Guild Wars 2

I almost always hide my shoulder skins. Most shoulder skins in this game are grossly exaagerated. I look like I’m wearing tanks on my shoulders. No thanks. Anet didn’t “do something wrong” here. They did something you don’t personally like.

Well other people in this thread don’t all agree with you. This is simply a matter of taste.

I leveled my masteries by running the event chains, because I enjoyed that. All the boosters you can really help. If you have birthday boosters, if you have celebration boosters, particularly XP boosters, food, utilities, fireworks…anything to get your XP up> The reason XP boosters are good is because they don’t only give you more Xp for kills, they give you more for events too.

My guess is you got an email with the code and didn’t realize it. You probably have to apply it manually. Find the email you received with the code, go to account.guildwars2.com, go to the content page and add the number in. Then it will be unlocked.

Derigar.7810:

Just a flesh wound.3589:

I suggest you start a brand new character and level up by playing the game, just like you would if you had bought the game and started playing. Jumping into a game at the end means you don’t know what’s going on or what to do or any of the lore of the game.

Yes because this game does so well at explaining anything lore wise…

This game does great at what it was intended to do. Not serve you everything on a silver platter. You want the lore, it’s out there, go find it.

See, some of us grew up on adventure games where we had to do more than follow a star to get to a wall of text to figure stuff out. In that way, Guild Wars 2 is a bit more old school. It doesn’t give you that bread crumb trail.

That’s one of the reasons I like it.

When you buy HoT you get a code. If you give her the code, she can apply it to her account.

Did you apply the code that came with the game to your account?

Swagger.1459:

I like how you used the word “you”… More players than I share this sentiment…

Yup more investment would be great…

You should maybe look at the bigger picture here Wanze.

Thanks for reading it finally instead of telling me to “buy more gems”…

And more than one player share my arguments. Neither one of us is alone. But if the majority is right, that means at one time the world was flat.

Having a majority doesn’t make you correct…and you can’t even prove you have that.

Jumping into an MMO at max level and trying to understand it is like trying to learn to read starting with college texts. It doesn’t really work.

This game is particularly hard because it’s different from other games.

Timer sites like gw2timer.com might help but you really should start a character and learn the game.

Aidenwolf.5964:

Vayne.8563:

Aidenwolf.5964:

Vayne.8563:

Aidenwolf.5964:

Vayne.8563:

Werdx.2059:

lunaticdawn.1860:

people keep saying 3 years 3 years, but not everyone play this game all 3 years, player can cut the subscription if they want a break

beside that, this game has gem store

I think that the content of HoT not worth $60 for players with core game

Selling HoT alltogether with core game was lame way to steal money from people who have core already.

Its ok to pay 50 euros,if you do not have game at all,but that means,i bought core game,which i don’t need at all = i wasted 25 euros for nothing.It would be awesome if they allowed us to give to people core cd key.

People who do not have game at all,they spent 50 euros on both games.

People who got core game,spent same amount of money for expansion..

That’s some weird logic,but then again,its Arena Net,nothing can surprise me anymore.

It’s also what all the top MMOs are doing, not just Anet. You’re trying to make it sound like it’s unreasonable to remove barriers to entry for people. People who bought half a dozen WoW expansions paid for them, but new players only need the base game and the current expansion.

It’s not something people complain about, because it’s ridiculous to think that people will look at a game to play, realize they have to buy three or four games and think sure why not. That’s not how it works.

Removing barriers to entry is good for veterans.

GW2 was Buy To Play it was supposed to be different than every other MMO. It is now a Freemium game and players have every right to dislike it. Buy once and play forever was corrupted by the gem store you championed no matter what they put in it. Players like me saw doom when you saw sunshine you’ll convince none of us to rejoice in being fleeced.

Guild Wars 2 is buy to play. You can buy it and play it. Now Heart of Thorns is buy to play. Just like Guild Wars 1 was buy to play but still had an expansion.

Buy to play doesn’t mean there’ll never be an expansion. Buy to play means you’re playing a game without a monthly fee.

Guild Wars 2 HoT essentially replaced Guild Wars 2 core. It’s the new Guild Wars 2. It’s buy to play.

If you want to play Guild Wars core, you dont’ have to buy anything. It’s now free.

I’ll correct you here because accuracy is important when attempting to correct misinformation. Guild Wars 2 is Free to Play…. Guild Wars is not. Each Guild Wars campaign still is Buy To Play. I was robbed and am unhappy about it, if you want to correct me, be correct.

Free to Play Guild Wars 2 has kitten all to do with the expansion anyways they just gave away my kitten for nothing to anyone who logs in.

The Guild Wars 2 game is buy to play. That is HoT which is the current incarnation. This is how MMOs work. Too much of a barrier to entry for new players to buy every single game leading up to the game. This is why WoW and EQ did it.

And you know, three year old games all go down in price to the point where you can buy the original Guild Wars Trilogy for the price of new players paid just for Prophecies.

So if you bought Prophecies, Factions and Nightfall when they came out, you were actually paying three times the price of all three games together if you waited.

It’s what happens. Expecting it not to happen, therefore, isn’t reasonable in my opinion. The real problem you don’t like the direction the game is heading in, and so you’ll complain about every aspect of the game, even something every other major MMO is doing or going to do for the exact same reason.

You think it’s better to charge for each game and have far less players? Okay then.

You’re right about my thoughts on the direction of the game but you’re actually trying to ignore that the core game is Free To Play which boggles the mind.

The core game is free to play with a bunch of restrictions. It’s almost more of an unlimited demo. But I’m not ignoring the fact. Your mind is boggled because you’re not grasping what I’m saying, because it requires a mental shift you’re not prepared to make.

I don’t see a core game. I see a game. The core game, limited as it is, is the demo for the full game, which includes HoT. Hot has it’s own website, it’s separately trademarked, it is the new Guild Wars product.

The core game isn’t sold anymore unless someone has it still in stock. Anet doesn’t sell it.

You can’t use trading post for a lot of stuff, can’t talk in map chat, can’t whisper people who aren’t on your friend’s list, can’t change gold for gems, can’t enter Lion’s Arch till level 35. Sure it’s free. Because it’s not the game anymore. It’s not being sold anymore.

The core game is just a demo for HoT. HoT is now the game. That’s all.

Best PvE – Gliding in all it’s forms. By far my favorite addition to the game. Love the design of the new maps too.

Worst PvE – Harder for casual players to come in and get stuff done in HoT. The amount of commitment needed for the game is higher now than it’s ever been.

Aidenwolf.5964:

Vayne.8563:

Aidenwolf.5964:

Vayne.8563:

Werdx.2059:

lunaticdawn.1860:

people keep saying 3 years 3 years, but not everyone play this game all 3 years, player can cut the subscription if they want a break

beside that, this game has gem store

I think that the content of HoT not worth $60 for players with core game

Selling HoT alltogether with core game was lame way to steal money from people who have core already.

Its ok to pay 50 euros,if you do not have game at all,but that means,i bought core game,which i don’t need at all = i wasted 25 euros for nothing.It would be awesome if they allowed us to give to people core cd key.

People who do not have game at all,they spent 50 euros on both games.

People who got core game,spent same amount of money for expansion..

That’s some weird logic,but then again,its Arena Net,nothing can surprise me anymore.

It’s also what all the top MMOs are doing, not just Anet. You’re trying to make it sound like it’s unreasonable to remove barriers to entry for people. People who bought half a dozen WoW expansions paid for them, but new players only need the base game and the current expansion.

It’s not something people complain about, because it’s ridiculous to think that people will look at a game to play, realize they have to buy three or four games and think sure why not. That’s not how it works.

Removing barriers to entry is good for veterans.

GW2 was Buy To Play it was supposed to be different than every other MMO. It is now a Freemium game and players have every right to dislike it. Buy once and play forever was corrupted by the gem store you championed no matter what they put in it. Players like me saw doom when you saw sunshine you’ll convince none of us to rejoice in being fleeced.

Guild Wars 2 is buy to play. You can buy it and play it. Now Heart of Thorns is buy to play. Just like Guild Wars 1 was buy to play but still had an expansion.

Buy to play doesn’t mean there’ll never be an expansion. Buy to play means you’re playing a game without a monthly fee.

Guild Wars 2 HoT essentially replaced Guild Wars 2 core. It’s the new Guild Wars 2. It’s buy to play.

If you want to play Guild Wars core, you dont’ have to buy anything. It’s now free.

I’ll correct you here because accuracy is important when attempting to correct misinformation. Guild Wars 2 is Free to Play…. Guild Wars is not. Each Guild Wars campaign still is Buy To Play. I was robbed and am unhappy about it, if you want to correct me, be correct.

Free to Play Guild Wars 2 has kitten all to do with the expansion anyways they just gave away my kitten for nothing to anyone who logs in.

The Guild Wars 2 game is buy to play. That is HoT which is the current incarnation. This is how MMOs work. Too much of a barrier to entry for new players to buy every single game leading up to the game. This is why WoW and EQ did it.

And you know, three year old games all go down in price to the point where you can buy the original Guild Wars Trilogy for the price of new players paid just for Prophecies.

So if you bought Prophecies, Factions and Nightfall when they came out, you were actually paying three times the price of all three games together if you waited.

It’s what happens. Expecting it not to happen, therefore, isn’t reasonable in my opinion. The real problem you don’t like the direction the game is heading in, and so you’ll complain about every aspect of the game, even something every other major MMO is doing or going to do for the exact same reason.

You think it’s better to charge for each game and have far less players? Okay then.

eldrin.6471:

If legendary is not superior to ascended then why do we put so much time and resources into getting it? It makes no difference why legendary is superior to ascended,what matters is that it is.Ascended armour will now be nothing but a stepping stone on the way to legendary armour.Yes this game was once casual friendly with little grind.I would hate to be just starting out in this game now.you get to lvl 80 to find you got 65 mill xp to grind out for mastery. and the small fortune for ascended just gets you a ticket on the gear treadmill for legendary.This game will grind itself out of existences.and thats a shame cos a lot of people loved what it used to stand for.

This isn’t true. Legendary armor won’t be a stepping stone for most people. This is because most people won’t even attempt to get it. In most games you need BIS gear to play certain content. That’s just not true here.

It’s not the same situation and it’s not a problem…unless you make it one yourself.

Soon.5240:

Ayrilana.1396:

The stuff im trying to point out …..

I notice that:

1) You apparently think that nothing in the HoT expansion should be criticized, and
2) You have 179 Post Tabs….

Do you play the game? Or just play the forums?

Or do you work for Anet?

There’s plenty in HoT to criticize, but there plenty of stuff that I feel is done right too. You can play the game and the forums. I have 141 mastery points in HoT and like Ayrilana I post here all the time.

No, I don’t work for Anet but I’d sure do it if they offered me a job. lol

Aidenwolf.5964:

Vayne.8563:

Werdx.2059:

lunaticdawn.1860:

people keep saying 3 years 3 years, but not everyone play this game all 3 years, player can cut the subscription if they want a break

beside that, this game has gem store

I think that the content of HoT not worth $60 for players with core game

Selling HoT alltogether with core game was lame way to steal money from people who have core already.

Its ok to pay 50 euros,if you do not have game at all,but that means,i bought core game,which i don’t need at all = i wasted 25 euros for nothing.It would be awesome if they allowed us to give to people core cd key.

People who do not have game at all,they spent 50 euros on both games.

People who got core game,spent same amount of money for expansion..

That’s some weird logic,but then again,its Arena Net,nothing can surprise me anymore.

It’s also what all the top MMOs are doing, not just Anet. You’re trying to make it sound like it’s unreasonable to remove barriers to entry for people. People who bought half a dozen WoW expansions paid for them, but new players only need the base game and the current expansion.

It’s not something people complain about, because it’s ridiculous to think that people will look at a game to play, realize they have to buy three or four games and think sure why not. That’s not how it works.

Removing barriers to entry is good for veterans.

GW2 was Buy To Play it was supposed to be different than every other MMO. It is now a Freemium game and players have every right to dislike it. Buy once and play forever was corrupted by the gem store you championed no matter what they put in it. Players like me saw doom when you saw sunshine you’ll convince none of us to rejoice in being fleeced.

Guild Wars 2 is buy to play. You can buy it and play it. Now Heart of Thorns is buy to play. Just like Guild Wars 1 was buy to play but still had an expansion.

Buy to play doesn’t mean there’ll never be an expansion. Buy to play means you’re playing a game without a monthly fee.

Guild Wars 2 HoT essentially replaced Guild Wars 2 core. It’s the new Guild Wars 2. It’s buy to play.

If you want to play Guild Wars core, you dont’ have to buy anything. It’s now free.

kdaddy.5431:

Vayne.8563:

kdaddy.5431:

The stuff im trying to point out is the fact they are catering to know one. They are making it harder for people to play the game. I understand they said gliding only in magumma but the question is why?

Why was the liquid xp changed? Why no cross specs/mastery points? Why no new WvW traits, reward tracks? Why very basic PvP rewards tracks and only 1 repeatable one?

My guild is at 29 and we started so strong and we have basically all but of died since the HOT. Why couldnt WvW upgrades in the Guild Hall require WvW participation? Why isnt the guild hall PvP room require you to do a PvP guild hall reward track?

I still havent finished the new story line because i cant since i dont spend a ton of time in PvE. I got up too level 3 gliding and 1/2 threw 4 and it was a huge mistake since i only have 1 to other things and it requires learning a language among other things to progress threw the story.

WvW is 1 thing but im truly wondering if they are gonna make the game better. Making changes now to WvW and if they are as bad as the HOT release then WvW will be all but done. I have quit playing WvW and i really only pop in to do my daily PvP rewards and i soon will probably quit logging into that since its been nearly 4 years and there have been no changes/additions worth the $200 i put into the original and expansion game.

This is wrong. They are not catering to no one, because probably about half the population of the game is enjoying the expansion. They’ve certainly catered to me, at any rate.

I’m an open world player and I love what they’ve done in the jungle. They’ve catered to people who want raids. The raid community seems like like the raid. They have NOT catered to WvW players that’s true, but then they said the changes they want to make are taking longer than expected.

Not sure how many people like the new PvP type but there are new PvP reward tracks.

there is 1 repeatable track and you yourself said they are catering to you.

Also ive always done a little of everything (65% pvp, 20% wvw and 15% pve if i had to give them a percentage) but i was always able do something from each area. The PvP players were actually happy when they merged PvP gear and PvE gear because now PvP players could go into WvW and PvE with ease. We kind of just merged into one another.

Now its nothing like that, i have done mostly PvP but simple fact that i cant play a new spec when i have played many many games with them already in PvP is furstrating. Not being able to do the story is frustrating. I have been to the PvE areas and got 100% completion on verdint brink but i am not going to replay the PvE missions over and over and over. Wait 2 hrs for a meta event when i already spend 8+ minutes queing for a match in PvP.

Like i said they catered to a certain group and you kind of hit which one. Maybe you dont care for the WvW group and maybe you dont care about the PvP group. Maybe this game can survive on the PvE crowd alone and with the way things are going they might have too.

You’re saying no one is happy. I’ve looked in multiple complaint threads and in a large percentage of them, 50% of the people are happy.

Saying there are people who aren’t happy isn’t the same as saying no one is happy, which is what you are saying. You’re therefore, demonstrably wrong.

kdaddy.5431:

The stuff im trying to point out is the fact they are catering to know one. They are making it harder for people to play the game. I understand they said gliding only in magumma but the question is why?

Why was the liquid xp changed? Why no cross specs/mastery points? Why no new WvW traits, reward tracks? Why very basic PvP rewards tracks and only 1 repeatable one?

My guild is at 29 and we started so strong and we have basically all but of died since the HOT. Why couldnt WvW upgrades in the Guild Hall require WvW participation? Why isnt the guild hall PvP room require you to do a PvP guild hall reward track?

I still havent finished the new story line because i cant since i dont spend a ton of time in PvE. I got up too level 3 gliding and 1/2 threw 4 and it was a huge mistake since i only have 1 to other things and it requires learning a language among other things to progress threw the story.

WvW is 1 thing but im truly wondering if they are gonna make the game better. Making changes now to WvW and if they are as bad as the HOT release then WvW will be all but done. I have quit playing WvW and i really only pop in to do my daily PvP rewards and i soon will probably quit logging into that since its been nearly 4 years and there have been no changes/additions worth the $200 i put into the original and expansion game.

This is wrong. They are not catering to no one, because probably about half the population of the game is enjoying the expansion. They’ve certainly catered to me, at any rate.

I’m an open world player and I love what they’ve done in the jungle. They’ve catered to people who want raids. The raid community seems like like the raid. They have NOT catered to WvW players that’s true, but then they said the changes they want to make are taking longer than expected.

Not sure how many people like the new PvP type but there are new PvP reward tracks.

Swagger.1459:

Sure vayne, “focused on cost efficiency” from a business conference call to investors and I highlighted what pieces of bigger things are in the game and promised to come and missing and neglected…

You have zero meangiful argument here. I’m not doing these straw man arguments from you, sorry.

Yeah, I don’t need anymore facts than those I presented.

Thanks

Edit- now if you can show me proof of any official legendary armor pics from Anet… If you can show me where the robust and meangiful winter event is… If you can show me there are more than a handful of spvp meta builds after 3 full years… If you can show me that ncsoft is really supporting growth of Anet on a large scale instead of saying “cost efficiency” then mentioning gw2 by name in the same sentence… Then we can have a discussion…

Edit 2- then asking for proof for the proof provided by both nc and Anet shows you have zero interest in talking about this topic. I’m given X amount of facts and thats what I work with… Want to disprove me, come up with your own factual statements from business calls and your own factual proof and point somewhere in current patch notes where we have these missing things… So far it’s a lot of tables of stuff at Anet, and that business call of “cost efficiency” explains a whole lot…

You presented one line, hell not even a line, a few words and you’re using that as your entire argument. That’s it. Look, an article had a couple of words. No context. Nothing. Zero.

Companies tell stock holders what they want to hear all the time. If profits are down, the sound bite is we’re going to cut costs. But there are times when that does happen, there are times when it doesn’t happen.

You’re drawing a conclusion about what’s going on with the game from a couple of words. That’s borderline ridiculous.

You can’t judge a company, or a game on a couple of words. I mean you can, but it wouldn’t be a very valid judgement.

You can repeat the same three, four words over and over again, and it’s still just that. Something said at one stock call, once.

In the larger scheme of things that’s meaningless.

As an example. the stuff that Anet is coming out with now, has been in the works for a year or more. So if this was said for let’s say the last quarter, it wouldn’t even affect the stuff we’ve seen yet. The timeline for the creation of anything in this genre is much longer than you think.

So even if this was happening, and even if the results of it are what you believe them to be, it’ll be many many months before we see those results. We’d only see these results if they were doing it say for the last year.

But a year ago, this wasn’t said in the stock call. So yeah, there’s no evidence at all.

I’m wondering why anyone would believe this is meaningful in any way, considering how many games NcSoft currently has and how general the conversation is.

NcSoft didn’t say they were cutting anything specifically. They didn’t say they had cut costs in Guild Wars 2. For all you know the cost cutting was on switching cleaning companies.

An assumption with nothing to go on, remains an assumption.

You’ve essentially added two plus two and came up with the answer fish. There are so many possibilities, down to you misreading the ambiguous phrasing of the quote you posted.

There’s no fact here, just speculation presented as fact.

Happy holidays everyone. Hope you’ve had a white (knight) Christmas. lol

Swagger.1459:

IndigoSundown.5419:

Swagger.1459:

IndigoSundown.5419:

- snip -

I gave specific examples of the pieced together development by what we see being implemented. There is no speculating… Fact that we have a mini raid and no legendary armor to even view is not a speculation. Nor is 1 wvw map while the rest of wvw is in production. Nor profession neglect that has been pointed out many times in and out of these forums… Those are facts… And that’s where “cost efficiency” come into play…

You are asking us to conclude with you that “cost efficiency” is the issue behind your observations. You’ve not looked at other possible issues that may have produced the effects. Thus, your analysis is flawed. Flawed analysis means suspect conclusions.

MMO developers failing to provide everything that MMO consumers might want at the pace those consumers prefer is the state of the genre. It certainly is not something unique to GW2. Nor is it new with regard to GW2. There have been complaints about GW2 content provision, lack of new profession mechanics, lack of attention to WvW, etc. since very shortly after the game launched. I’m sure that costs are a factor in that dynamic, but this is not something new.

Anet’s financial resources from ncsoft are too low and then spread too thin. That’s the main problem. This game deserves a very hefty injection of cash from the masters. Until then, it’s going to be continuous patchwork quilting on every project… That’s a problem.

I believe GW2 has the potential to be the number 1 flagship game for ncsoft. It needs a big cash boost…

You keep repeating this. Do you have some evidence, or is this just your opinion of the situation?

Palador.2170:

Vayne.8563:

We’ve seen no layoffs. We have seen hiring. I’m not thinking this is really an issue at this point.

That would depend on what everyone at ANet is doing.

If there’s a second project (and given ANet’s size, there really should be), then the staff on GW2 can drop even while they hire more people.

I’m not saying that this IS the case, as I have no way of knowing if it is or isn’t, but it’s a possibility we have to consider.

There’s no evidence Anet is working on anything else. There is evidence they’re working on Guild Wars 2. We can consider anything. But stuff gets leaked all the time. I’m not thinking Anet is making another game at this time.

I think you might be reading this article wrong. This sentence:

“During the conference call, NCsoft said it has been focused on cost-efficiency and expects fourth quarter revenues to improve, referencing Guild Wars 2 specifically.”

Now, a lot of this has to do with comma placement, but I read this as they’re focusing over all on cost-efficiency, and they’re expecting fourth quarter revenues to improve referencing Guild Wars 2 specifically. The cost cutting measures are what all companies say when profits are down.

So Guild Wars 2, according to the article, profits were down “a bit”. That’s a three year old game that had yet to have an expansion, and had a content drought that lasted many months. Of course profits were down a bit.

I don’t see this is the doom and gloom that I’m reading from your article.

We’ve seen no layoffs. We have seen hiring. I’m not thinking this is really an issue at this point.

One more thing. We got one new map in WvW, because the rest of the changes weren’t done yet. It’s not that we’re not getting more changes to WvW. They simply didn’t have them ready for the release of HoT. Throwing more money at those sorts of issues don’t necessarily make them move any faster.

We’ve seen four changes in the sneak preview for WvW for sometime early next year, again not the big changes, and that preview was very well received by the WvW player base (which is shocking in and of itself).

It’s easy to read an article in something like MMORPG and let your fears carry you away but in reality, it’ll be another six months to a year before we know how well Guild Wars 2 is actually doing, now that the expansion has been released.

That’s impressive. Good job both of you.

Playing on Tarnished Coast. Unless you’re playing WvW (large scale PvP) it’s largely irrelevant.

Werdx.2059:

lunaticdawn.1860:

people keep saying 3 years 3 years, but not everyone play this game all 3 years, player can cut the subscription if they want a break

beside that, this game has gem store

I think that the content of HoT not worth $60 for players with core game

Selling HoT alltogether with core game was lame way to steal money from people who have core already.

Its ok to pay 50 euros,if you do not have game at all,but that means,i bought core game,which i don’t need at all = i wasted 25 euros for nothing.It would be awesome if they allowed us to give to people core cd key.

People who do not have game at all,they spent 50 euros on both games.

People who got core game,spent same amount of money for expansion..

That’s some weird logic,but then again,its Arena Net,nothing can surprise me anymore.

It’s also what all the top MMOs are doing, not just Anet. You’re trying to make it sound like it’s unreasonable to remove barriers to entry for people. People who bought half a dozen WoW expansions paid for them, but new players only need the base game and the current expansion.

It’s not something people complain about, because it’s ridiculous to think that people will look at a game to play, realize they have to buy three or four games and think sure why not. That’s not how it works.

Removing barriers to entry is good for veterans.

Everyone has different opinions. If you already own the game, jump in and find out. For my money, it’s definitely worth it. Your mileage may vary.

Axialbloom.8109:

Wasted.

I would question how much Anet cares about us, outside of the gemstore. HoT has been disappointing so far.

Hot has been disappointing to you. Does that mean Anet doesn’t care about us, because you don’t like it.

I like it. I know a lot of other people who do as well. No change to any game will keep all people happy. So if some people aren’t happy that means a company doesn’t care?

I think that’s a very long conclusion to draw and probably a wrong one as well.

Leohart.4610:

Happy Christmas? That’s so weird to say lol. Merry Christmas

More people in Australia, where I am anyway, say happy Christmas than merry Christmas.

Either way, happy holidays everyone.

Why can’t you open the story mode dungeon? I’ve always been able to. What happens when you try?

Happy Wintersday, OP, and congratulations on your accomplishment. It’s an inspiring thing to read.

Samnang.1879:

“6: Have a staff who genuinely Care about its players’ money”

Corrected

Since when has caring about money become such a bad thing? I care about money? You can care about money and still care about players. They’re not mutually exclusive.

I ran a shop and genuinely cared about customers. I still cared about money. If you think those two things can’t co-exist, I’m sad to say I believe you’re mistaken.

OP, I agree with you, I’m having a great time.

A lot of times, meta events are easier with less people. This is a non-issue.

It’s true that there’s no tier of gear above the top tier, which wasn’t raised in the expansion. Here’s my take on it.

I want to be powerful myself, not to wear powerful clothes. I don’t want to be a coatrack for greatness.

In Guild Wars 2, if you want to be great, you have to be skillful, rather than wear Hogwart’s Amazing Coat of Awesomeness.

I’d rather play a game where actually learning to play your profession makes you skillful, more than what I’m wearing.

DaShi.1368:

In other words, if you don’t agree with Vayne, you hate the game and hate Anet.

Not what I said. Not even CLOSE to what I said.

I simply said that Anet is removing barriers to entry and that’s good for everyone especially long term players.

I can’t remember buying a game 3 years later for as much as I paid for it. In fact, most 3 year old games don’t see at all, or are lying around in the bargain bin.

WoW has many expansions. You get them all for buying the base game and the current expansion. The same with EQ. You guy the current expansion you get everything.

MMOs have natural attrition. People stop playing all the time for all sorts of reasons. So the only way a game can stay healthy is to attract new customers and that means removing barriers to entry. The NPE was made to make the game easier to learn. The pricing is to make it appealing to new people.

The best thing, the very best thing, Anet can do for veteran players is to remove obstacles for new people to start playing.

If you love the game as much as you claim, you should be happy they made this decision.

Cedric Ambidexter.9174:

serialkicker.5274:

There is nothing wrong with the gem store itself, it’s actually welcoming. But it is wrong that all cool stuff ends up in the gem store and that’s pretty much the only way to get those things. For example, expansion only brought us few new armor sets (two or three) and exactly 0 alternative glider skins to work for. If you want new skins, you better open your wallet and throw it into gem store. That’s why many people play gw2 like me (on and off)…
But since you’re new player you still have plenty of stuff to work towards if you like.
Also, what you’re saying about story is not true, like others said already. I have never finished personal story myself and I have 6 lvl 80 characters. Maybe you’re getting confused, because you need to be certain level in order to continue story.

I agree with you that leveling is not that much fun, but that’s of course personal opinion and many will disagree and want to kill me now. It depends how much you like world, story and npcs. If you like those a lot you will have no problem exploring and doing story and events.
So I disagree with guy who said leveling is the most fun part and endgame is boring.
I can’t get myself to level characters , because it’s so painfully boring, I just want to get to 80. When you’re 80 you have all the tools available/skills/traits, you can try all the builds you want and learn all about your profession and how to master it. That’s fun. You won’t be doing that when you level up, because you won’t bother with builds, because it’s useless. You will be changing gear often and so it’s no reason to spend a lot of money to gear your character as best as possible. There is also no reason to bother with build if you don’t have all traits and skills available.

Hi,

U make a good post. Am I wrong in stating that you can’t level up quickly just by ‘killing things’ ?

The best way to level up is to do events and explore. The story is something that’s optional if you like that sort of thing. It’s by no means required.

JUST killing things, without doing events though, is quite slow.

Also many events fill in hearts as you do it, so you don’t have to focus on hearts. I tend to run through hearts, do a couple of things in passing and finish them a bit as a time as I run back through them.

I really really don’t think you understand how to level in this game.

Just look for events. Orange circles on your big map. They’re like quests.

OP I think you need to learn about the game before making suggestions on how to improve it.

Wildkitten.3872:

Yeah, GW2 is so bad to allow you to deposit many things directly from your inventory directly to your bank without going anywhere and providing tons of merchants just about everywhere in the world. And if you are in one of the few places that has no merchant around, you go to a WvW borderland walk 5 feet to one, sell, exit back to exactly where you were.

Or the PvP lobby. Or use one of the merchants you’ve stacked up from daily log in rewards.

Every map has a merchant when you enter in HoT. Go to the merchant, and sell. Because if you leave the map, you lose your progress in that map events.

If you keep trying you get in. Usually takes me about 1 minute of trying. Yes, it does give you that warning, just be persistent. Once you’re in you stay in.

Zenith.6403:

Vayne.8563:

To suggest that you can make an MMO in good conscience that includes no grind is a spurious argument. There is no MMO that doesn’t include some form of grinding.

- I remember a trailer where one of their lead designers said something along the lines of “if you like MMOs you should check out Guild Wars 2 and if you hate MMOs then you really should check out Guild Wars 2”. The same trailer also specifically addressed the problem of grinding and said that they don’t want grind in Guild Wars 2.

Actually that’s a side issue. The problem is that of game design. The first Guild Wars had actual quests that involved traveling to different locations, talking with different NPCs and had different phases. That to me looks like game made in good faith: you could reasonably say that such activity is interesting to player.

Guild Wars 2 quests are like this: you enter a new area and immediately notice the ground is littered with trinkets. Quest appears: collect these trinkets and bring them to quest NPC. So you collect some and bring them to NPC only to have the progress bar move slighly forward. You must collect more of them. That is the core of the game. Kill these monsters and collect these trinkets over and over again. I can’t imagine how anyone would consider such activity inspiring. Guild Wars 2 is a game made in bad faith.

Prophecies had 203 actual quests. Guild War 2 launched with 300 hearts and more than 1500 dynamic events. It has more quests, since DEs replaced quests. Many of those 203 quests were simple and fast, btw.

As for the if you hate MMOs you’ll want to play Guild Wars 2 that doesn’t mean every single thing that is in another MMO won’t appear here. There are tons of things here that most other MMOs don’t have.

Downscaling, everyone can rez everyone, no kill stealing, no node stealing, no need or greed, no raising the level cap, no new tier of gear with the expansion, no linear leveling. The game is not linear at all. This game doesn’t have mounts and most MMOs do.

Quoting one line from a single video that game out two years before the game came out, without looking at everything that was said after is sort of pointless.

Anet tried to do it with minimal grind and people got their exotic gear, saw nothing to work for and left. So Anet compromised by adding ascended gear to the game. That was a couple of years after the quote you mentions which is now five years old. Games evolve. You either like their evolution or you don’t. But quoting a single marketing line or even a video five years after it was made? Five years is forever in this industry.

It’s still largely a cosmetic end game which is basically what Anet said they were going to deliver. There’s a reason people call this game Fashion Wars.

How come no one quotes Eric Flannum saying there would be stuff to grind for?

WTFast helps. Yeah it’s not free, but it has improved my connection. Anet isn’t going to redesign or even design the game for the people with the worst connection or the slowest computers. It’s not really reasonable to expect them to.

I’ve been using WTfast for the last 10 days and it’s helped some. It’s not a perfect solution and it’s not a free solution but it’s a solution that’s available now. It’s also not without some difficulties, but it’s worth it in the long run.

Zenith.6403:

Elyndis.2130:

For many people, GW2 is an enjoyable, shared experience in the here and now. I think that obliging yourself to grind away at a piano or martial art when you would enjoy yourself more with another activity is problematic because it seems like a lot of people put an emphasis on these hobbies as a form of self-betterment, and judge each other based on each individual’s participation in such things. Therefore, a lot of the pressure to do those kinds of things results from a fear of being different, or a fear or people, or a fear of shame. These are unhealthy motivations.

- I was thinking that spending time with low-quality game is pretty bad way to spend one’s life. Not in a sense that it would be morally wrong, but the alternatives are better. I think these things can and should be judged. A picture with high resolution is better than same picture in low resolution. Food that has no flavour in it is worse than same food properly flavoured. Same way a game that contains grind is worse than a game made in good faith. Grind invokes compulsion and eventually existential crisis. It feels like working in a sweatshop where you’re toiling away day to day for paltry reward, receiving no appreciation from anyone. It’s not something to take lightly. Many players have lost their satisfaction in life as a result of these MMO games.

To suggest that you can make an MMO in good conscience that includes no grind is a spurious argument. There is no MMO that doesn’t include some form of grinding.

Prior to this games release, at one of the interviews, someone asked if there would be stuff to grind for for people who enjoy that play style and Eric Flannum said yes.

So I don’t know why people say that Anet said there would be no grind.

What they said was, and this now becomes a matter of opinion, there’ll be no grind to get to the fun stuff.

The examples they gave at the time were placing events like SB in starter zones, so you could do fun things while leveling and not have to wait for a completely different game at level cap.

That was the pre talk about grinding.

That and talking about not having to grind for BIS gear, an issue over which they had to compromise to keep the game moving forward early in it’s life.

To this day, ascended gear remains my least favorite thing about Guild Wars 2. But they never said there would be no grind.

I’ve been using WTFast as a solution for latency. It takes me down to about 220ish ping, which is more playable. It isn’t free, but it’s worth it for me. Just a heads up.

My favorite timer site is http://gw2timer.com .

It’s even easier if you use the Wintersday vendor to do it. Less clicking.

Zenith.6403:

Kal Spiro.9745:

So you’re not a gamer, why are you even here? Playing a game for 10k hours seems just fine by me if I was willing to do it for 10k hours in the first place. There’s nothing in this game, though, that takes even remotely that long.

- I am a gamer. I’ve played lots of games during my life. Most of them were good experiences. 20-40 hours of high-quality content for a fair price. It used to be that developers would strive create an experience or a challenge for players to face. These days there’s a talk of “player retention”. What a bizarre concept. It sounds like some drug dealer wanting to hook up his customers so they come back for more. All the “dailies” and achievements are just there to hook you up once the game has lost its appeal. Sometimes it’s hard to see what the core of the game is with all the fluff. What if there was no items? What do we need them for? The slot machine effect, that’s what. Reinforcement for player to keep on playing indefinitely. Minimum effort for maximal player retention.

Is this what “a game” means to you?

Actually MMOs have always talked about player retention, though maybe not publicly. At least it’s been that way for many years Another term for player retention when referring to MMOs is market share.

You believe old games didn’t talk about market share? Yeah maybe in the 80s, that was true, but no time since.

People made games to get them to buy games. Now, the game market is far far more crowded and you don’t even have to go to a store to buy a game anymore. So the competition is fierce, thus market share comes a word every business uses at some point or other.

In MMOs your market share is based on player retention. Nothing really to do with this argument.

Games have gotten more expensive to produce. Far more expensive. Very few early games had to worry about voice acting, which costs a small fortune. They didn’t have a staff of 300 people to feed. They certainly didn’t have the level of competiion.

Take Guild Wars 1. It came out ten years ago at a time when it was the only non subscription multiplayer fantasy game. The only one. Now there are free to play games, and freeium games, and games with “optional” subscriptions that claim to be free to play. Every one of these games is competition.

What company in their right mind wouldn’t talk about player retention?

You know, people saying the Karka Queen dies to fast are probably right. However, that doesn’t make her, as the OP says, the most frustrating boss ever. His main complaint is that he missed her…by not having a waypoint, why being there 8 minutes early. Anyone defending this post is saying it’s okay to know about the random spawn, not get the waypoint and then complain that it died before he could get there. If he’d taken the time to get there, this post would have likely never happened.

Dying too fast because it should take longer because it’s not epic is not the argtument he’s using.

Also the Karka Queen is not likely dying this fast because of power creep as one person suggesting. She’s dying this fast due to mega server creep. When we had individual servres this wasn’t the same kind of problem. Sure ascended have some affect as do conditions ,but at the end of the day, this boss has been a joke since the megaserver appeared.

Now, because they’re essentially on farm anyway, I’m not sure that making them take longer would serve much of a purpose without a complete redo which obviously takes time and resources.

I had GWAMM before I had 50/50, I think I needed three more achievements for that. At the end of the day, no one cares.

I think GWAMM sounds better too, but more people use it. Champion of The Gods is hardly ever used.

Frankly I like Rift Warden best. lol

There’s just too much to explain. A lot of things have changed. Fractals, revamped. Dungeon rewards, nerfed. Expansion. released. Core game, free to play. There’s just so much that has gone on, where would anyone start.

There’s an action combat mode in the game now, to make it play more like an FPS, there are zone rewards, there are masteries, skill points are now hero points, traits are now specializations, there are elite specializations… a lot has changed.