually have to do something to placate the masses about legendary armor as well.

gabriel.8540:

Taxidriver.2043:

u dont want to buy HOT then u are not supporting the game so no raid for U.

i dont buy games to support the company who made that game, i buy games for my entertainment, and dont worry they have a lots of money…..and like i said ,for me it’s not worth it to pay that price for a small expac because i buy once the core game, whit that money you can buy 2 very good games on steam…

anyway, i thanks to all fanboys for the replays.

As opposed to WoW where you could raid in the core game for $15 a month.

cranos.5913:

It’s ridiculous rly, had they not called this armor “legendary” but just raid armor instead, no one would be threatening to quit and in general there would be so much less whining about it.

I believe you’re incorrect. The graphic quality makes a serious step up whether you raid or you don’t raid. If it were more like a stat set like agony resistance, no one would care. But if you put something visually different from anything else in the game with no chance of anyone else getting something like that, in a game centered around image (they don’t call it Fashion Wars 2 for nothing) people would still complain, loudly and for a long time.

Hypairion.9210:

Vayne.8563:

I tried PvPing to do get the legendary back piece. I don’t enjoy PvPing and that almost ruined the game for me, until I decided to stop.

Sure I could raid, but it would destroy the game for me. Completely and utterly destroy it. Therefore I won’t have legendary armor.

Since I want legendary armor, my choice is to destroy the game for myself, or to not get it.

Since I’m not sure either choice is exceptable to me, and I see more and more rewards I have to not enjoy the game to get, I start wondering if the future of this game is for me.

I won’t make a big deal if and when I leave this game, I’m just going to leave.

Legendary armor locked behind content I never have intention to do doesn’t encourage me to keep playing.

i dont understand this mindset. No one has to have all in game. if you trully are ready to quit because you want legendary armor but don’t want to raid, maybe indeed this game is not for you anymore. Or you should join a training guild and kill one or 2 boss a week… or maybe just buy boss kill.
Legendary armor is both a reward for mastering challenging content and a carrot to bring people into raid (even if i know a lot of people who would still raid without legendary armor).

The solution is probably to wait until another set of legendary armor is released for open world pve-ers.

Nope, I don’t agree. This isn’t like a stat set that I want or don’t want. This armor is animated. Since some of us play for toys, that’s one toy I won’t have. And it’s not just the one time. There are several skins I’ll never have, because I won’t play those game types.

Now all things being equal, if there were other animated armors in the game, you might be right. But seeing something pretty cool that I won’t be getting, will put me off from the game, Not just me, but a lot of other people who play for shinies. They’re not going to suddenly start raiding. And if they do, there’s a good chance most of them will not particularly enjoy it. We play a different game.

So some people will try to raid and that could potentially ruin the game for them and some won’t and they’ll look around at something they want that they can’t have, something that is cool in a way that no other armor is, and they will feel disenfranchised.

The funny thing about feelings is they can’t be logically dissected because they’re feelings. I’ve said this before more than once.

As more and more rewards specific to game types come out, more and more people who don’t enjoy those game types will FEEL disenfranchised.

You’re right. When that happens this game may no longer be for me and people like me.

I tried PvPing to do get the legendary back piece. I don’t enjoy PvPing and that almost ruined the game for me, until I decided to stop.

Sure I could raid, but it would destroy the game for me. Completely and utterly destroy it. Therefore I won’t have legendary armor.

Since I want legendary armor, my choice is to destroy the game for myself, or to not get it.

Since I’m not sure either choice is exceptable to me, and I see more and more rewards I have to not enjoy the game to get, I start wondering if the future of this game is for me.

I won’t make a big deal if and when I leave this game, I’m just going to leave.

Legendary armor locked behind content I never have intention to do doesn’t encourage me to keep playing.

Rauderi.8706:

Djinn.9245:

I believe it was last week that one of the Dailies was Event Completion in Dragon’s Stand. At the time I was playing, there seemed to be 2 maps: 1 that was full and 1 that had a few people that seemed to be mainly trying to get into the full map. Not enough people to do the events. After a while of trying to get into the full map, I gave up on that Daily.

This has happened to me several times lately when I have tried to do things in HoT maps.

It repeatedly makes me think that map caps and how it handles possible space-saving is just done improperly. We need smaller map caps for “full” and possibly smaller taxi allotments in order to usher more people more naturally into maps that can fill.

For daily events in DS, you don’t need a full map. You only need four events. If you want to run the whole meta, you’d get there early and get into a map.

My experience is this though. There’s more chance of failing DS on the daily days. That’s because people who don’t know the fight come to the fight in greater numbers. They’re not really prepared, they don’t understand, they tend often not to listen to instructions in map chat, and they tend to cause issues when it gets to the harder bits, particularly the room with the leyline collectors.

In my opinion, daily days are probably the worst day to try DS.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Map caps and the way that map shards spawn never really gets a fair test because people stack 1, 2 or ? shards because a full map is more likely to succeed. Unfortunately, taxiing isn’t going away. I’m of two minds that changing numbers on caps and shard creation algorithms would be a good thing. If I thought that people would not seek the path of least resistance with taxi, I would be in favor. As it is, a smaller cap might just mean fewer people get into the 1 or 2 choice maps.

@ Vayne: how often do you, in your ever-successful HoT experience, end up not being able to “join in” and for how long?

I don’t know. I’m there at the right times, because I use a timer site. I’ve never gotten into a zone ten minutes early and not been able to get on a map. But I pay attention to the times.

There are times I’m randomly in a zone, just doing my own thing, and that’s a different story. But then I’m not trying to do anything particular. So it’s different for me.

Let’s say I decide I need leyline crystals. Unless the Garent is up, I can pretty much do events in any area of TD to get ley-line crystals, whether people are present or not.

But to get metas done? AB is pretty much an automatic. If you get to DS on time, that’s pretty much an automatic. If you get to TD a bit early, I almost always get into a full map about 80% of the time.

The one exception to all this is VB, which is usually a problem because it’s the least understandable of all the metas. People don’t know how to do it, and it takes time and energy to explain. However, I don’t really care if I hit T4 or not, I can still get my reward chest from doing any of the bosses they’re doing, and move onto the next thing.

A lot of the time I spend in HoT, I’m just doing events, farming currency, or figuring out new ways to get around. I don’t live for the meta. I do them, because they’re there, and I’m there, but I don’t find that the best way to play HOT.

misterman.1530:

Abelisk.4527:

There’s a magic tool called LFG that seems to connect players from around the server. Idk, maybe give that a try.

I would really like a NMELFG tool (No Meta Event looking for group) that would enable me to get onto a map that isn’t doing the meta at all on the HoT maps. Right now, just want to get on one that has people getting the HPs. That’s it.

I would hate to take up a slot on a map trying to do the meta when I am just flying around trying to get a specific HP.

That’s why people often list HP trains in LFG.

Dante.1508:

Apparently you don’t want customers to stay huh, “goldilocks” customers better throw more money at Anet then to compensate for the loss of casual customers.

Except that my guild is filled with casual players who enjoy the game. So I’m not really sure what your point is.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Vayne.8563:

Aenaos.8160:

Obtena.7952:

Strawman or not … that’s tough news. Anyone that doesn’t actually anticipate that old maps and content become old news in an MMO is fooling themselves … and to complain about it? I mean, why don’t I join an MMO after 4 years and QQ i’m behind everyone … oh that’s right … because that would be nonsense. OFC you’re behind and having a hard time completing things. That’s no surprise to anyone who has played MMO’s.

Let’s review this again … WHAT are you paying for in an MMO … access to a service. There is no guarantee you ‘win’ or can ‘catch up’. OP is over a year behind on an expansion … does any reasonable player here actually think there is something weird about his situation? I don’t. That doesn’t make HoT terribly designed at all. IMO, that’s what makes GW2 an MMO. I guess people forgot what that means, for better or worse.

My recommendation, better make some friend that want to help you … or you to help them.

The problem is not that the maps are getting old and less played,it’s that they shove grouping down your throat everywhere,and they don’t downscale enough to compensate for lower population.
It’s failed design from top to bottom.

You’d be right if this were true, but mostly it’s a matter of getting to a populated map. I’m in HoT all the time and simply using LFG to get to active maps prevents you from not having enough people to do things, even if you don’t stay in a group.

Would that that were true for all players, and not just those who get lucky to be able to “join in” during their play window. The problem with mega server is that it creates a climate in which the lucky have fun and the unlucky do not. If you’re consistently lucky, good for you. However, your experience is clearly not shared by everyone.

I don’t agree. I play HOT at almost every hour of the day. I’m in Australia, not the US. I’m up with my guild sometimes in the US mornings. I’ve played in the US afternoons. I’ve played in the US evenings. I’ve played in the US early morning hours. I spent a lot of time in game and a good portion of that time in HoT.

This isn’t just some lucky verses unlucky thing. It’s really not. Now some people get on a server, have one bad experience and they give up on it forever. That’s like going into a fractal, getting one bad pug and giving up on it forever. It’s just giving up.

If you were to go on the day of new content, say the first day Ember Bay came out, of course there will be less people in HOT on that day. We’re all checking out the new zone, including me. But that has nothing at all to do with luck. That’s a simple basic thought pattern.

However, I’ve been in HoT every day for the last week, and I’ve been in each zone. I’ve not gotten a T4 map in VB, but I haven’t tried. I’ve beaten metas in AB, TD and DS though, and I’ve run into enough people in VB to do a meta if that was what I was interested in participating in.

I’ve done these metas all hours of the day and night. Remember, my evening is very very early morning US. There are always people around if you care enough to try to find those people.

I find it interesting that the people who stay away from the zone insist it’s one way when people who play the zone all the time say otherwise.

Aenaos.8160:

Obtena.7952:

Strawman or not … that’s tough news. Anyone that doesn’t actually anticipate that old maps and content become old news in an MMO is fooling themselves … and to complain about it? I mean, why don’t I join an MMO after 4 years and QQ i’m behind everyone … oh that’s right … because that would be nonsense. OFC you’re behind and having a hard time completing things. That’s no surprise to anyone who has played MMO’s.

Let’s review this again … WHAT are you paying for in an MMO … access to a service. There is no guarantee you ‘win’ or can ‘catch up’. OP is over a year behind on an expansion … does any reasonable player here actually think there is something weird about his situation? I don’t. That doesn’t make HoT terribly designed at all. IMO, that’s what makes GW2 an MMO. I guess people forgot what that means, for better or worse.

My recommendation, better make some friend that want to help you … or you to help them.

The problem is not that the maps are getting old and less played,it’s that they shove grouping down your throat everywhere,and they don’t downscale enough to compensate for lower population.
It’s failed design from top to bottom.

You’d be right if this were true, but mostly it’s a matter of getting to a populated map. I’m in HoT all the time and simply using LFG to get to active maps prevents you from not having enough people to do things, even if you don’t stay in a group.

Shaaba.5672:

Vayne.8563:

Back at launch they weren’t coming out with a new map every single update. Now they’re trying to. I’d rather have that more often than a new halloween thing that I get to play for 3 weeks out of the year.

I understand what you’re saying and applaud Anet’s attempt to bring out new maps. I am skeptical that it will last. Anet has a history of trying a thing, then scrapping it and trying another thing. It’s why a lot of areas of the game feel half-done. Anet has so much potential and a lot of it is fulfilled, but everything just needs polished to make it a really great game. Festivals are part of the polish. For many people, they will see festival content and maps much more often than Bloodstone Fen or Ember Bay over the life of the game.

Doesn’t really matter if it lasts, though. Let’s say they bring out six maps and it stops. It’s still six maps we didn’t have before.

And yet people have run raids with the old setup and beat those raids within hours of the patch. Are you really looking on professions forums to see the truth behind how good or bad a patch is?

Conncept.7638:

As someone who has been playing since the first halloween event, casually at that, there is literally nothing for me to do but work on that nightmarish bullkitten of a backpiece, the ascended bat themed one. Which is a giant wast of time with how much resources/gold/dumb luck it takes, could spend all my playtime with no guarantee that I’ll even get everything to make it with before the event ends, and that with spending obscene amounts of gold as well.

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

I don’t want new Halloween content. I want more changes to the world (Living World & current events) and more festivals that are mostly repeats.

Put another way, I’d rather see dev resources applied to changing the game’s permanent content rather than on a festival that lasts only a few weeks.

Why not both? They could pull this off when they first launched the game with the bare bones of a plan for what they were going to do for both the holidays and the living story, with just as many or possibly even fewer developers and resources than they have now, and with less experience under their belts at that.

How exactly they have they become worse at pumping out content with time? It doesn’t make any sense, if anything they should have been improving and developing a more consistent pipeline over the last four years.

Back at launch they weren’t coming out with a new map every single update. Now they’re trying to. I’d rather have that more often than a new halloween thing that I get to play for 3 weeks out of the year.

I don’t miss Guild Wars 1, but there are things I miss from Guild Wars 1. Probably heroes and build templares are the big things I miss. I also miss the ability when dead to enter the eyes of a person on your party and keep watching game play. That was awesome.

AlienMenace.7516:

Vayne.8563:

AliamRationem.5172:

I agree with much of what you say. Gliding is awesome, adventures are lame, and everyone should earn spirit shards for experience regardless of their mastery progress. I otherwise enjoy the mastery system, but I would make the additional suggestion that bounce mushrooms and updrafts should have been granted as baseline via the storyline.

Along with gliding, players would have the basic tools they need to begin exploring the jungle and I think it would have felt a lot less restrictive.

The tradeoff is loss of progression.

Anet didn’t raise the level cap. They didn’t introduce a new tier of gear. Masteries replace the leveling system in other MMOs, and it’s supposed to show progression.

In all reality it takes roughly a couple of hours to get your first three masteries, particularly if you use boosters. That’s updrafts, gliding and mushrooms. So you can save someone a couple of hours, but at the end of the day you lose the feeling that you’re unlocking stuff that matters, and I don’t know that that would be the best trade for everyone.

I agree with what you are saying here. That feeling of progression is important, and admittedly while many people feel that the pacing might have felt off when they had to fill their first mastery bar before continuing with early story, though the plot itself had a sense of urgency to it, it can feel good to unlock new potential. And I actually like that the new Living World zones (Bloodstone Fen and Ember Bay) have some small amounts of similar progression to them.

The problem my original post addresses, however, is the problem that only reveals itself after a long time playing the expansion. The final tiers of masteries require a dozen Mastery Points. There is also a set of masteries that require raids to get. The system in place right now says that until you 100% all of that, you cannot earn any more XP, and therefore cannot get Spirit Shards.

Before Heart of Thorns launched, everyone got the equivalent of a Spirit Shard whenever they leveled-up post-80. They were called Hero Points back then and were a currency, not like they are now. But they changed it so that those who 100%ed all of their masteries are able to regain that functionality. However, those who have not 100%ed every mastery yet, but have filled up the maseries they have available (hit a wall of running out of Mastery Points) earn no XP, and therefore no Spirit Shards.

Bloodstone Fen and Ember Bay both count as expansion zones, and in Bloodstone Fen one of the big rewards you can get is https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Bloodstone_Empowerment – an ability that increases XP gains. You have to be level 80 to reach this zone, so it is clear that they intend that to confer a benefit to post-80 players. So it is particularly frustrating for a player who has run out of Mastery Points but who has not yet maxed out every Heart of Maguuma Mastery Track, because at that point the game halts any XP gains and grants no Spirit Shards.

While I know a lot of people had complaints about the early-game, this particular issue is one that manifests in late-game, and I think any of my proposed solutions could alleviate that issue somewhat.

Yeah I"m not disagreeing that everyone should get spirit shards and the ability to do so should not force you to have to raid. That’s not what I’m saying at all.

I’m simply saying that giving people those three masteries early on would take something away, as well as giving something, and I’m not sure it’s worth the trade off. It wouldn’t have been worth the trade off for me, since I’m mostly progression driven.

Vix.6730:

Dadnir.5038:

Well after reading your post I can say that your title is wrong. It’s not the game that’s disgusting, it’s the player mentality when it come to group content. What disgust you is the fact that players desperatly seek efficiency through known build. The game itself does not force you to follow this trend.

Wrong. The skill system has been ultra-simplified to open the door to as many casual players as possible. This was a decision that has backfired. What made the original Guild Wars fun was the sheer amount of fun you could derive from running unique builds in virtually any environment. Sure it created balancing headaches, but the players loved the variation. The players raved about the variation. Players continued to play the game.

Backfired for you. Was fun for you. The original Guild Wars 1 was an awesome game for creating builds and it appealed, generally, to harder core players, which most people would probably guess represent a smallish percentage of the playerbase.

But I’m guessing that for every person who loved that aspect of Guild Wars 1, another person either didn’t play or stopped playing Guild Wars 1 because of the Build Wars aspect.

The only way this didn’t backfire is if more people played Guild Wars 1 than Guild Wars 2. I’m relatively certain that more people have played Guild Wars 2 than have played Guild Wars 1.

Even PvP, which Guild Wars 1 was known for, one of the devs once said there are more people playing Guild Wars 2 PvP than have PvPed throughout the history of Guild Wars 1.

So I’m not really sure backfired is the right term.

It’s definitely a significant change in the game system, that was changed for a very deliberate reason.

In Guild Wars 1, I was less immersed in the game world because I was more immersed in the mechanics. I always saw that as a problem.

Those who immerse themselves in the game world, instead of the mechanics (there are probably more of us than you think) don’t necessarily see this as something that backfired.

AliamRationem.5172:

I agree with much of what you say. Gliding is awesome, adventures are lame, and everyone should earn spirit shards for experience regardless of their mastery progress. I otherwise enjoy the mastery system, but I would make the additional suggestion that bounce mushrooms and updrafts should have been granted as baseline via the storyline.

Along with gliding, players would have the basic tools they need to begin exploring the jungle and I think it would have felt a lot less restrictive.

The tradeoff is loss of progression.

Anet didn’t raise the level cap. They didn’t introduce a new tier of gear. Masteries replace the leveling system in other MMOs, and it’s supposed to show progression.

In all reality it takes roughly a couple of hours to get your first three masteries, particularly if you use boosters. That’s updrafts, gliding and mushrooms. So you can save someone a couple of hours, but at the end of the day you lose the feeling that you’re unlocking stuff that matters, and I don’t know that that would be the best trade for everyone.

Rauderi.8706:

Vayne.8563:

And yet I get stuff done in HoT all the time. And other people in my guild seem to. Not every time I want to, but then that’s also happened to me with temples in Orr which you can’t predict at all, they’re not on a reliable timer and I like that a lot less.

I don’t mind the rigid timers at all! The boss rotation was one of the good things to come of it. Kind of. Megaservers and open/closing maps has a habit of making Orr temples a baffling thing to participate in, with much lower stakes, since the towers are split up. Bit of a shame, that.

I do mind the space of time in between event/boss cycles. 3 hours to wait for a specific world boss in vanilla Tyria? 2 hours for pretty much everything in HoT (not counting the new zones)? I almost reach out for the Bad Design button, but I’ll just go so far as to say it’s not player-friendly, specific to entry/exit points.

If everything was up all the time, there wouldn’t be enough people to do them in my opinion. I won’t do T4 VBs every hour of every day. Sometimes you fill a map and sometimes you don’t. So if you make them every hour you halve the number of people at each time.

People already complain it’s not being done enough.

The issue here is that you have to balance how often something happens with how often people are going to do it, with how many people are needed to do it.

There really is no easy answer.

Rauderi.8706:

Vayne.8563:

Rauderi.8706:

Gryphon.2875:

VB is fine. We just made T4 this morning

My most recent story starts with a need to get a Plated Staff for Bo, which needed Reclaimed Plates. Best way to get them is the VB meta. I kinda mis-timed it, showed up at 10:20 instead of 10:10, but I figured I could at least hit up Matriarch, since the megazerg always takes 12+ minutes, meaning I should have gotten there right in the last 25%.

I zone in. There’s no Matriarch. o_O
And Axemaster was dead. o_O!! (no rly, who does that anymore?)
Sadly, my last reasonable option, Patriarch, didn’t go so well. :\
So, I’m a little torqued that I would’ve had to wait another two hours, so I just ditched the game after that. Thanks a lot, uber-long meta-event timers.

Because this is easier than buying cheap rare reclaimed weapons from the trading post, which are so cheap now it’s ridiculous.

You’ve shelved the game because you think you’re doing something efficiently that you didn’t have to do at all.

I’m not really sure what to make of this complaint.

I stopped playing for the night. Not forever. Yeesh. If all it took was a lousy loot fragment to quit this game, I would’ve been gone years ago.
Granted, it doesn’t help that earlier that night I was in Tangled Depth, twice, once trying to catch the Gerent event that I wasn’t on the One True Map for, just like Dragon Stand. Frustration was running high by that point.
But yeah, trying to actually get things done in HoT is a mess, and that complaint’s been steady for over a year. And that gets compounded by the way certain grinds become necessary due to “assumed value” of things rather than adjusting to the practicalities of how players actually do things.

And yet I get stuff done in HoT all the time. And other people in my guild seem to. Not every time I want to, but then that’s also happened to me with temples in Orr which you can’t predict at all, they’re not on a reliable timer and I like that a lot less.

Rauderi.8706:

Gryphon.2875:

VB is fine. We just made T4 this morning

My most recent story starts with a need to get a Plated Staff for Bo, which needed Reclaimed Plates. Best way to get them is the VB meta. I kinda mis-timed it, showed up at 10:20 instead of 10:10, but I figured I could at least hit up Matriarch, since the megazerg always takes 12+ minutes, meaning I should have gotten there right in the last 25%.

I zone in. There’s no Matriarch. o_O
And Axemaster was dead. o_O!! (no rly, who does that anymore?)
Sadly, my last reasonable option, Patriarch, didn’t go so well. :\
So, I’m a little torqued that I would’ve had to wait another two hours, so I just ditched the game after that. Thanks a lot, uber-long meta-event timers.

Because this is easier than buying cheap rare reclaimed weapons from the trading post, which are so cheap now it’s ridiculous.

You’ve shelved the game because you think you’re doing something efficiently that you didn’t have to do at all.

I’m not really sure what to make of this complaint.

SoV.5139:

Defenders. I’ll make it real simple.

This is how the mircotrans industry works.
F2P – want access? pay for it or consume time earning it in game
P2P – access to content.
gw2 – pay to pay to play.

They shouldn’t have to advertise that they aren’t going to double charge you for content. Not double charging for content should be the norm. This is true for most other games. I say most because if I said all some rules lawyer would find the one other game double charging happens in and ignore the other couple thousand it doesn’t happen in while fully defending this practice.

gw2 is advertised as a buy to play game, not a buy to buy to play game.

Guild Wars 2 is now free to play.

Guild Wars 2 HOT is buy to play.

That means everything in HoT is buy to play. You happen to get the free to play game with it. Season 2 was part of Guild Wars 2 core that was not free to play. It was something else to buy. So buying HOT doesn’t include it because it’s not part of HOT, or part of Guild Wars 2 core game that was free to play. It’s separate content for which you have to pay. If you don’t want to pay for it, you can farm gold and buy it with gold, which fits your grind for content description anyway.

Galtrix.7369:

Vayne.8563:

Galtrix.7369:

vesica tempestas.1563:

Galtrix.7369:

vesica tempestas.1563:

Ashen.2907:

vesica tempestas.1563:

as i said, objective and subjective e.g ‘convoluted’ I was talking about an objective evaluation of wether GW2 HOT zones were designed to be aimed at people who enjoy platformer games – and it is clearly not..if you are objective. Anyone can give their opinion, but that doesn’t make a thing factual. Simply put because someone thinks a thing is a ‘platformer’ when it was clearly designed not to be a platformer then that does not make it true.

also, the new zone is less complicated than HOT. There is no ‘direction’ there is simply a game that is expanding, and it would be a dull game if every zone that was introduced was simply the same as came before with a new skin.

And the HoT zones clearly were designed for people who enjoy platformers if you are being objective.

See I can call an opinion an objective fact too. Fun stuff.

that fact that players do not go to HOT to play a platformer is fact, not opinion. Its interesting that the only people who think its a platformer is those people who dislike it isnt it. Nothing wrong with not liking the design of the HOT zones, but you should ask yourself why you have the need to justify your dislike with an attempt to label it as something that it is not.

I enjoy HoT and I label it as a platformer. Because that’s what it is.

From the Wikipedia: “Platform game (or platformer) is a video game which involves guiding an avatar to jump between suspended platforms and/or over obstacles to advance the game. These challenges are known as jumping puzzles or freerunning.”

In order to advance the game and to acquire hero points, one must jump using mushrooms and or gliding to reach the intended hero point which is, most of the time, behind a series of jumping platforms (trees that you can step on).

Whether or not players go to HoT for platforming, they are indeed platforming whether they like it or not.

Guild wars 2 is a lot more than the elements you have picked out, context matters, overal design goals and genre matter. You can cherry pick out any element from any game and look at it in isolation – what matters is design intent.

What matters here is the word choice – Platform game (or platformer) is a video game which involves guiding an avatar to jump between suspended platforms and/or over obstacles to advance the game.

In order to advance HoT in the slightest, you must be willing to grind for the abilities to use mushrooms, leylines, and teleporters. This isn’t simply a part of HoT. This is HoT. If you choose not to platform – or use mushrooms and hop on trees, you will not progress, you will not pass go, and you will not collect your money, bruh.

What am I cherry-picking here? The entirety of HoT consists of jumping, gliding, and using shrooms to progress beyond a certain point.

Find me a fact that opposes anything I just said.

P.S: We’re not talking about GW2 as a whole. We’re only talking about HoT. If I labeled GW2 as a platformer, then it would be considered “cherry-picking”.

What obstacles do you have to jump over in HOT to advance the game, and more importantly how is that different from core Tyria, where you have to jump of stuff to get vistsas which advance the game, ie map completion?

In order to “not die” on the last boss of HoT, you need to get the updraft mastery. In order to get the updraft mastery, you need mastery points. In order to get mastery points, you have to complete some sort of platforming to get to the mastery points.

It’s different from core Tyria because platforming is essentially inserted into the main storyline by way of collecting mastery points in order to progress. The last boss is only one example of many where the game requires you to have enough mastery points to progress the storyline. If this were not the case, I would rethink my opinion that HoT is a platformer.

So like hte personal story windtunnel in one the personal stories. And map complete is still part of this game and still considered furthering the game. I bet as many people map complete as finish the personal story.

Easy enough with the guild window to see the last time people logged in. If someone doesn’t log into the game for six months, I remove them from the guild. If it’s someone I know or remember, I send them a note telling them I’m removing them to keep the guild roster more active and they can always rejoin if they return to the game.

Galtrix.7369:

vesica tempestas.1563:

Galtrix.7369:

vesica tempestas.1563:

Ashen.2907:

vesica tempestas.1563:

as i said, objective and subjective e.g ‘convoluted’ I was talking about an objective evaluation of wether GW2 HOT zones were designed to be aimed at people who enjoy platformer games – and it is clearly not..if you are objective. Anyone can give their opinion, but that doesn’t make a thing factual. Simply put because someone thinks a thing is a ‘platformer’ when it was clearly designed not to be a platformer then that does not make it true.

also, the new zone is less complicated than HOT. There is no ‘direction’ there is simply a game that is expanding, and it would be a dull game if every zone that was introduced was simply the same as came before with a new skin.

And the HoT zones clearly were designed for people who enjoy platformers if you are being objective.

See I can call an opinion an objective fact too. Fun stuff.

that fact that players do not go to HOT to play a platformer is fact, not opinion. Its interesting that the only people who think its a platformer is those people who dislike it isnt it. Nothing wrong with not liking the design of the HOT zones, but you should ask yourself why you have the need to justify your dislike with an attempt to label it as something that it is not.

I enjoy HoT and I label it as a platformer. Because that’s what it is.

From the Wikipedia: “Platform game (or platformer) is a video game which involves guiding an avatar to jump between suspended platforms and/or over obstacles to advance the game. These challenges are known as jumping puzzles or freerunning.”

In order to advance the game and to acquire hero points, one must jump using mushrooms and or gliding to reach the intended hero point which is, most of the time, behind a series of jumping platforms (trees that you can step on).

Whether or not players go to HoT for platforming, they are indeed platforming whether they like it or not.

Guild wars 2 is a lot more than the elements you have picked out, context matters, overal design goals and genre matter. You can cherry pick out any element from any game and look at it in isolation – what matters is design intent.

What matters here is the word choice – Platform game (or platformer) is a video game which involves guiding an avatar to jump between suspended platforms and/or over obstacles to advance the game.

In order to advance HoT in the slightest, you must be willing to grind for the abilities to use mushrooms, leylines, and teleporters. This isn’t simply a part of HoT. This is HoT. If you choose not to platform – or use mushrooms and hop on trees, you will not progress, you will not pass go, and you will not collect your money, bruh.

What am I cherry-picking here? The entirety of HoT consists of jumping, gliding, and using shrooms to progress beyond a certain point.

Find me a fact that opposes anything I just said.

P.S: We’re not talking about GW2 as a whole. We’re only talking about HoT. If I labeled GW2 as a platformer, then it would be considered “cherry-picking”.

What obstacles do you have to jump over in HOT to advance the game, and more importantly how is that different from core Tyria, where you have to jump of stuff to get vistsas which advance the game, ie map completion?

Djinn.9245:

vesica tempestas.1563:

that fact that players do not go to HOT to play a platformer is fact, not opinion.

So you somehow have evidence that all players do not go to HoT to play a platformer? Or maybe you meant “some players” – how many? How did you get this evidence?

Facts are based on evidence.

I don’t go to hot to platform. I’ve played literally dozens of platform games, probably over a hundred in fact, and there’s very little in HoT that even remotely resembles a platform game.

You, on the other hand, haven’t play platform games, but you continue to insist, with no experience in the genre, that HoT is platforming.

Jumping puzzles in HoT are platforming. Adventures, many of them, are platforming. Basically running around HOT doing quest chains and map completion….not platforming.

Seems to me someone who’s done a lot of platforming would probably have a better idea of what platforming is, but that’s just me.

sorudo.9054:

TexZero.7910:

sorudo.9054:

it shows they never even listened to ppl complaining about dungeons and made the exact same mistake, elite only, screw the casuals.

I’m sorry but what ?

If you couldn’t do dungeons, that had nothing to do with the company and everything to do with the player. There was nothing hard or elite about dungeons.

ok, so why can’t i ever complete even one while all the other things like PS, LS, open world for both core and HoT are easy to me….

Cause you didn’t group with people who knew how or take the time to learn how. Most dungeons are relatively easy.

IndigoSundown.5419:

As usual, a forum discussion gets derailed by arguments over a term. Perhaps, rather than focusing on someone’s use of the term “platformer,” we could instead focus on the fact that getting around in HoT is a great deal more reliant on vertical movement and gimmicks than either the core game, or most of the games in the MMO genre. That choice on ANet’s part was bound to displease some players.

But that’s just it. It’s not that hard to get around HoT. The actual issue is probably more the masteries than the difficulty in getting around.

The jumping mushrooms pose no difficulty in getting around once you’ve unlocked them. The nuhoch wallows pose no difficulty once you unlock them. Gliding is hitting your space bar. It’s not much different from running.

However, reaching certain updrafts is difficult if you don’t have lean gliding and later unlimited gliding. This is by design.

But the difficulty isn’t in the platforming elements. It’s in the unlocking elements. Once you’ve unlocked stuff, nothing is platforming or difficult. As I’ve said, many times now, I’ve showed people how to get around every single HOT zone with great success…even people that said it was impossible.

Remember Old Dirt Beard and how he used to complain about how hard HoT was and how impossible. I took him around once, on one day and he hasn’t complained since.

The problem with the term isn’t semantics. The problem with the term is how misleading it is. And if you tell people twitch mechanics are needed to use a jumping mushroom or an updraft or a nuhoch wallow you’re creating a false impression.

It’s simply not like that. Not even a little.

What is like that are the adventures and a couple of jumping puzzles in HOT, but that’ the same with the core game and mini games. 2

Yep, HoT truly revitilized the game for me. I go into the old zones if I need something from them, but most of my time is spent in the new zones.

Gwilym.4257:

Vayne.8563:

Gwilym.4257:

Vayne.8563:

Djinn.9245:

Raine.1394:

For those unsure of the game genre in use when playing HoT I suggest the following exercise. I use the word exercise but it is not hard at all.

snip

Well said, thank you.

You don’t have the experience with platformers, so why wouldn’t you just accept the experience of those who do platform? You’ve never played a platforming game by your own admission.

A jumping mushroom isn’t platforming. When those definitions were written, they were written in a vacuum. Stuff like jumping mushrooms that require zero skill to use didn’t likely exist at all in any game.

This game isn’t a platformer, and saying it does won’t change that.

As Raine mentioned above game genre exist in their respective definitions. If you were to follow the steps in Raine’s post you would arrive at a definition of ‘platform game’ or ‘platformer’. Not because you or Raine know enough for the rest of us to stop thinking, but rather, one of of you (Raine) took the easy path of chasing down the definition for the rest of us. You actually don’t need to hunt down someone who claims to know what they are talking about, and you don’t need to trust the wiki as any gaming site will have same basic definitions.

Platforming is so basic that it lives inside of two definitions: 1) navigation of platforms, and 2) advancing the game thereby. It doesn’t say anything about level of skill, but it’s typical to the genre to modulate difficulty over time.

Platform games are platform games not because enough people know enough about gaming that they don’t need to ask what a platformer is, but rather, they know because they’ve learned the definition of the gaming genre. Read Raine’s post as he/she lays it out for you.

But by that definition you’ve given Guild Wars 2 has always been a platformer, even more than HoT is. It’s that simple. You can’t have it both ways.

The major complaint people have about the platforming in HoT is that they can’t complete zones. By this definition you’ve always needed platforming to complain zones, as in from launch.

So either Guild Wars 2 has always been a platformer, or Guild Wars 2 is not a platformer.

Their definition its’ always been, my definition it’s never been.

The takeaway from this is HoT didn’t turn Guild Wars 2 into a platformer. You need more jumping and more skill to complete maps pre hot than you need in HoT itself.

I don’t want it both ways; one definition to rule them all! GW2 was never a platformer and never a platformer by the stated definition of a plaform game. Remember 2? That went: “2) advancing the game thereby.” That is, advancing the game through platforming. Platforming (jumping puzzles, etc.) in vanilla GW2 was always take it or leave it—the core game didn’t care if you platformed or not. In HoT you advance the game through platforming. Don’t know how to break this down further for you; my process has always been to read the English and understand the concept expressed. Maybe someone else could jump in here.

Either map completion advances the game or it doesn’t. For many people it does. If map completion doesn’t advance the game, you’d be right, but most of the complaints we see about platforming are about map completion.

If you need it to complete the map, it’s part of map completion. You can’t make a legendary weapon without it, which mean consider to be an end game goal. The only way to advance that end game goal is map completion which required, in the core game, platforming.

HoT isn’t any different, except the platforming required is easier.

Galtrix.7369:

I’m with ya. I absolutely despise TD. I love the rest of HoT, but TD just makes me want to bash my face into the computer monitor.

The reason TD sucks is because:
1. There are no players there. Ever.
2. The map is confusing as crap. More so than the other HoT maps.
3. Events are nearly impossible to complete due to low player population.

1. There are players there, because the meta gets done. So I don’t know how you can say this. Of course, if you belonged to an active guild that did that sort of content, you’d bring players with you when you went. 2-3 people can do about 90% of that zone without any issues at all.

2. The maps are only confusing if you don’t “get them”. I could show someone how to understand the map in a very short amount of time and have done so repeatedly.

3. I’ve completed everyone event in that zone multiple times. I STILL complete most events in that zone. Again, you need a tiny handful of people to do 90% of them.

By the way seems like your #1 and #3 complaint are pretty much the same complaint so I don’t know why they need seperate numbers.

I’m almost 100% positive you think you need more people to complete content in that zone than you do.

Gwilym.4257:

Vayne.8563:

Djinn.9245:

Raine.1394:

For those unsure of the game genre in use when playing HoT I suggest the following exercise. I use the word exercise but it is not hard at all.

1. Google with search term platformer game
2. your first hit will be the wiki for the platform game genre. Game genre is by definition and luckily the wiki uses the standard definitions.
3. The first sentence of the article reads: “Platform game (or platformer) is a video game which involves guiding an avatar to jump between suspended platforms and/or over obstacles to advance the game. These challenges are known as jumping puzzles or freerunning.”

There. That wasn’t hard at all. The key aspects to gameplay in a platform game are 1) navigation of platforms, and 2) advancing the game thereby. Vanilla GW2 with jumping puzzles was an MMO not a platformer. You could navigate platforms all day but you were not advancing the core game. An example of advancing the core game is arriving at VB and discovering that you need both gliding and updrafts to begin advancing the core game.

The problem is not having elements of platforming in GW2. Jumping puzzles were absolutely brilliant. You could knock youself out with them and have a ton of fun. At the same time Player X could ignore them and derive their fun from standard MMO aspects of the game. Brilliant.

And, for the last comentator here, it has nothing to do with game “difficulty”. Because the full genre here is ‘platformer obscura’ you can’t figure anything out except by brute force as in trying every possibility. Brute-force and skill-based are at opposite ends of the spectrum. This is why the first jump by a skillful player is always to youtube to find out the remaining jumps. What about brute force is going to make the gameplay fun?

Well said, thank you.

You don’t have the experience with platformers, so why wouldn’t you just accept the experience of those who do platform? You’ve never played a platforming game by your own admission.

A jumping mushroom isn’t platforming. When those definitions were written, they were written in a vacuum. Stuff like jumping mushrooms that require zero skill to use didn’t likely exist at all in any game.

This game isn’t a platformer, and saying it does won’t change that.

As Raine mentioned above game genre exist in their respective definitions. If you were to follow the steps in Raine’s post you would arrive at a definition of ‘platform game’ or ‘platformer’. Not because you or Raine know enough for the rest of us to stop thinking, but rather, one of of you (Raine) took the easy path of chasing down the definition for the rest of us. You actually don’t need to hunt down someone who claims to know what they are talking about, and you don’t need to trust the wiki as any gaming site will have same basic definitions.

Platforming is so basic that it lives inside of two definitions: 1) navigation of platforms, and 2) advancing the game thereby. It doesn’t say anything about level of skill, but it’s typical to the genre to modulate difficulty over time.

Platform games are platform games not because enough people know enough about gaming that they don’t need to ask what a platformer is, but rather, they know because they’ve learned the definition of the gaming genre. Read Raine’s post as he/she lays it out for you.

But by that definition you’ve given Guild Wars 2 has always been a platformer, even more than HoT is. It’s that simple. You can’t have it both ways.

The major complaint people have about the platforming in HoT is that they can’t complete zones. By this definition you’ve always needed platforming to complain zones, as in from launch.

So either Guild Wars 2 has always been a platformer, or Guild Wars 2 is not a platformer.

Their definition its’ always been, my definition it’s never been.

The takeaway from this is HoT didn’t turn Guild Wars 2 into a platformer. You need more jumping and more skill to complete maps pre hot than you need in HoT itself.

Djinn.9245:

Raine.1394:

For those unsure of the game genre in use when playing HoT I suggest the following exercise. I use the word exercise but it is not hard at all.

1. Google with search term platformer game
2. your first hit will be the wiki for the platform game genre. Game genre is by definition and luckily the wiki uses the standard definitions.
3. The first sentence of the article reads: “Platform game (or platformer) is a video game which involves guiding an avatar to jump between suspended platforms and/or over obstacles to advance the game. These challenges are known as jumping puzzles or freerunning.”

There. That wasn’t hard at all. The key aspects to gameplay in a platform game are 1) navigation of platforms, and 2) advancing the game thereby. Vanilla GW2 with jumping puzzles was an MMO not a platformer. You could navigate platforms all day but you were not advancing the core game. An example of advancing the core game is arriving at VB and discovering that you need both gliding and updrafts to begin advancing the core game.

The problem is not having elements of platforming in GW2. Jumping puzzles were absolutely brilliant. You could knock youself out with them and have a ton of fun. At the same time Player X could ignore them and derive their fun from standard MMO aspects of the game. Brilliant.

And, for the last comentator here, it has nothing to do with game “difficulty”. Because the full genre here is ‘platformer obscura’ you can’t figure anything out except by brute force as in trying every possibility. Brute-force and skill-based are at opposite ends of the spectrum. This is why the first jump by a skillful player is always to youtube to find out the remaining jumps. What about brute force is going to make the gameplay fun?

Well said, thank you.

You don’t have the experience with platformers, so why wouldn’t you just accept the experience of those who do platform? You’ve never played a platforming game by your own admission.

A jumping mushroom isn’t platforming. When those definitions were written, they were written in a vacuum. Stuff like jumping mushrooms that require zero skill to use didn’t likely exist at all in any game.

This game isn’t a platformer, and saying it does won’t change that.

HazyDaisy.4107:

In Frost Gorge Sound there’s an area along the east side of the map. Years ago, when I first navigated it, I dubbed this area the Crevasse of Death, because once you were in, there seemed to be no exit out of the crevasse, a series of dead ends and Ice Elementals chasing you and throwing stuff at you til you died in a corner, cold and alone. Ever since then, when I’ve explore that area, I’ve climbed along the top of the glacier to reach the NE corner of FGS, NEVER venturing into the Crevasse of Death itself, because after all only death and dead ends reside there.

Tangled Deaths, forgive me, Depths…is a giant Crevasse of Death, only there is no way to quietly skip along the top to reach the other side. Because the map utilizes all 4 levels, it makes it very difficult to determine exactly where you’ve come from or where you’re headed to. This can be confusing and perhaps enraging for first time explorers, or even explorers that have successfully made their way through TD to DS.

Luckily, Anet provided (through masteries) a rather quick way from the beginning of this map to the entrance to DS. With Updrafts and Wallows, you can get there in about 5-7 mins. BUT, even the possibility of a shortcut will not appease those explorers that are forever trumatized by this map.

I know more than a few explorers who are really happy with this map though. Explorers of empty areas with pushover foes is all very nice, but can you really call yourself an explorer if you’re just walking around with no danger at all?

Explorers bring to mind the Europeans who braved the congo, and faced all manner of terrifying beasts in order to explore a new area.

I’m pretty sure none of them walked through central park, mapped it and write articles about it for national geographic.

That “Crevasse of Death” is pretty easy to fight through. Tangled Depths, you can get from one end to the other with barely aggroing anything if you know how. If you’re on a US server I’d be happy to show you.

Tangled Depths, particularly once you have nuhoch wallows unlocked, isn’t hard to navigate at all. But even if you don’t have them, it’s quite easy to get through the zone. In fact, I can take a new character in there, with wallows, and get every single waypoint unlocked easily in under 15 minutes.

Oldirtbeard.9834:

Vayne.8563:

Oldirtbeard.9834:

Vayne.8563:

LoL NooBs.5076:

Finally! +1 for this thread.
Guilds dead. Builds dead. What is there to do in this game? Glide? Chat? Wow. Such features.

Your guild may in fact be dead, but you can’t speak for all guilds. My guild is definitely not dead.

I know this is anecdotal but it sure seems quiet to me but then I might just be the weirdo that every one ignores when I type in Guild chat perhaps.

Couple of simple questions? Do you play during the prime time of your guild? Do you participate in guild events? Do you log into your guild’s voice chat program?

There are certainly times when my guild isn’t busy. Right now it’s 7:41 am EST and there’s only four people online repping the guild. and one person online repping a different guild. I certainly wouldn’t judge how active a guild is if I logged in right now, because how would I know? Most people would be sleeping or getting ready for work. In fact the only reason we have five people online is because two of them are in Australia.

Guilds all have times at which they have traffic and times at which fewer people play. But you can at least look at how many people log in every day in the guild panel and get some idea if your guild is active.

You can show up to scheduled events and see how many people participate.

Ah I see so most of The socialization might be occurring on a 3rd party chat server, during prime time.

Sure. For one thing, some people are running fractals, and not likely to chat in guild chat during that, or doing PvP or WvW, or a dragon stand run, or even an AB meta. During those times, I almost never chat in guild chat. I talk to the people on mumble, because I don’t have to read and fight at the same time.

This is a dastardly game for typing while fighting. It’s very hard to type and dodge at the same time.

Oldirtbeard.9834:

Vayne.8563:

LoL NooBs.5076:

Finally! +1 for this thread.
Guilds dead. Builds dead. What is there to do in this game? Glide? Chat? Wow. Such features.

Your guild may in fact be dead, but you can’t speak for all guilds. My guild is definitely not dead.

I know this is anecdotal but it sure seems quiet to me but then I might just be the weirdo that every one ignores when I type in Guild chat perhaps.

Couple of simple questions? Do you play during the prime time of your guild? Do you participate in guild events? Do you log into your guild’s voice chat program?

There are certainly times when my guild isn’t busy. Right now it’s 7:41 am EST and there’s only four people online repping the guild. and one person online repping a different guild. I certainly wouldn’t judge how active a guild is if I logged in right now, because how would I know? Most people would be sleeping or getting ready for work. In fact the only reason we have five people online is because two of them are in Australia.

Guilds all have times at which they have traffic and times at which fewer people play. But you can at least look at how many people log in every day in the guild panel and get some idea if your guild is active.

You can show up to scheduled events and see how many people participate.

Raine.1394:

For those unsure of the game genre in use when playing HoT I suggest the following exercise. I use the word exercise but it is not hard at all.

1. Google with search term platformer game
2. your first hit will be the wiki for the platform game genre. Game genre is by definition and luckily the wiki uses the standard definitions.
3. The first sentence of the article reads: “Platform game (or platformer) is a video game which involves guiding an avatar to jump between suspended platforms and/or over obstacles to advance the game. These challenges are known as jumping puzzles or freerunning.”

There. That wasn’t hard at all. The key aspects to gameplay in a platform game are 1) navigation of platforms, and 2) advancing the game thereby. Vanilla GW2 with jumping puzzles was an MMO not a platformer. You could navigate platforms all day but you were not advancing the core game. An example of advancing the core game is arriving at VB and discovering that you need both gliding and updrafts to begin advancing the core game.

The problem is not having elements of platforming in GW2. Jumping puzzles were absolutely brilliant. You could knock youself out with them and have a ton of fun. At the same time Player X could ignore them and derive their fun from standard MMO aspects of the game. Brilliant.

And, for the last comentator here, it has nothing to do with game “difficulty”. Because the full genre here is ‘platformer obscura’ you can’t figure anything out except by brute force as in trying every possibility. Brute-force and skill-based are at opposite ends of the spectrum. This is why the first jump by a skillful player is always to youtube to find out the remaining jumps. What about brute force is going to make the gameplay fun?

It’s not a platformer because there’s no skill in jumping. Period. I’ve played platform games. I’ve played Guild Wars 2. They’re not the same. Jumping puzzles are platforming, no matter whether Guild Wars 2 is not.

However, in core Guild Wars 2, in order to map complete you had to jump. You had to do vistas. Map complete is part of the game and part of progression. Therefore, if you play Guild Wars 2, even the core game, by your definition Guild Wars 2 was always a platformer.

Because for many people getting a legendary weapon was end game progression and to get that you needed world complete which requires 3 jumping puzzles and many vistas that have jumping puzzle elements.

The thing with this game is progression is different things to different people. The people complaining about platforming are complaining about not being able to advance the game without it. Well since advance the game means different things to different people, for some people, we’ve always needed platforming, by your defintion, to progress the game.

However, since a jumping mushroom is no different from a portal, it doesn’t qualify as platforming to anyone who plays platform games.

If you jump in a mushroom in mario brothers, you go straight up in the air and right back down on the same platform. The jump pads in Not So Secret Jumping puzzle do the same. That’s platforming.

Standing on a mushroom that places your character into a new position? Not platforming.

DeceiverX.8361:

Rising Dusk.2408:

This thread makes me sad.

• You can play and beat any content in the game using any build you want. (Including even raids)
• The ‘meta’ is decided by what minimizes risks and maximizes efficiency while still doing as much damage as possible, and varies wildly for different content.
• If you play with a guild group, you can play whatever you want wherever you want so long as they’re aware and cool with it (and if you find casual groups, they will be).
• This exact same thing happened in GW1 (DwG / Trenchway / Ursanway / etc) and happens in every other team game. People want to be efficient.

This post is only applicable to PvE. The OP speaks for sPvP and WvW.

There are some builds which mathematically cannot kill others in the PvP formats unless the target literally just doesn’t use abilities.

The difference in efficacy between builds is so ridiculous that GW2’s PvP environments are a running joke in a large segment of the MMO community.

The game was absolutely excellent around two years ago, aside from the D/D bunker ele issue. As Xil said, he’s late to the fun, because to be competitive, you’re not playing much straying off the meta, and some classes are more fortunate than others.

From what I understand, most tournament teams don’t use metas, so I’m not sure why people would insist you need the meta to succeed.

Meta is all about solo play. It means you can team up with anyone and know what they’re doing because everyone is on the same page. But I can’t but help think people who are serious about PvP who have a team, who use voice chat are probably able to do a lot of things that the meta can’t. Seems to work that way anyway.

The problem I see with this post is that it doesn’t address any specific issue(s). While it’s probably true that you hate tangled depths, the lack of detail and the reasons make this post unhelpful. It’s not good feedback. It’s barely feedback at all.

It doesn’t invite discussion. It doesn’t try to solve anything. So without more detail, there’s no real reason for anyone to participate in this “discussion”.

What do you hate about it?

Djinn.9245:

AliamRationem.5172:

I agree that it isn’t really “platforming”

Just to check, I looked up platformer games online – Mario Brothers was mentioned almost every time. So I watched a play through video (even though I have seen it played) just to make sure I remembered it correctly. In the first couple of minutes it showed Mario jumping on objects that shot him in the air, gave him a speed boost, etc. Running through a tube that shot him across a chasm…

Sounds very similar to me.

The objects in mario brothers did indeed shoot him in the air. However, where he landed after he was shot in the air, was dependent on skill. In other words he was shot in the air, but in the air you were, and needed to, control the character. Depending on how you moved after you shot in the air depended on where you landed. In addition you also needed to shoot often while shot in the air. Neither of these things happen in HoT.

Jumping on a mushroom that puts you exactly where you need to be with no other input from you is not platforming.

Watching someone take a tablet of medicine or a tablet of poison looks the same if you have no other information.

But taking medicine is not the same as taking poison.

I’ve played mario brothers and the similarities of jumping mushrooms to mario brothers ends at their visual similarities. There is skill involved in jumping in mario brothers. It’s hard. There’s no skill involved in jumping on jumping mushrooms.

Djinn.9245:

Healix.5819:

maddoctor.2738:

I’m just curious here, if someone likes exploring maps for the sake of exploring them, then maps with huge complexity will be much better than plain/flat ones no?

Yes, HoT maps were designed for true explorers. For those that follow the rewards however, if they find that they are incapable of completing a single objective, there is no longer a reason to bother with any of it.

Vayne.8563:

People throw around words like platforming

Some people are very slow to act, are keyboard turners and have a hard time doing multiple actions at once. The simple act of jumping can be an obstacle, so they see the HoT maps as such.

Having not actually played any platforming games, it might be that they are far more complex than I think. However, using movement crystals, bouncing mushrooms, updrafts, leylines, and now thermal tubes, definitely reminds me of the platforming games I have seen others play.

Platforming games are like jumping puzzles. They require some level of skill to make jumps. A jumping mushroom is more like a teleporter. It just puts you where you need to be. No skill, no nothing.

In Divinity’s Reach you have shining portals that take you from the upper city to the lower city but no one calls it platforming. A better example of platforming would be many of the vistas (not just a few but many) that are in the core game, including 3 were are atop jumping puzzles.

Jumping puzzles are definitely platforming. But something can look like it without being it, because the actual mechanic requires no actual skill.

There are jumping puzzles in HoT. One of them has a mastery point on top of it, in Verdant Brink and that is definitely 100% platforming. No question about it. But it’s not needed for zone complete.

Gliding around and getting an updraft isn’t really platforming. This is more like puzzle solving than hand-eye coordination.

Edit: Lava tubes are like mushrooms. You step in one and it takes you exactly where you need to go, no skill required. No different than a portal. Thus I wouldn’t consider them platforming either. You don’t aim or control them at all.

You can stop and glide mid way and that requires the skill of tapping the space bar as you go, but it’s not really required for anything, it’s just something you can do. Still wouldn’t call that platforming.

IndigoSundown.5419:

maddoctor.2738:

IndigoSundown.5419:

Vayne.8563:

But really why is map complete so important otherwise? What do you get for it? Why does it matter?

It’s something to do in a game genre that survives by presenting players with things to do. Some people like exploring for its own sake, and reaching benchmarks provides a sense of satisfaction. Everything does not have to feed into pursuit of cosmetic carrots to be enjoyable.

I’m just curious here, if someone likes exploring maps for the sake of exploring them, then maps with huge complexity will be much better than plain/flat ones no?

I won’t speak for anyone else, but for me enjoyment trumps complexity, and having someone show me or consulting a guide ruins the experience. Perhaps my exploration skills are sub-par, but — especially in VB — I start from point A to get to point B and can’t get there. I try something different, but end up in the same frustrating place. I try a third something with no better result. It seems like there is some secret trick that is either not evident or locked behind some mastery I don’t have.

I get the whole “different strokes” thing. I liked exploration in GW and I know some hated it. The frustrations of GW exploration yielded to a systematic approach, and I’ve yet to find a systematic approach that works in HoT. So for me, HoT’s particular type of complex kittens and is not better.

As I’ve said to a number of people, showing you a few simple tricks would make HoT exploration a lot easier. Like in VB, how to get to the canopy during the day. There are several ways to do it, and I know them all.

Once you learn that, it becomes a lot easier to navigate VB. And yes, I do understand the concept of I want to do everything by myself and learn everything by myself, but that’s not really the way MMOs are designed. They’re designed so that people can (and probably should) help each other.

There’s no value to insisting I can’t do this and I’m not going to accept any help at all, particularly if you can learn something you might be able to pass on to someone else.

I’m always happy to show people some stuff. It doesn’t take long. It just gives you the tools to succeed on their own. Most people I take around VB once know enough to finish everything on their own.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Vayne.8563:

But really why is map complete so important otherwise? What do you get for it? Why does it matter?

It’s something to do in a game genre that survives by presenting players with things to do. Some people like exploring for its own sake, and reaching benchmarks provides a sense of satisfaction. Everything does not have to feed into pursuit of cosmetic carrots to be enjoyable.

There’s no shortage of things to do, and I repeat, it is not that hard. It’s really not that hard. I mean if you have to watch a video you can, but even without a video it’s not that hard.

I mean look, we should make everything easier because someone can’t do it. That’s the way forward.

People use words like platforming to describe the new areas, but this isn’t jumping puzzles. This is standing on a mushroom that puts you exactly where you need to be. It’s a visual gate. It’s taking an updraft which propels you up in the air you can can glide to something.

There are a couple of branches that might be tricky but they’re not platforming in the sense of say jumping puzzles that are already in the game that are required for map completion. Take a look at Tribulation Scaffolding or the Wall Breach Jumping puzzle, which have vistas that you need for map completion.

The stuff in HoT isn’t platforming in any sense of the game. If people are going to complain they should complain about the core game, because the platforming required to get vistas and pois in HoT is considerably less.

Now, in VB you have some tricky bits to get to certain areas during the day, but you can always come in at night and take choppers. Is that really platforming? Interacting with a ladder?

That’s my issue. People throw around words like platforming to malign HoT when the amount of platforming you need isn’t as serious as climbing the Vizier’s Tower in Straits to get a vista and a hero point.

Seriously people need to think about what’s already been in the game and stop making it like HoT is some vast departure.

Combat wise it is harder, but it requires less platforming to complete zones than the core game.

Ashen.2907:

maddoctor.2738:

Vayne.8563:

The design of the zones is very much a matter of taste, but I think people over-emphasize how hard it is to get around, along with how vertical it is. As pointed out in another post in this thread EB and AB don’t have much verticality to them at all.

All this hate on vertical maps is not founded on reality, I even saw SW as an example of a vertical map, SW doesn’t have any vertical action other than the jumping puzzle, but that’s a jumping puzzle so it makes sense.
Auric Basin has vertical action only at the start of the zone where you can fall down to the Mushroom HP bellow.
Dragon Stand is as flat as any other zone, some pre-events at the beginning are the only parts with some bouncing/gliding around, and the last fight requires some updraft use.
Tangled Depths vertical action is limited to the north west corner (the Mordrem “labyrinth”) and around Teku Nuhoch, the rest of the zone is straightforward, for example there are no up and downs at any of the other camps except Nuhoch.
Only Verdant Brink actually has lots of verticality.
All this for normal play, there are many secrets, hidden chests and achievements in places that require some platforming on all HoT zones.

You claim that the dislike of verticality in mals is not based in reality and then describe how all of the maps in question, again in your words, do, in fact, mandate such play for access or completion.

When world complete required map completion, I agree this was a thing. But people seem to think that maps after the original maps much be completed, and frankly that’s not the case. There’s nothing you get for it, unless you want to make HoT legendary. If you want to make a HoT legendary, by all means, you’d have to complete the map.

But really why is map complete so important otherwise? What do you get for it? Why does it matter?

You need to complete one map on different alts for an specialization weapon too, but it can be any map. If verticality isn’t your thing, do AB. For anything else, you never need to complete TD at all.

This came isn’t called map completion wars 2.

If you want to unlock your elite spec, there are plenty of easy to get to hero points you can do, or you can join a train, they run frequently enough.

Djinn.9245:

Quarktastic.1027:

nottsgman.8206:

it is always there until you have completed a certain part in the HoT story, then it goes away.

Mine never went away. I’ve reported it several times since HoT launched, but it’s never been fixed. I can replay the story step and get rid of it, but it reappears as soon as I leave the map and come back.

There’s a thread to report tickets that have not been addressed in over 3 days:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/support/GW2-Tickets-for-Review-3-days-older-2

A bug like that wouldn’t be a ticket. A customer service representative probably can’t fix something like that. There’s a difference between game bugs and asking for someone to refund a purchase mistake or help you log into the game.

I’m pretty sure something like this requires the developers to actually fix the bug. It’s very unlikely it’s something customer service can help with.

Ashen.2907:

Vayne.8563:

snip

I tend to agree. An expansion that is aimed at players who have, in theory, had three years of experience learning how to play their characters, the various mechanics of play, and so on, needs to be more difficult in order to provide an ongoing challenge for a player base which has outgrown the core content (and which now has access to some pretty serious power creep for their characters). A game company cannot afford to assume that their players are incapable of improving, growing, over time. If they did then no content would be more difficult than the tutorial instances.

That said, I am still not fond of the HoT zones, not because of play difficulty, but because of map design. The LS3 zones have been slightly better, but not sufficiently so to maintain my interest. I will be watching map design closely throughout the remainder of LS3 to assist in deciding whether to purchase the second expansion. If elite specs continue to be a source of power creep and the zones continue to be designed as they currently are, I am less likely to buy again.

And yet to me, the map design, more than the increased difficulty, is the best part of the HoT zones, where as most of the other zones, I don’t care much about the map design at all.

Just as in Rift, Scarlet Gorge was by far my favorite map.

The design of the zones is very much a matter of taste, but I think people over-emphasize how hard it is to get around, along with how vertical it is. As pointed out in another post in this thread EB and AB don’t have much verticality to them at all.