Guild Wars 2

Jordo.5913:

well considering there were only 3 options for this category and FF14 and SWTOR kind of suck in general compared to gw2

if a WoW expansion launched, it def would have lost, just because

but it still doesn’t fix the fact that half the expansion is unplayable at the moment, except raids

The last WoW expansion was a complete disaster. The launch was bad, it wasn’t well received by fans and WoW lost millions of subs.

FFXIV is considered a good MMO by some. SWToR I have less information about.

Garambola.2461:

It is extremely demanding indeed. I have finally managed to get to level 50. But even the fists decorations require level 75. Which I expect will require the already too scarce soft wood. sigh

While I agree scribing is too expensive and probably should have a different mechanism, the first scribe decorations start at 50, not 75. I’m scribe 51 right now. I’ve so far made a fancy chair and a guild banquet schematic. Other things you can make at 50 include cermanic planter, festival tent, Large square pillar, in fact there are 17 decorations you can make at 50. However almost all of htem contain stuff I need for other guild hall upgrades. It’s badly thought out.

It might be you can’t see those things until your guild upgrades to the decoration merchant in the market place, which we just did.

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

You can be a customer and not be offensive or insulting to an entire group of people. I’ve worked in the retail sector and the customers who were most insulting were the customers I was least likely to try to mollify and the ones who often got ignored by a percentage of my staff just by human nature.

If you are the kind of person that wants to be offensive to people when you’re angry that’s your own lookout. It doesn’t really belong on the forums. Complain about the game, not the people making it. It’ll be better for you AND them.

I’m sorry you’re so bitter about the game that you feel the need to venture into something that isn’t that far off a personal attack. But I promise you it’s not helping your argument at all.

Woah woah woah! Did u just called me bitter? You used a negative adjective towards me based on my previous actions? I am offended! It’s a personal attack towards me! You don’t know me!

See where this gets us? You can’t make every negative comment into a hate crime. I understand that being offended is the new cool, but even this is way too far. An offence is like a salt. Put a little of it and food tastes better, put too much and food is ruined. It’s all about personal taste, but take the salt away and your food is tasteless. Maybe you like tasteless, I don’t. Trust me, I’m good at offending and I haven’t even started yet.

Please, keep on dragging this thread off topic, you are really good at this.

Actually there’s a huge difference between judging a person based on what they say, and maligning an entire group of people you’re not interacting with.

This is the dictionary definition of bitter:

feeling or showing anger, hurt, or resentment because of bad experiences or a sense of unjust treatment.

This is actually something you’ve acknowledged in your own posts, so I felt no issue in assigning the label to you.

Look there are major problems in WvW and they’re systematic base problems. They’ve existed since launch. Presumably a lot of resources are there right now. Other resources are fixing bugs, working on getting Wintersday out, there’s a lot of stuff going on.

This entire thread is about adding outfits, which are essentially skins to the cash shop but not putting more stuff in game. That’s the purpose of the thread. But the game has undergone quite an overhaul. It takes a lot of work and manpower to do what has been done with this game.

I believe people are underselling the amount of work it takes.

Animism.6849:

Vayne.8563:

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

Wryscher.1432:

Vayne.8563:

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

Nope you don’t have to say that. Nor do you have to trot out trite words like lazy to express your dissatisfaction which is a lazy way to complain, and an offensive one.

Anet can’t be lazy, because Anet isn’t a person. Anet is a company comprised of people. It is extremely likely that a percentage of employees of any company are in fact lazy, but the company itself can’t be lazy unless you’re personifying it. Whether you’re a developer, a customer or a norse god is not really relevant to the conversation.

You chose to use a word some would consider to be an insult and directed it at a group of 300 people. So unless every single one of those people is lazy, you’re doing a disservice to them, and you’re potentially being offensive.

If I were working really hard on something and someone called me lazy, yes, I’d take offense. Last I’ll say on the subject since to anyone reading it, this was obvious a while ago. Only someone deliberately ignoring what I’m saying would keep going and what I’m saying is factual. You can’t call a company lazy, without impugning everyone in the company.

Really? Are we really talking about how word “lazy” should be used? Ok.

First of all, be honest with yourself. I’m pretty sure you were not running around at release (when reviews were glowing) saying how we can’t praise Anet, because it’s not a person. There still could have been one slacking programmer, you know

Secondly, companies have personalities, in fact, they’re juridical persons. Companies are not the people working for them. For example, 2 of 3 Anet founders have left the company, does it meen Anet is no longer Anet? No. It’s still the same company, even though it changed over the years (people change too, right?). Companies could be good, evil, corrupt and yes, lazy. Its personality is represented by:
1) the people working there. It’s usually the senior officers, but there’re a lot of exceptions. In Anet case, that would be every red post we see on forums. Yes, there’s a living human being with the name who says something on those forums, but in the end, we remember that it was the Anet, who said that thing. Anet can’t go behind that persons back and say: “Dont look at me, it was he who said you that the fractal rewards will be fixed” (yeah, I know it’s still December).
2) its work. It this case that would be the expansion. And if someone, who had the ability and resources to produce something good, presents me a half-finished product… well, I have a pretty nice word to describe that person.

Basically, you say that I can’t call Anet lazy, because that would hurt their feelings. Well, it’s the reality talking and guys from South Park even made an episode about this. Saying anything else just gives them a wrong message that they could get away with this. No, they can’t.
Yes, you could say that my critisim is not constructive. But how can I been constructive when all I want to say is “give me more stuff for the money I paid”?

If you’re defending your use of lazy to describe a group of people, my conversation with you is pretty much over. Using a legal fiction to create some type of reality is what lawyers do. It’s offensive to call people lazy if you don’t know how hard the work and doing so only makes your argument weak. Surely you can complain without inventing stuff.

As for getting your money’s worth, you’re absolutely entitled to that opinion. I have no problem with you feeling that.

But using the word lazy? I can have no respect for that argument.

By the gods do I love you. You are so freaking good at this.

But i am curious because he actually makes a valid point. Is there a list of words that you are ok using to describe a company? Just the positive ones then?

I’m not sure it’s necessary to malign the company to critique the game at all. Look, I’m a professional editor and I’ve been in my critique group settings. Nothing like what appears on this forums would be allowed. I’m also older and find a lot of stuff to be disrespectful and rude.

So it’s very easy to say, I don’t feel like the expansion has enough content for what I paid. I expected more. That’s a perfectly valid criticism. It doesn’t impugn the devs. It doesn’t blame or set fault. It states it as a fact.

Saying that the devs are lazy is not constructive, it helps no one, not a single person and it’s almost definitely untrue. If Anet has an issue it’s more likely to be an organizational one than one of laziness.

But again, I don’t work there, I don’t see the devs every day and I think it’s bad to draw conclusions about them based on the game. If I want to critique something an author wrote, I focus on the work. I don’t use language to malign the author.

I could say you’re too lazy to have done the research but who does that help?

First of all, has the lazy become the new n-word?
Secondly, it was never the statement of fact. I don’t know how hard working they are and you don’t know it either. It’s an assumption based on the facts I have and I all have have is an expansion.
Does calling someone lazy help? I don’t know. It’s a feedback from a player and a negative one. It’s not about giving an advise on how to fix this or that. It’s all about saying that what you gave us at release was more than enough and what you are giving us now is not. I do not compare Anet to other authors. I am comparing the creators work now with it’s previous work. Does the “now” pale when comparing with the “past”? In my opinion, yes (and, as you said, I am entitled to that opinion). You could say that I could have draw the line here. Yes, I could have. But I am a customer. I don’t have time for this “in my opinion, developer used to give us more stuff”. I have one simple word and use it when I feel the need to. Anet is not a child. I don’t have to hold its hand and try not to make it cry. It’s a cold and unforgiving market. Deal with this.

You can be a customer and not be offensive or insulting to an entire group of people. I’ve worked in the retail sector and the customers who were most insulting were the customers I was least likely to try to mollify and the ones who often got ignored by a percentage of my staff just by human nature.

If you are the kind of person that wants to be offensive to people when you’re angry that’s your own lookout. It doesn’t really belong on the forums. Complain about the game, not the people making it. It’ll be better for you AND them.

I’m sorry you’re so bitter about the game that you feel the need to venture into something that isn’t that far off a personal attack. But I promise you it’s not helping your argument at all.

Saying that’s not far off a personal attack is a bit of an exaggeration don’t you think? Yes his bitterness shows through, as does mine. BUT his points are still very much valid. GW1 was a free game, with a very small element of the ‘gem store’ – in different form. This game received proper expansions, more content. HOW? Lesser budget = more content? My mind is absolutely boggled as to what has been happening in the local company of Arenanet since the very release of GW2. Seems they just want to keep experimenting to try and maximise their profits constantly – without much thought into the repercussions. I honestly think GW2 is now on a slippery slope to death. What is there for me to do in this game now? There is aetherpath – the only rewarding dungeon left, daily adventures – which I am capped by mastery points for doing dull world events, degraded fractals which are even more dull than before, and finally the infamous world events, which over half of the player base didn’t really find much interest in.

Nope. It’s not an exaggeration, I think it’s hurtful and if enough people say it, it’s potentially damaging to people. There is zero reason to get personal and judge people.

If I were working my kitten off at Anet, as no doubt many people are, and I saw me being called lazy it would hurt. Developers are human beings with feelings. By implying they’re simply not trying, you are in fact maligning them, particularly if you don’t know them. It’s a judgement that doesn’t need to be made. It’s the type of language that sullies any argument because it’s unprovable and off topic.

Complain about the game, don’t point fingers at people you don’t know. There’s no reason to do it. It doesn’t strengthen your argument.

You can complain about not getting enough updates without being personal.

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

Wryscher.1432:

Vayne.8563:

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

Nope you don’t have to say that. Nor do you have to trot out trite words like lazy to express your dissatisfaction which is a lazy way to complain, and an offensive one.

Anet can’t be lazy, because Anet isn’t a person. Anet is a company comprised of people. It is extremely likely that a percentage of employees of any company are in fact lazy, but the company itself can’t be lazy unless you’re personifying it. Whether you’re a developer, a customer or a norse god is not really relevant to the conversation.

You chose to use a word some would consider to be an insult and directed it at a group of 300 people. So unless every single one of those people is lazy, you’re doing a disservice to them, and you’re potentially being offensive.

If I were working really hard on something and someone called me lazy, yes, I’d take offense. Last I’ll say on the subject since to anyone reading it, this was obvious a while ago. Only someone deliberately ignoring what I’m saying would keep going and what I’m saying is factual. You can’t call a company lazy, without impugning everyone in the company.

Really? Are we really talking about how word “lazy” should be used? Ok.

First of all, be honest with yourself. I’m pretty sure you were not running around at release (when reviews were glowing) saying how we can’t praise Anet, because it’s not a person. There still could have been one slacking programmer, you know

Secondly, companies have personalities, in fact, they’re juridical persons. Companies are not the people working for them. For example, 2 of 3 Anet founders have left the company, does it meen Anet is no longer Anet? No. It’s still the same company, even though it changed over the years (people change too, right?). Companies could be good, evil, corrupt and yes, lazy. Its personality is represented by:
1) the people working there. It’s usually the senior officers, but there’re a lot of exceptions. In Anet case, that would be every red post we see on forums. Yes, there’s a living human being with the name who says something on those forums, but in the end, we remember that it was the Anet, who said that thing. Anet can’t go behind that persons back and say: “Dont look at me, it was he who said you that the fractal rewards will be fixed” (yeah, I know it’s still December).
2) its work. It this case that would be the expansion. And if someone, who had the ability and resources to produce something good, presents me a half-finished product… well, I have a pretty nice word to describe that person.

Basically, you say that I can’t call Anet lazy, because that would hurt their feelings. Well, it’s the reality talking and guys from South Park even made an episode about this. Saying anything else just gives them a wrong message that they could get away with this. No, they can’t.
Yes, you could say that my critisim is not constructive. But how can I been constructive when all I want to say is “give me more stuff for the money I paid”?

If you’re defending your use of lazy to describe a group of people, my conversation with you is pretty much over. Using a legal fiction to create some type of reality is what lawyers do. It’s offensive to call people lazy if you don’t know how hard the work and doing so only makes your argument weak. Surely you can complain without inventing stuff.

As for getting your money’s worth, you’re absolutely entitled to that opinion. I have no problem with you feeling that.

But using the word lazy? I can have no respect for that argument.

By the gods do I love you. You are so freaking good at this.

But i am curious because he actually makes a valid point. Is there a list of words that you are ok using to describe a company? Just the positive ones then?

I’m not sure it’s necessary to malign the company to critique the game at all. Look, I’m a professional editor and I’ve been in my critique group settings. Nothing like what appears on this forums would be allowed. I’m also older and find a lot of stuff to be disrespectful and rude.

So it’s very easy to say, I don’t feel like the expansion has enough content for what I paid. I expected more. That’s a perfectly valid criticism. It doesn’t impugn the devs. It doesn’t blame or set fault. It states it as a fact.

Saying that the devs are lazy is not constructive, it helps no one, not a single person and it’s almost definitely untrue. If Anet has an issue it’s more likely to be an organizational one than one of laziness.

But again, I don’t work there, I don’t see the devs every day and I think it’s bad to draw conclusions about them based on the game. If I want to critique something an author wrote, I focus on the work. I don’t use language to malign the author.

I could say you’re too lazy to have done the research but who does that help?

First of all, has the lazy become the new n-word?
Secondly, it was never the statement of fact. I don’t know how hard working they are and you don’t know it either. It’s an assumption based on the facts I have and I all have have is an expansion.
Does calling someone lazy help? I don’t know. It’s a feedback from a player and a negative one. It’s not about giving an advise on how to fix this or that. It’s all about saying that what you gave us at release was more than enough and what you are giving us now is not. I do not compare Anet to other authors. I am comparing the creators work now with it’s previous work. Does the “now” pale when comparing with the “past”? In my opinion, yes (and, as you said, I am entitled to that opinion). You could say that I could have draw the line here. Yes, I could have. But I am a customer. I don’t have time for this “in my opinion, developer used to give us more stuff”. I have one simple word and use it when I feel the need to. Anet is not a child. I don’t have to hold its hand and try not to make it cry. It’s a cold and unforgiving market. Deal with this.

You can be a customer and not be offensive or insulting to an entire group of people. I’ve worked in the retail sector and the customers who were most insulting were the customers I was least likely to try to mollify and the ones who often got ignored by a percentage of my staff just by human nature.

If you are the kind of person that wants to be offensive to people when you’re angry that’s your own lookout. It doesn’t really belong on the forums. Complain about the game, not the people making it. It’ll be better for you AND them.

I’m sorry you’re so bitter about the game that you feel the need to venture into something that isn’t that far off a personal attack. But I promise you it’s not helping your argument at all.

Wryscher.1432:

Vayne.8563:

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

Nope you don’t have to say that. Nor do you have to trot out trite words like lazy to express your dissatisfaction which is a lazy way to complain, and an offensive one.

Anet can’t be lazy, because Anet isn’t a person. Anet is a company comprised of people. It is extremely likely that a percentage of employees of any company are in fact lazy, but the company itself can’t be lazy unless you’re personifying it. Whether you’re a developer, a customer or a norse god is not really relevant to the conversation.

You chose to use a word some would consider to be an insult and directed it at a group of 300 people. So unless every single one of those people is lazy, you’re doing a disservice to them, and you’re potentially being offensive.

If I were working really hard on something and someone called me lazy, yes, I’d take offense. Last I’ll say on the subject since to anyone reading it, this was obvious a while ago. Only someone deliberately ignoring what I’m saying would keep going and what I’m saying is factual. You can’t call a company lazy, without impugning everyone in the company.

Really? Are we really talking about how word “lazy” should be used? Ok.

First of all, be honest with yourself. I’m pretty sure you were not running around at release (when reviews were glowing) saying how we can’t praise Anet, because it’s not a person. There still could have been one slacking programmer, you know

Secondly, companies have personalities, in fact, they’re juridical persons. Companies are not the people working for them. For example, 2 of 3 Anet founders have left the company, does it meen Anet is no longer Anet? No. It’s still the same company, even though it changed over the years (people change too, right?). Companies could be good, evil, corrupt and yes, lazy. Its personality is represented by:
1) the people working there. It’s usually the senior officers, but there’re a lot of exceptions. In Anet case, that would be every red post we see on forums. Yes, there’s a living human being with the name who says something on those forums, but in the end, we remember that it was the Anet, who said that thing. Anet can’t go behind that persons back and say: “Dont look at me, it was he who said you that the fractal rewards will be fixed” (yeah, I know it’s still December).
2) its work. It this case that would be the expansion. And if someone, who had the ability and resources to produce something good, presents me a half-finished product… well, I have a pretty nice word to describe that person.

Basically, you say that I can’t call Anet lazy, because that would hurt their feelings. Well, it’s the reality talking and guys from South Park even made an episode about this. Saying anything else just gives them a wrong message that they could get away with this. No, they can’t.
Yes, you could say that my critisim is not constructive. But how can I been constructive when all I want to say is “give me more stuff for the money I paid”?

If you’re defending your use of lazy to describe a group of people, my conversation with you is pretty much over. Using a legal fiction to create some type of reality is what lawyers do. It’s offensive to call people lazy if you don’t know how hard the work and doing so only makes your argument weak. Surely you can complain without inventing stuff.

As for getting your money’s worth, you’re absolutely entitled to that opinion. I have no problem with you feeling that.

But using the word lazy? I can have no respect for that argument.

By the gods do I love you. You are so freaking good at this.

But i am curious because he actually makes a valid point. Is there a list of words that you are ok using to describe a company? Just the positive ones then?

I’m not sure it’s necessary to malign the company to critique the game at all. Look, I’m a professional editor and I’ve been in my critique group settings. Nothing like what appears on this forums would be allowed. I’m also older and find a lot of stuff to be disrespectful and rude.

So it’s very easy to say, I don’t feel like the expansion has enough content for what I paid. I expected more. That’s a perfectly valid criticism. It doesn’t impugn the devs. It doesn’t blame or set fault. It states it as a fact.

Saying that the devs are lazy is not constructive, it helps no one, not a single person and it’s almost definitely untrue. If Anet has an issue it’s more likely to be an organizational one than one of laziness.

But again, I don’t work there, I don’t see the devs every day and I think it’s bad to draw conclusions about them based on the game. If I want to critique something an author wrote, I focus on the work. I don’t use language to malign the author.

I could say you’re too lazy to have done the research but who does that help?

1. I presume Malyck is being saved for season 3.

3. You’re going to Rata Novus because it was possible they new how to defeat the dragon. Those Asura are pretty smart. You don’t know it’s a dead city and allies are allies.

Find a guild that does the new zones, and do that. That’s a lot to do there. Then work into raids. I can’t comment on the PvP bit.

Drew.7192:

Zypher.7609:

They made a really great game that I enjoy being immersed in on a nightly basis. Thank you again for all your hard work and look forward to what you are bringing to the game in the future.

The future.
Entire game including HoT, F2P by end of 2016, current gated content converted to DLC for F2P players. All updates geared towards gem store sales and DLC.

WvW will be replaced by an updated version of EotM factions.

Gw2 sPvP Esports….., was never going to happen.

A declining player base and layoffs, Anet puts the game on autopliot.

Right because there have been so many layoffs already. lol

When a couple of years proves you wrong will you come back and admit it?

I’m on board, OP. I’m having a blast. Thanks for posting this.

I have a couple of people in my guild who have a similar experience to yours, OP. I mean, they didn’t really like it at first, but the longer they spent their the more it grew on them.

I also have a couple of people in my guild who like it less. The bulk of my guild, though, seemed to like it right away, perhaps because we do things as a guild.

I imagine people who insist they can only play solo aren’t liking it quite as much…but even some of my solo guildies have come to liking HoT.

That’s not to say HoT isn’t without it’s flaws. There are plenty. But I’m still having fun.

Bubi.7942:

Vayne.8563:

Bubi.7942:

Vayne.8563:

Kerin.9125:

Vayne.8563:

Apparently they’re going to be fixing the formulas so they don’t require events that spawn off failed events. You’re probably better off setting it to the side until they fix it.

Where did they post something as explicit as that?

I’ve not seen anything like that orund here, all I’ve see are vague comments about ‘looking at’ one in particular, basically.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Update-on-Legendary-Collections-More

“Fix issues that encourage toxic play or interactions. No collectible should be gated behind failed events, or mechanics that make you upset that another player is playing a specific way. Unfortunately these things take longer to fix and test around the fixes (don’t want to break something else on accident), so the turn around will be slower…”

aka never

Of course fixing a program this complex takes time. People say Anet doesn’t communicate and when they do, people heckle the communication. I don’t know why Anet should talk at all with reactions like this.

As develpoing 3 legendaries took 2 years, not to mention forum search or bar brawl.

Not sure why I care tho.

Forum search has nothing to do with Anet, it’s not their software. The bar brawl didn’t take 3 years, it was abandoned for different content. Developing 3 legendaries didn’t take 2 years either. It’s just that when they started developing stuff, they had different plans. Stuff was supposed to be introduced for the Living Story and they decided to do an expansion instead…based on player pressure, possibly.

That means things that might have come out earlier had to wait for the expansion or they’d have had nothing for the expansion.

In the mean time, during those three years, they did come out with a lot of stuff and made a lot of changes to the core game, they released the game in China, they created the expansion, but they also had two seasons of Living Story, the wardrobe, Edge of the Mists and other updates as well.

Legendaries probably wasn’t a priority for them, until they had a system to deliver them.

It was like this is Guild Wars 1 though. The light stuff was all early and as you got deeper into end game it got more serious.

Thanks for the post OP. I was debating viper for a condition damage character, now I know I’m going to go that way.

ESO felt too generic for my taste. It also felt dated I hate static quests now, voiced or not voiced. I mean it’s okay..but that’s all it is from my point of view.

Bubi.7942:

Vayne.8563:

Kerin.9125:

Vayne.8563:

Apparently they’re going to be fixing the formulas so they don’t require events that spawn off failed events. You’re probably better off setting it to the side until they fix it.

Where did they post something as explicit as that?

I’ve not seen anything like that orund here, all I’ve see are vague comments about ‘looking at’ one in particular, basically.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Update-on-Legendary-Collections-More

“Fix issues that encourage toxic play or interactions. No collectible should be gated behind failed events, or mechanics that make you upset that another player is playing a specific way. Unfortunately these things take longer to fix and test around the fixes (don’t want to break something else on accident), so the turn around will be slower…”

aka never

Of course fixing a program this complex takes time. People say Anet doesn’t communicate and when they do, people heckle the communication. I don’t know why Anet should talk at all with reactions like this.

DoctorDing.5890:

Just going back to the Hearts thing.
I have to say that as a new player (3 months now) I found the Heart tasks a really refreshing thing in the game so it’s a shame they are not adding new ones, especially in HoT which seems to need a bit of light relief.

Every RPG since forever has had the thing where you see an NPC with a symbol over their heads, talk to them to get a task which you complete then go talk to them again to get the reward. The hearts are a slicker version of that, doing away with the talking and with the always-cluttered quest log.

I like the events too but Hearts would be right up there on my list of things the game does well! (although I’m still not convinced of the benefits of entertaining a cow).

Maybe the game is starting to take itself too seriously.

I think end game should take itself seriously. The whole idea of a heart is that we’re in friendly territory helping out the people who live there.

In this game, end game, we’re in enemy territory and we’re fighting a war. There’s a game full of light relief,

My favorite zones in the game before HoT were Straits of Devestation and Hirathi because I felt like I was fighting a war.

I have problems with updrafts and laylines sometimes due to lag as well. The latency is Australia is pretty annoying sometimes. We expect fibre next year, I’m hoping that helps some.

Kerin.9125:

Vayne.8563:

Apparently they’re going to be fixing the formulas so they don’t require events that spawn off failed events. You’re probably better off setting it to the side until they fix it.

Where did they post something as explicit as that?

I’ve not seen anything like that orund here, all I’ve see are vague comments about ‘looking at’ one in particular, basically.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Update-on-Legendary-Collections-More

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

Nope you don’t have to say that. Nor do you have to trot out trite words like lazy to express your dissatisfaction which is a lazy way to complain, and an offensive one.

Anet can’t be lazy, because Anet isn’t a person. Anet is a company comprised of people. It is extremely likely that a percentage of employees of any company are in fact lazy, but the company itself can’t be lazy unless you’re personifying it. Whether you’re a developer, a customer or a norse god is not really relevant to the conversation.

You chose to use a word some would consider to be an insult and directed it at a group of 300 people. So unless every single one of those people is lazy, you’re doing a disservice to them, and you’re potentially being offensive.

If I were working really hard on something and someone called me lazy, yes, I’d take offense. Last I’ll say on the subject since to anyone reading it, this was obvious a while ago. Only someone deliberately ignoring what I’m saying would keep going and what I’m saying is factual. You can’t call a company lazy, without impugning everyone in the company.

Really? Are we really talking about how word “lazy” should be used? Ok.

First of all, be honest with yourself. I’m pretty sure you were not running around at release (when reviews were glowing) saying how we can’t praise Anet, because it’s not a person. There still could have been one slacking programmer, you know

Secondly, companies have personalities, in fact, they’re juridical persons. Companies are not the people working for them. For example, 2 of 3 Anet founders have left the company, does it meen Anet is no longer Anet? No. It’s still the same company, even though it changed over the years (people change too, right?). Companies could be good, evil, corrupt and yes, lazy. Its personality is represented by:
1) the people working there. It’s usually the senior officers, but there’re a lot of exceptions. In Anet case, that would be every red post we see on forums. Yes, there’s a living human being with the name who says something on those forums, but in the end, we remember that it was the Anet, who said that thing. Anet can’t go behind that persons back and say: “Dont look at me, it was he who said you that the fractal rewards will be fixed” (yeah, I know it’s still December).
2) its work. It this case that would be the expansion. And if someone, who had the ability and resources to produce something good, presents me a half-finished product… well, I have a pretty nice word to describe that person.

Basically, you say that I can’t call Anet lazy, because that would hurt their feelings. Well, it’s the reality talking and guys from South Park even made an episode about this. Saying anything else just gives them a wrong message that they could get away with this. No, they can’t.
Yes, you could say that my critisim is not constructive. But how can I been constructive when all I want to say is “give me more stuff for the money I paid”?

If you’re defending your use of lazy to describe a group of people, my conversation with you is pretty much over. Using a legal fiction to create some type of reality is what lawyers do. It’s offensive to call people lazy if you don’t know how hard the work and doing so only makes your argument weak. Surely you can complain without inventing stuff.

As for getting your money’s worth, you’re absolutely entitled to that opinion. I have no problem with you feeling that.

But using the word lazy? I can have no respect for that argument.

Vlad Morbius.1759:

Vayne.8563:

Well, you’ve ignored some honest discussion at least. That is to say there’s information out there you’ve ignored. Take hearts.

Hearts were never even meant to be in the game at all. They were only added last minute to show people were dynamic events were. Even in end game zones like Orr there are no hearts. Nor are there any in South Sun or Dry Top or the Silverwastes. There won’t be any more hearts, because hearts were added to train people to stay in the areas were dynamic events are. That’s all they were ever there for. It’s communication. You may not like what it says, but those are the essential facts on the situation. Anet isn’t talking about it now because they’ve said this already.

Also Anet has said straight out that dynamic events, not hearts, were the center and focus of this game. They’ve been saying it since launch. I’m not sure why this should come as a surprise to you.

Maps not being populated is simply not true. Because I’m in those zones every single day and those maps are populated. Now you may get on an ocassional unpopulated map, and you can then use the LFG tool to look for an active map. So your starting premise about those maps being unpopulated is simply in error. No real reason for Anet to discuss this.

Guild items are costly. They’re meant to be a long term goal. Anet said straight out they wanted something for guilds to work toward long term. That’s the reason they were put this way. See, that to me, is communication. You may not like what Anet is saying, but they did in fact say this.

There’s nothing really to discuss here. Anet has made decision you don’t like. You don’t like the monetization system. That’s the business plan. The developers don’t really decide that stuff, the suits do. The suits aren’t going to come talk to us, because we’re not stock holders in NcSoft, at least I’m not. But there are other people to answer to besides just us.

At any rate, I can guarantee you the cash shop in this game is less intrusive than just about all other MMOs that don’t charage a monthly fee.

By all means, vote with your wallet. It’s what you should do. But at the end of the day, Anet knows if their formula is working or not, and they’re going to stick to it if it is. What if Anet came here and said, look this is what we’re doing, tough nuts. Not like that.

You don’t want an honest discussion. You want them to change what they’re doing. Well so do a lot of people.

The problem is not everyone wants stuff changed in the same direction.

Granted I know hearts are a thing of the past but that was more of a short form for saying not enough of the new content is designed for solo players and that is something I greatly miss in HoT

Maps not being populated…now who isn’t being honest? I am not the only one who hates this whole taxi scenario and more than that why can’t they just have it set so you immediately log onto a map that is closest to being full so we don’t have maps with 5 or 6 players where you can be booted from losing all your progress. I see you didn’t bother to respond to that particular section of the post either since I’m sure you have been hit by this once or twice yourself and you know it’s a poor design flaw.

As far as guild items, there is nothing wrong with long term goals but it doesn’t all have to be focused around extreme amounts of value and certainly not every aspect of crafting has to be a royal pain in the butt or so bloody costly. It is absurd to think of how little one get actually make do to the amount of raw materials or the amount of gold needed to purchase them, and heaven forbid you want more than one item within a month if you don’t have deep pockets!

I completely understand the need behind monetization but to be honest it is way over the top and it wasn’t anywhere near this the first 3 years the game was around so yes I have a problem with the current balance of pay to get items vs. what was actually added to the $100.00 version of the expansion I purchased.

Now let’s touch on the items you didn’t care to touch on like the length of meta timers, or is this something you don’t like either but won’t speak up for fear it will actually clash with your all is well image? Is this another imagined issue Anet doesn’t need to deal with or are the hundreds of voices complaining here and on Reddit just being unreasonable? What about the constant DR in areas we actually do enjoy playing in which by the way kicks in prior to people even having the time to complete metas, is that acceptable or do you consider that a non-issue when it comes to “play the way you like”.
I’m tired of the whole ideology the game was built on being thrown aside and yes I think I should question those things as should you. I don’t want this game to fail but I do want them to take notice of what is or isn’t working and frankly unless they are honest and discuss these points we have no idea if it is falling on deaf ears. I doubt that is the case at the grass roots level and the fact is they don’t have the ability to challenge it at a higher level from what I’ve read but if this doesn’t change it can greatly affect the game long term.
Since there is no communication I have no choice but to speak with my wallet and yes I’m aware of the double edged sword and the irony of that statement but if you have a better idea many would love to hear it.

I didn’t comment on the length of meta timers, because I don’t necessarily disagree. I don’t disagree with every criticism made and I either agree with people if I agree or don’t comment if it’s not an issue for me one way or another.

However, I cut your list in half.

Now you want Anet to communicate with you on every complaint you have? Not going to happen. And that’s probably true of most games. People have complaints, and if the devs have nothing to say other than it’s not going to change, they’re not going to communicate.

Where Anet feels work is required they have communicated. Where they feel the game is what they want it to be they won’t. There’s no real percentage for them in coming here and saying, sorry we like it how it is. So yeah, that’s that.

As for the traffic on the maps, I am being honest. There’s traffic on maps. I very rarely have to use the LFG tool, but I have occasionally. This is one problem I think is being over-represented.

I suspect you don’t play those maps enough to even reach an educated conclusion. I’m in those maps a good portion of my day and I’m getting stuff done all the time…mostly without having to switch servers.

Labjax.2465:

Vayne.8563:

No, but I know 300 guys working on a game for a year aren’t doing nothing. That is to say, this would have to be the worst run company in the history of companies if it doesn’t take a long time to create.

These quests aren’t really cut and pasted. They’re hand crafted and it takes more time. They interact with each other and often overlap each other and that takes more time.

This copy paste thing you’re talking about? Not seeing that so much here.

Oh, so now you know how many people were working on the expansion and how long it took too? Lol… you are something else man. Of course, ignore the fact that you have no idea how your numbers compare to other games, too.

Obviously some of it is not cut and pasted, like the dialog. But it’s obvious that the overall design of it is. There’s nothing hand crafted about another escort event or another “kill X number of mobs in Y area.” Creating an event chain would not be hard either if you have tools made for it.

You talk about the idea of a company being badly run if it doesn’t take a while to make stuff, as if time spent is the metric for making good game content. You have no idea what you’re talking about when it comes to the process of making games. That much is obvious. I didn’t want to go there, but since you keep insisting, I feel there’s no point in holding back on that one. They would have to be one of the worst run companies if they didn’t have the sort of tools to make things like their events easy to repeat the creation of.

Perhaps you are taking the phrase “copy/paste” too literally? But I think it’d be obvious that if they copy/pasted entirely, then the content would be exactly the same as other content with different graphics and it’s not.

Anyway, I’m sorry to burst your bubble of rose-colored glasses with which you look at the development of GW2. Its development is not extra-super-hard because the game has a few innovative features. The reason stuff like the Living Story has proven so hard is because, in addition to story they have to write (which has to be strong, since it’s their flagship narrative) and the voice actors they have to hire, they tend to change existing parts of the game world in some way and that’s anything but cost-effective. It goes directly against the idea of saving and re-using assets. In some cases, they have had to both trash old assets and create new ones in their place for part of LS.

But that, I think, is why more recent LS has been so tame in its world-effecting influence. Somebody higher up probably stepped in and said, “This is hurting us more than it helps.” (I remember when that one WP in LA was blocked… that was our piece of LS for that time. Almost like a consolation prize “here’s something at least… we tried.”)

You have to understand that for the most part, when it comes to this subject, I’m speaking from the mindset of a developer, not a player. I hate pulling out experience cards cause it sounds so silly, but I do have some experience making games (albeit on a much smaller scale) and as silly of a major as it may sound, I studied game design in college. I’m not just pulling this stuff out of my theoretical backside. Most of what I’m telling you is the application of general principles applied to scale.

And I’ve worked on creative projects for a good portion of my life, and I know a few things for a fact. It’s often things take longer to produce than the public thinks they dfo and just about all developers know this.

People who say this takes X long or this takes Y long, or this is or isn’t complex without examining the code and what was required to make it are essentially expressing an opinion that is tauntamount ot making stuff up.

Or do you approve of calling people you don’t know and haven’t worked with lazy?

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

Manthas.6234:

So, could we conclude that a company, which is getting bigger and producing less content is actually… getting lazy?
You say it’s just the way industry works and I agree. But you accept that questionable practice, while I close my pocket.
I never said that the game is not fun anymore. What I’m saying is, that I expected more from this company, but that’s probably just the hype talking, right?

They’re producing more than just content. They’ve changed the way the game is moving forward, whether you like that or not.

They’ve added systems, more than I’ve seen in an expansion. Masteries, specializations, combat mode, gliding and all that entails, in fact, the entire game has basically been rebooted and there’s content.

There was new technology created just for revenant skills, Maybe you think that doesn’t take man hours but it does.

By creating this stuff now, moving forward, future expansions should be larger. Anyway you should probably not use words like lazy when you have no idea how hard anyone is working. It’s not only inflammatory but it’s probably not true.

Even if it were true for a small percentage of devs, there are 300 people working at Anet. Are you suggesting they’re all lazy?

Calling people lazy is a lazy thought process.

I’m a customer, not a game developer. Do I have to be one to say, that your new product doesn’t meet my expectations? I believe not. Do I have to care about what’s going on behind the scenes? No, I pay money and I want decent product. And I want this product at release, not in the nearest future. I paid for expansion, not early beta. I shouldn’t be explaining those things, this is how market works. If it doesn’t, well, the developer is lazy.

Nope you don’t have to say that. Nor do you have to trot out trite words like lazy to express your dissatisfaction which is a lazy way to complain, and an offensive one.

Anet can’t be lazy, because Anet isn’t a person. Anet is a company comprised of people. It is extremely likely that a percentage of employees of any company are in fact lazy, but the company itself can’t be lazy unless you’re personifying it. Whether you’re a developer, a customer or a norse god is not really relevant to the conversation.

You chose to use a word some would consider to be an insult and directed it at a group of 300 people. So unless every single one of those people is lazy, you’re doing a disservice to them, and you’re potentially being offensive.

If I were working really hard on something and someone called me lazy, yes, I’d take offense. Last I’ll say on the subject since to anyone reading it, this was obvious a while ago. Only someone deliberately ignoring what I’m saying would keep going and what I’m saying is factual. You can’t call a company lazy, without impugning everyone in the company.

Excludee.3850:

I love the use of the term, “new technology” used to describe an animation applied to the skill bar for revenant swaps. As if it’s some amazing breathrough or something.

Anyways, someone should develop a plug-in for Chrome that blocks Vayne’s nonsensical forum posts. That’s some “new technology” I could get behind.

New technology means some of the tools used to create the actual skills, like the shield the moves with you. There are things you couldn’t do before, that you new could the require coding.

Manthas.6234:

So, could we conclude that a company, which is getting bigger and producing less content is actually… getting lazy?
You say it’s just the way industry works and I agree. But you accept that questionable practice, while I close my pocket.
I never said that the game is not fun anymore. What I’m saying is, that I expected more from this company, but that’s probably just the hype talking, right?

They’re producing more than just content. They’ve changed the way the game is moving forward, whether you like that or not.

They’ve added systems, more than I’ve seen in an expansion. Masteries, specializations, combat mode, gliding and all that entails, in fact, the entire game has basically been rebooted and there’s content.

There was new technology created just for revenant skills, Maybe you think that doesn’t take man hours but it does.

By creating this stuff now, moving forward, future expansions should be larger. Anyway you should probably not use words like lazy when you have no idea how hard anyone is working. It’s not only inflammatory but it’s probably not true.

Even if it were true for a small percentage of devs, there are 300 people working at Anet. Are you suggesting they’re all lazy?

Calling people lazy is a lazy thought process.

Kerin.9125:

Vayne.8563:

Anet isn’t a 50 person company anymore it’s a 300 person company and those people do have to get paid. The cash shop is how that happens.

So 50 people made GW2, which was great, and it took 300 to create the meh that much of HOT is.

I suggest a large-scale deployment (outside Anet) is needed to put things back the way they were.

No 50 people made Guild Wars 1.

250 people made Guild Wars 2. Your facts are in error.

Vlad Morbius.1759:

Vayne.8563:

Actually they have talked about Fractals and they have talked about WvW, at least say they know know the problems but the solution is complex and it’s taking longer than they thought.

I’ve already changed certain other problems and another dev addressed the problems with the collections.

So they have communicated some stuff. People just conveniently ignore them. I’ll see you when you get back from Black Desert I suspect that game is going to suffer badly in the west.

Both those issues i have no interest in, as i posted in another thread these are the hot button topics i’d like to see discussed;
- not enough mastery points available in content that interests me
- everything in HoT is tied to a dynamic event and group oriented, no hearts
- meta events timers are way too long
- maps are not populated enough to complete the larger events
- every item to craft is incredibly expensive and time consuming
- too much focus on the gem store not enough on in game weapons and armor
- monetization is way too prominent and many items are priced too high or bundled
- leaving a map destroys all your work and progression
- guild items are incredibly costly
- very little encouragement to participate in content you enjoy due to DR

Now as far as Black Desert, you may well be right but the point I’m making is i will continue to put money elsewhere until i see some real honest discussion about these topics and I’m certain I am not the only one doing so.

Well, you’ve ignored some honest discussion at least. That is to say there’s information out there you’ve ignored. Take hearts.

Hearts were never even meant to be in the game at all. They were only added last minute to show people were dynamic events were. Even in end game zones like Orr there are no hearts. Nor are there any in South Sun or Dry Top or the Silverwastes. There won’t be any more hearts, because hearts were added to train people to stay in the areas were dynamic events are. That’s all they were ever there for. It’s communication. You may not like what it says, but those are the essential facts on the situation. Anet isn’t talking about it now because they’ve said this already.

Also Anet has said straight out that dynamic events, not hearts, were the center and focus of this game. They’ve been saying it since launch. I’m not sure why this should come as a surprise to you.

Maps not being populated is simply not true. Because I’m in those zones every single day and those maps are populated. Now you may get on an ocassional unpopulated map, and you can then use the LFG tool to look for an active map. So your starting premise about those maps being unpopulated is simply in error. No real reason for Anet to discuss this.

Guild items are costly. They’re meant to be a long term goal. Anet said straight out they wanted something for guilds to work toward long term. That’s the reason they were put this way. See, that to me, is communication. You may not like what Anet is saying, but they did in fact say this.

There’s nothing really to discuss here. Anet has made decision you don’t like. You don’t like the monetization system. That’s the business plan. The developers don’t really decide that stuff, the suits do. The suits aren’t going to come talk to us, because we’re not stock holders in NcSoft, at least I’m not. But there are other people to answer to besides just us.

At any rate, I can guarantee you the cash shop in this game is less intrusive than just about all other MMOs that don’t charage a monthly fee.

By all means, vote with your wallet. It’s what you should do. But at the end of the day, Anet knows if their formula is working or not, and they’re going to stick to it if it is. What if Anet came here and said, look this is what we’re doing, tough nuts. Not like that.

You don’t want an honest discussion. You want them to change what they’re doing. Well so do a lot of people.

The problem is not everyone wants stuff changed in the same direction.

Manthas.6234:

Ok, but you are forgetting one thing – expansion. Expansion came and as you said “it wasn’t well received by a portion of the community”. Why? I don’t really have the right answer, but in my opinion, it was the lack of stuff. They have some stuff, some little things, which would make people more satisfied. But no, you have to open your wallet again to get them and I find this insulting.

Well, I think people tend to see only what’s in front of their face. This is less just an expansion in the traditional sense of the word, and more of an expansion/season pass. What if Anet says, okay we’re going to be starting Living Story Season 3 soon (which I believe will happen). Then you’ve bought the expansion and you’re getting that. There’ll be more raids coming too. The WvW changes are coming too. There’s still stuff coming, just like when the game came out and guesting wasn’t in the game.

I think the story now is better than the personal story that originally came with the game. The way the story is being told has improved. I think the wardrobe now is better than the way it was when the game launched. The lack of culling. The new combat mode. The changes to the crafting UI. The changes to squads. The changes to Fractals. Aside from rewards, which they’re changing, I consider this to be a great change for casual players.

The point is, yes, you had to pay for an expansion, and you are getting an expansion. But Guild Wars 1 had costumes too. Long after it stopped coming out with armor sets, it came out with costumes. Quite a few of them. Whatever armor was in the game was in the game, and only costumes in the cash shop were coming out. You may not remember this but I do.

And I’m still having fun with the expansion. It’s probably not great to run around by yourself, but with friends, it’s a blast. You can get a lot done, have some laughs, get some loot and enjoy the game. It certainly seems to work that way in my guild. Most people are in fact, quite happy with this expansion, and yes, we’re a casual guild.

As a guild we’ve tried the raid once. Didn’t get all that far, but you know that’s us. A small group of people probably will try the raid, but most of the guild will never set food in there. That doesn’t mean those people aren’t having fun.

The cash shop, it’s a necessary evil in this day and age. When you look at the competition, something like WoW, they have millions of players each paying $15 a month. And they charge for the expansion. And they have a cash shop.

Anet isn’t a 50 person company anymore it’s a 300 person company and those people do have to get paid. The cash shop is how that happens.

In the end, you can either live with it, or not live with it, but it’s not likely to change. All MMOs have something that they do to make money. They’re either pay to win, pay to have this specific content, pay for things that we say are convenience but that you really need, or offfer “optional” subscrptions, or offer subs. That’s how the industry works, and it is very competitive.

I’ve accepted that. Not everyone will but I don’t see how that will stop the industry from being this way.

I think the problem is people assume they’re trying to focus. Pretty much the entire game was casual content. A portion fo the playerbase was screaming for harder content. Anet gave them that because it was their turn.

Now it’s WvW’s turn. Then the new living story will come out and it’ll be our turn again.

Sure it looks like the company has no focus. Because they don’t have the manpower to do everything all at once. Not while fixing bugs and planning future stuff. So they do what needs to be done most. They prioritize. People felt the game wasn’t challenging enough and Anet address this, but Fractals are actually easier now. You don’t need agony resistence at all till level 19 for example. That’s far more casual. Break bars have made it even easier.

At the end of the day, the focus is on trying to keep everyone happy, but everyone has different wants and desires.

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

Manthas.6234:

Dude, you keep on missing the point and adding irrelevant things into discussion doesn’t really help. No one is talking about the bugs, raids, dungeons or champions here. It’s about developers attitude toward its customers. It was The Chosen One because they took the harder path, brought a lot of innovation and no subscription fees. They dreamed big and achieved a lot.
Now, they look like just another company developing f2p game and that is my point.

So I’m still not sure what you’re on about.

Thank you for the history lesson, but I’ve been there and seen that
Look, I used to play SWTOR. Nothing too impressive, but hey, its StarWars, so I gladly paid those subscription fees. But then it went f2p and I was like “ok, I paid for the game, maybe they’ll give me some cool stuff”. And all I got was the slap in face. I quit without looking back. It’s all about that slap in the face. If I get invested in the game, I want something in return and not trough cashshop. Right now, I feel a slap incoming.

No one is going to change your feelings, but that’s all they are…feelings. The expansion is fun for some people and obviously not fun for others.

But the company didn’t go from a shining star to a cash grab. They haven’t really changed that much. Your perception changed.

C’mon, my perception changed and somehow every forum is swarmed by guys like me.

Your perception has changed. People were saying what you’re saying 2 months after this game launched. Doesn’t that tell you anything?

Of ocurse Anet is a business. Of course they made this game to make money. Which doesn’t mean they’re sitting in a room saying let’s make a game that’s not fun that people hate. That’s not even a thought process.

They are making a game they think will be fun and in this case, it wasn’t well received by a portion of the community.

But then, two months out from the launch of the original game, there were people leaving in droves because they felt like they had nothing to do.

Everything in this sort of business has to be a compromise, because different factions want different things.

When the game launched, the supported your play style so you perceived them as a shining beacon of gameness. Are you suggesting in two months a sinister virus invaded the Seattle water supply and the company morphed into the evil empire? Because that doesn’t sound plausible to me.

It sounds more plausible that they were this way all the time and you were not looking closely enough.

Companies need to compromise sometimes, and they need to make money. These aren’t dirty words. These are facts of life. Now, in this competitive environment, it’s particularly important.

So Anet did make some compromises, not because they don’t care about you or the game. Because they had to. That’s the business reality.

Your personal feelings aside, I don’t think they changed as much as you think.

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

Manthas.6234:

Dude, you keep on missing the point and adding irrelevant things into discussion doesn’t really help. No one is talking about the bugs, raids, dungeons or champions here. It’s about developers attitude toward its customers. It was The Chosen One because they took the harder path, brought a lot of innovation and no subscription fees. They dreamed big and achieved a lot.
Now, they look like just another company developing f2p game and that is my point.

So I’m still not sure what you’re on about.

Thank you for the history lesson, but I’ve been there and seen that
Look, I used to play SWTOR. Nothing too impressive, but hey, its StarWars, so I gladly paid those subscription fees. But then it went f2p and I was like “ok, I paid for the game, maybe they’ll give me some cool stuff”. And all I got was the slap in face. I quit without looking back. It’s all about that slap in the face. If I get invested in the game, I want something in return and not trough cashshop. Right now, I feel a slap incoming.

No one is going to change your feelings, but that’s all they are…feelings. The expansion is fun for some people and obviously not fun for others.

But the company didn’t go from a shining star to a cash grab. They haven’t really changed that much. Your perception changed.

Manthas.6234:

Dude, you keep on missing the point and adding irrelevant things into discussion doesn’t really help. No one is talking about the bugs, raids, dungeons or champions here. It’s about developers attitude toward its customers. It was The Chosen One because they took the harder path, brought a lot of innovation and no subscription fees. They dreamed big and achieved a lot.
Now, they look like just another company developing f2p game and that is my point.

And they’re still doing that, but your’e just not seeing it because they’ve made some compromises along the way. Do you know when ascended gear was introduced? Only a short time after launch. And people said, right then, right there, Anet went back on their promise.

Before that, guesting was supposed to be in the game. And it didn’t appear at launch. It was delayed for months.

It’s the same company. It’s not a different company. They’re not really doing anything different.

Anet tried to do something that they thought would please the bulk of the user base. They did that to make money. They STILL came out with an expansion that didn’t raise the level cap and didn’t offer a new tier of gear. There is still innovation going on in the way masteries are done. You may not like it, but that doesn’t stop it from being innovation.

You’ve fallen into the trap of saying I like this, so the company is awesome and I don’t like this so the company has lost their edge.

I’ve played, as I’ve said, a lot of MMO expansions but I’ve never played an MMO expansion like Heart of Thorns. It doesn’t mean everyone is going to like it.

The same company innovated with the Living World Season 1 and it was pretty much a disaster and they had to change it. That company told us they wouldn’t make an expansion, they’d move forward with the living world. They are in business to make money and they do so by trying different things and seeing what works and what doesn’t. Because they’re often in new territory.

But people don’t want to forgive them what doesn’t work. They just want to yell that it doesn’t work. You can’t really have innovation without a lot of things not working. That’s not how innovation works. It really is the same company.

You just put Anet on a pedestal in the past, when in reality they were trying to make a game that sells. They did that by making a game they enjoy. Well, I still think they’re doing that. I don’t think they made HoT and thought, people won’t enjoy this. And indeed some people do enjoy it.

So I’m still not sure what you’re on about.

Labjax.2465:

Vayne.8563:

I’ve played a lot of MMOs. Not one or two. A lot. The complexity of these zones, and the events in them dwarfs what most MMOs give you.

Remember that static quests are far easier to program and control. Events that don’t scale, same thing. Adding gliding to the game with updrafts and speed/breaks and layline gliding, that’s complexity.

I think you’re confusing the kind of new zones you get in other games with the same old static quests, with what this game is doing.

Every single zone in this game is harder to create than a typical MMO due to the lack of static quests and scaling. The verticality of the zone is huge as well.

These maps too a very long time to design compared to zones I’ve played in other games. So no, I don’t believe he is right.

It’s not really relevant how many MMOs you’ve played. It doesn’t matter whether Anet’s quest system is more complex. If the framework is in place, with the right tools, the copy/pasting is virtually the same. The hard part is in the initial creation of the system, not making new events down the road.

As for verticality, yes, that was one new system and they only did it in the four new zones. Where did I say “zero complexity” though? I said “a lot of,” not 100%.

Frankly, you have no idea how long these maps took to design unless you worked on the expansion start to finish. Nor do you have any idea how long zones in other games took, by comparison, unless you also worked on those games. You can guess and that is it. Acting like your perception of how long it took is fact… is just silly.

Being well-versed in playing MMOs does not make you experienced in how they are made.

No, but I know 300 guys working on a game for a year aren’t doing nothing. That is to say, this would have to be the worst run company in the history of companies if it doesn’t take a long time to create.

These quests aren’t really cut and pasted. They’re hand crafted and it takes more time. They interact with each other and often overlap each other and that takes more time.

This copy paste thing you’re talking about? Not seeing that so much here.

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

Manthas.6234:

What I see right now is a lazy developer who focuses on creating an easy to produce content. If I wanted that, I would be playing Candy crush saga. Don’t go easy path EAnet, it leads to the dark side.

Anyone who thinks the Jungle and the Raid are easy to produce doesn’t know enough about programming. That is all.

This discussion was never about the raids or the jungle, it’s about the cash shop and skins. As some would say, there’s entirely different group of people programming those things. That is all.

Give me a break. Easy to produce CONTENT. And saying if I wanted easy to produce content I’d be playing Candy Crush saga, which implies something other than just cash shop.

If that was your intention you expressed it in a way that pretty much guarantees people will see it wrong.

Edit: At any rate, it’s an economic decision regardless not one based on laziness. If you can produce and sell more outfits faster that’s good for the bottom line.

Ok, maybe my expression was wrong and misleading but…
My point is: In 2012 we received GW2. A shining knight. The MMORPG of all mmorps. The Chosen One. Not being sarcastic, this is how I feel.
2015 and we are getting the first expansion, which feels half complete in my opinion. (You can’t just deliver 10 pages of your master thesis on deadline, say that you’ll deliver other parts of the work each two weeks and expect to get a good mark). The skins are just an epitome of how this expansion looks like. At vanilla launch, we received ton of skins, hell, even dungeon had their own armor. With expansion, we got 3 new skins for everyone + 1 for heavies and ton of outfits.
Please , compare 2012 and 2015 and tell me they are not getting lazy. Yes, perhaps this new model with outfits in gemshop is more profitable. But Anet is no longer The Chosen One, its just another game developer.

It was never the chosen one. We got the first game, with tons and tons of bugs. The TP didn’t work for days. Orr was an absolute mess. In your head it was the chosen one. It was a business from day one and your glamorizing that to say it was more is just that. Glamorizing it.

People had all sorts of complaints in the beginning but it was new and shiny so people ignored stuff. That’s what always happens with new and shiny.

The dungeons, complaints they were not rewarding, which is why Anet upped the dungeon reward. The reward we have for dungeons now is BETTER than the reward at launch, because we get champ bags now and we didn’t back then.

People complained there was no reward to kill a champ even though they were much harder than vets. It was a long time before champ bags were added, because people didn’t feel rewarded.

There were far more broken events in the game at launch than there are now, by an order of magnitude. I said, even back then, the game launched six months to a year too early and it was true back then. No development team ever really gets enough time.

The WvW problems we have today…the existed at launch. The same problems. People complained about Fractal rewards even before the nerf. People complained about the RNG involved in getting precursors all along.

Tell me when this golden age was again?

This has always been a good game and it’s still a good game. But people’s expectations are unrealistic, because it is a business.

Labjax.2465:

Vayne.8563:

Anyone who thinks the Jungle and the Raid are easy to produce doesn’t know enough about programming. That is all.

If we take scale into account and compare it to the programming of other MMO’s features, they are doing a lot of standard procedure (e.g. nothing particularly interesting in terms of effort invested) – reusing assets, copy/pasting event design, etc.

In other words… obviously it’s not “easy” in a vacuum. However, if you compare it for scale to other MMOs, it’s not exactly hard either.

Manthas is more or less on the money. A lot of the bread and butter content they put out with HoT is copy/paste caliber of effort. I’m not saying anything against the individual devs who did what they could with the resources they had and the time allotted them, but let’s not obfuscate the point with technicalities of language.

Somewhat unrelated, but also somewhat related, it occurs to me that this game would probably be forgettable as hell without its A+ art team.

I’ve played a lot of MMOs. Not one or two. A lot. The complexity of these zones, and the events in them dwarfs what most MMOs give you.

Remember that static quests are far easier to program and control. Events that don’t scale, same thing. Adding gliding to the game with updrafts and speed/breaks and layline gliding, that’s complexity.

I think you’re confusing the kind of new zones you get in other games with the same old static quests, with what this game is doing.

Every single zone in this game is harder to create than a typical MMO due to the lack of static quests and scaling. The verticality of the zone is huge as well.

These maps too a very long time to design compared to zones I’ve played in other games. So no, I don’t believe he is right.

Vlad Morbius.1759:

Vayne.8563:

Honest is a code word for I don’t like it. It’s honest if you don’t like it.

There are some of us who honestly like it though. That’s honest too.

Not that there aren’t flaws in HoT, because there are, but there’s a lot of really good stuff too…for people who share my play style at any rate.

That may likely be the case I know I’m really enjoying my Reaper but that said they have yet to discuss any fixes or potential changes for the areas that are flawed. We haven’t had any real feedback of consequence at all on many areas that have been posted regularly since launch, very discouraging. Perhaps they are meeting to review all of these things who really knows because there is no communication and one can’t help but feel like they have their money now so too bad so sad.

As far as honesty goes, I will be giving them until December 16th to at least share their plans on how they are going to fix some of these concerns and if by then we hear nothing or if I’m not happy with their direction I will put my allotted gem money into Black Desert and their beta.

Actually they have talked about Fractals and they have talked about WvW, at least say they know know the problems but the solution is complex and it’s taking longer than they thought.

I’ve already changed certain other problems and another dev addressed the problems with the collections.

So they have communicated some stuff. People just conveniently ignore them. I’ll see you when you get back from Black Desert I suspect that game is going to suffer badly in the west.

Manthas.6234:

Vayne.8563:

Manthas.6234:

What I see right now is a lazy developer who focuses on creating an easy to produce content. If I wanted that, I would be playing Candy crush saga. Don’t go easy path EAnet, it leads to the dark side.

Anyone who thinks the Jungle and the Raid are easy to produce doesn’t know enough about programming. That is all.

This discussion was never about the raids or the jungle, it’s about the cash shop and skins. As some would say, there’s entirely different group of people programming those things. That is all.

Give me a break. Easy to produce CONTENT. And saying if I wanted easy to produce content I’d be playing Candy Crush saga, which implies something other than just cash shop.

If that was your intention you expressed it in a way that pretty much guarantees people will see it wrong.

Edit: At any rate, it’s an economic decision regardless not one based on laziness. If you can produce and sell more outfits faster that’s good for the bottom line.

Manthas.6234:

What I see right now is a lazy developer who focuses on creating an easy to produce content. If I wanted that, I would be playing Candy crush saga. Don’t go easy path EAnet, it leads to the dark side.

Anyone who thinks the Jungle and the Raid are easy to produce doesn’t know enough about programming. That is all.

Deihnyx.6318:

Kheo.2504:

Your biggest fault is being too generous and making all these guys think they deserve more free stuff than you’ve already given us.
Thank you.

While I agree that a thank you is great sometimes, those free updates were “sold” during the pre-order of the game, it was a promise. It’s not being too generous, it is simply respecting what they said during pre-orders.

Most of those free updates weren’t specifically sold. It’s one thing to say we’re going to do updates, but when the game was sold, the living story hadn’t been conceived or described yet.

So if you liked stuff like The Nightmare Tower, the Marionette, or Escape from Lion’s Arch, as I did, then a thank you is still something one can offer.

Basically Anet took a huge risk and in many ways that risk didn’t pay off, but I enjoyed Season 1 more than I enjoyed Season 2.

It was really nice, till you insulted part of the player base. I know it’s frustrating to see complaint after complaint when you’re having fun, but I’d edit this before it gets an infraction.

I’m not sure most of us can see anything, or agree on anything. I agree there needs to be more and better communication earlier though.

Some of us are still having a ball with HoT. Since my focus has always been open world content (as opposed to say dungeons, fractals or PvP) and since I like a bit of challenge, HoT fills that need admirably.

There are people who have different needs obviously who aren’t as happy.

As for Anet taking care of it’s veteran players, we could have a very long conversation about that. A single character slot, one way or the other doesn’t really tell the story in my opinion.

Put it this way. I feel for the money I spent combined between Guild Wars 2 and HoT, I got more than enough content for my money.

If you were here for Season 1 and for the Living Story for example, you would have gotten that content for free. People buying HoT now either have to pay for it, or don’t get to see it at all, as in the case of Season 1.

I enjoyed the hell out of some of that content.

Wizzzi.4197:

And? It doesn’t matter. I bought it. I payed them. So why am i supposed to pay more to have the same content as 1 month player… It’s injustie to veteran player who bought it 3 years ago and want to have all content…

All MMOs are starting to do this, and with good reason. If you play WoW, you don’t have to buy every single expansion ever made to have access to that content. You need the core game and the newest expansions.

MMOs suffer from natural attrition. It means people stop playing them over time. As more and more expansions come out, they become a barrier to entry to new players.

So it’s smart to remove that barrier to get new players in, or the game stagnates.

Now the F2P Guild Wars 2, isn’t the Guild Wars 2 you bought anyway. It’s filled with all kinds of restrictions. Can’t enter a home city till level 10. Can’t go to LA till level 35. Can’t talk in map chat. Can’t whisper someone not on your friend’s list. Can’t buy gems for gold. Can’t sell gems. TP limitations. Only 3 character slots.

People who bought the game experienced cotent new people will never see. They got in on the ground floor before inflation hit too.

I’ve done tons of stuff new players never will, gotten rewards new players will never get. It’s a small price to pay.

If you don’t like this business model you better stop playing MMOs because everyone is going to have to start doing it soon. The bigger MMOs already do it.

Honest is a code word for I don’t like it. It’s honest if you don’t like it.

There are some of us who honestly like it though. That’s honest too.

Not that there aren’t flaws in HoT, because there are, but there’s a lot of really good stuff too…for people who share my play style at any rate.

Devata.6589:

Vayne.8563:

Devata.6589:

So for like 3 years I have been saying Anet has to do something about the grind. Also saying that with HoT players will come back, feel the grind and might leave again, something you for sure do not want with your first expansion. As they will not come back for the second one if they now leave again.

And for that what some people consider required vs optional grind does not matter at all. People feeling grind is the problem.

Anyway, I just found a perfect example of that.

Back around launch I used to watch Tales of Tyria, a youtube show about GW2. The show and the guild that helped with the show pretty much left in April of 2013.

I just happen to see they have started a new show because just before the launch of HoT they (the show and the guild) came back. And lo and behold. Pretty much the first thing they talk about in the first episode (since their back) is the grind.

It’s just the perfect example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uUpJ7G_Ey6g (19:00 > 33:00) of what I am talking about.

So people can have all these discussions about required grind and none required grind (all grind is optional anyway) but it does not matter even a little. People feeling grind is the problem.

And let me go a step further.. You could remove the grind by removing the rewards, like they did with dungeons. But that does also not help if you still need the rewards / currency.

You just have to make specific rewards for specific content so you do content for its rewards instead of doing things that reward you the best currency that you need to buy all the items you want.

Just wanted to throw that example in here. I think it’s a good show to follow also to see how people who left and now come back, look at the game. What is very important to know.

Sure those who originally played this game, in part, don’t like the changes made to the game. But that doesn’t mean people don’t like it, even if some of the original people don’t.

You’re talking about the most vested fans making a podcast. You’re talking about a generation of people trained to play other MMOs. They wanted X and got Y. But that doesn’t mean people aren’t playing Y.

There are absolutely people disenfranchised and they’re loud, sure. But there are absolutely people having fun too, who aren’t as loud because they have no reason to be.

What you’re saying is looking I can point out an example that proves I’m right. No one said some people aren’t happy and aren’t playing. But the game is doing well, by all reports. We’ll see how well in six months.

I think you’ll be surprised.

I am talking about a player-base that did shrink, now comes back with the expansion and you don’t want to shrink (that much) again. Thats all.

Up until the announcement of HoT income was consistently shrinking. It was not at a bad point but when it would continue that line it would become back. Now you have a spike because of the expansion and clearly there will be a drop of players as well. However you don’t want that drop to go to the point where it was just before the announcement of HoT and then continue to go down as it did.

With HoT you want to also get members back that this time around do stay.

Okay, the game goes free to play. It gets a boatload of new players, some of which convert to HoT some of which don’t.

It’s better value for them because they lose restrictions on their free to play account.

You lose some people due to attrition for whatever reason, you gain a base from people that are free to play.

Those that don’t like the changes leave and those that do, take up the expansion To me that’s business as usual.

When I ran a business we lost and gained customers all the time. So yes, all MMOs have natural attrition. WoW, Guild Wars 2, Final Fantasy, all of them. They’re all losing market share. An expansion comes out and they gain a bit and then start losing again. It’s the cycle.

The specific numbers are far more important than any annecdote. My guild has about the same traffic now that it did before, but it’s not all the same people.

Some guys had left because the game was too easy. they’re back. Some people who liked the game don’t play as much because it’s too much “work”.

Saying some people aren’t happy with the expansion isn’t a revelation to anyone. Did you see comments on the last WOW expansion? The same thing happened. It happens in every game.

The numbers are far more important than just knowing that some people are leaving. We’ll know the numbers, not in three months, but more like six.

Tabootrinket.2631:

Labjax.2465:

BloodyNine.7504:

I think maybe it is because I am newer to this game. But none of this surprises me. The game is F2P. They have to make money somehow. These people don’t work for free. The astronomical costs of items in games is by design. Why pretend otherwise? They NEED you to pull out your credit card and buy gems or the game goes away. Purchases of the game will only go so far. To keep it running there needs to be a revenue stream.

I can understand why people are upset. To be honest I would rather have no gem store, pay a subscription and have everything earn able in game. But that isn’t happening.

This doesn’t excuse the the obvious problems stated in many other posts. I am just saying, I understand why they do this. Not just why, but why the have to do it.

Basically, a number of people are abnormally mad at anything Gem Store related because they are tee’d off about the general direction of the game, HoT (the expansion), and, in some cases, more recent Gem Store practices (such as stuffing desirable items inside of “packs” and making them only purchasable through those packs with a bunch of assorted crap that no one wants, or releasing gliders as a new feature and then making 1% of the glider skins available through actual gameplay and 99% Gem Store purchase).

In other words, people are looking for more reasons to hate on the Gem Store because they’re already mad at it and the game. It’s understandable frankly. It’s not entirely logical half the time, but it’s understandable.

So here I’m going to put some logic in it.
Your character gets like 2 new skin sets by playing HoT. The rest is through the gemstore. Every week, we get to see new outfits going through the gemstore, while not seeing any new skin unlockable by playing the expansion.
There’s a clear overwhelming balance issue here.

Now people are going with a “but it’s f2p” as an argument. The thing is, this expansion is sold the same price as the core game when it came out. But the core game came with a lot more skins than this. The core game came with a lot more maps than this.

Yeah, you’ll come back by saying, “the expansion provides whole new mechanism which is a lot of work etc”. Well I agree. But they could at least provide at least a satisfying amount of new gear set so we could further customize our character.

And then you’ll say “They didn’t have time to create many new gear skins because they focused on providing actual gameplay”… well they have time to create those outfits every week.
“But it’s f2p” uuuuuhh…

Outfits aren’t skins, end of argument. Outfits can’t be mixed and matched. They’re inferior to skins.

Devata.6589:

So for like 3 years I have been saying Anet has to do something about the grind. Also saying that with HoT players will come back, feel the grind and might leave again, something you for sure do not want with your first expansion. As they will not come back for the second one if they now leave again.

And for that what some people consider required vs optional grind does not matter at all. People feeling grind is the problem.

Anyway, I just found a perfect example of that.

Back around launch I used to watch Tales of Tyria, a youtube show about GW2. The show and the guild that helped with the show pretty much left in April of 2013.

I just happen to see they have started a new show because just before the launch of HoT they (the show and the guild) came back. And lo and behold. Pretty much the first thing they talk about in the first episode (since their back) is the grind.

It’s just the perfect example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uUpJ7G_Ey6g (19:00 > 33:00) of what I am talking about.

So people can have all these discussions about required grind and none required grind (all grind is optional anyway) but it does not matter even a little. People feeling grind is the problem.

And let me go a step further.. You could remove the grind by removing the rewards, like they did with dungeons. But that does also not help if you still need the rewards / currency.

You just have to make specific rewards for specific content so you do content for its rewards instead of doing things that reward you the best currency that you need to buy all the items you want.

Just wanted to throw that example in here. I think it’s a good show to follow also to see how people who left and now come back, look at the game. What is very important to know.

Sure those who originally played this game, in part, don’t like the changes made to the game. But that doesn’t mean people don’t like it, even if some of the original people don’t.

You’re talking about the most vested fans making a podcast. You’re talking about a generation of people trained to play other MMOs. They wanted X and got Y. But that doesn’t mean people aren’t playing Y.

There are absolutely people disenfranchised and they’re loud, sure. But there are absolutely people having fun too, who aren’t as loud because they have no reason to be.

What you’re saying is looking I can point out an example that proves I’m right. No one said some people aren’t happy and aren’t playing. But the game is doing well, by all reports. We’ll see how well in six months.

I think you’ll be surprised.

Manasa Devi.7958:

Vayne.8563:

Spirited Was Eceni.3869:

Save your money and buy Black Desert Online instead.

Said about ESO, Said about Neverwinter. Said about Wildestar and particularly said about Archeage, and look at how that worked out.

I think that Black Desert will definitely have an audience, but I suspect it’ll be a much smaller one than you envision.

Those games probably have a bigger audience than GW2 would have had if they’d launched with an abundances of content that’s anything like what the expansion’s content is like.

Those games have a smaller audience than Guild Wars 2 though, even though people thought they would be the death of this game. Because it’s easier to hype an MMO than it is to create one. We’ve seen that all over the place, including here.

Black Desert should start okay, but I strongly suspect the grind there for BIS gear will put Guild Wars 2 to shame…and people complain here.

Spirited Was Eceni.3869:

Save your money and buy Black Desert Online instead.

Said about ESO, Said about Neverwinter. Said about Wildestar and particularly said about Archeage, and look at how that worked out.

I think that Black Desert will definitely have an audience, but I suspect it’ll be a much smaller one than you envision.