Guild Wars 2

Ok, after watching this thread for several days now and still seeing no (appropriate) official response, I want to chime in and say my opinion, too.

Personally I’m in a small guild who usually has not enough members online to fill a whole dungeon group. I’d still consider us rather active (have been since release), and I don’t feel left out by the new content because it seems reasonably achieveable for us.
Not by earning all that influence through activities, but because you can buy all the influence you need with gold, too. We’re all casual players, but earning gold isn’t really a big problem.

But I can totally understand all the people who are disappointed now because of the way this content was advertised beforehand. Or rather, the lack of proper information before the patch and the lack of dialogue now.
I really don’t get why the unlocks are structured that way either, why the Art of war tree, why we have to unlock them one after the other without having choices. It doesn’t make sense to me and I don’t like this linear path at all. That’s one thing. The issue that I find really disturbing in all this is the lack of communication and dialogue with the playerbase though, because even if I am not too concerned personally this time, this feel so much like the awful silence that followed the November patch, where so many people were concerned about something and nobody bothered to explain the dev team’s motivations in a comprehensible way.

This patch or its content isn’t a big deal to me personally, but the way reasonable and very understandable player concerns get treated makes me feel uneasy.

Actually there are severe lag issues with the open world events since the patch yesterday. I’ve never had any before, but the dragon events have become close to unplayable.. see other thread on this.

Yeah, this is really horrible since yesterday. Had two dragon events now where I couldn’t even see or move my character after appearing at the waypoint and by the time I could, the event was over.

Uncle Salty.6342:

I’ve got mixed feelings about your tutorial concept.

Let’s use this analogy. When you buy shelving from Ikea, do you bother reading the instructions? Or just in your mind aggregate, would others?

Granted people might benefit. But when it comes down to the fight itself, dungeon awareness, proper builds, gears etc doesn’t come from just one tutorial. It takes an extended play to learn and come to terms with what needs to be done. A tutorial just wouldn’t accomplish enough.

I agree there, especially about the whole builds and gear thing. But that’s exactly the problem – as a new player who might not even be used to games where you need to think about where you actually put your points, all of this can be very overwhelming at first.
If you fail, you just don’t know why. Did you stand in an AoE, did a mob get you, were you supposed to dodge, is your armor wrong or your build too weird?
That’s the kind of stuff I think new people need to get a chance to worry about bit by bit, not all at once. There is just so many things going on in dungeons at the same time, you never really get a break with the difficulty they currently have.

I just think the learning curve for dungeons is much too steep, for one due to GW2’s combat system that differs a lot from what most people are used to, and secondly because of the dungeon designs themselves. I don’t know how exactly to make it easier for new players, so the tutorial practise-dungeon was just an idea..
Raising the difficulty of the first dungeon the game however seems to go completely in the opposite direction there.

Uncle Salty.6342:

I’m just worried that their idea of ‘dungeon introduction’ equates to story mode.

In that case I think story modes are way too hard to do that job, too. I just levelled another character to 80 and did AC and CM story modes at the suggested level. With friends, with level 80 toons! And seriously, I found them harder than the “easy” paths in explo mode.

My idea of “introduction” would be a more tutorial-like thing, a bit similar to all the pop up explanations you get when you enter the Heart of the Mists for the first time.
“Traps – look out for the thin red circles on the ground that are easy to miss in between all the spell effects, and use your dodge to get out, running just might not do it”… “Gargoyle head – traps like this can shoot at you from the distance, make sure to take them out, they are small and easy to miss…”

I mean it might seem a little embarassing to more experienced players now, but when I think back to how we felt at the beginning of this game, being taken by the hand like that was what we would have needed…

And my next thought is, are people even still supposed to be able to level in dungeons at all or are explo-modes meant for level 80s only in the future?
In that case it would be a good idea to label them as such, because when you are level 35 and receive an official invitation letter to continue your adventures in AC… and then fail horribly… it is anything but encouraging, because obviously you feel like you must just suck too much to be able to handle this game the way it is meant to be played. And that puts people off..

I don’t mind the changes and being challenged more in there as such, but as several people before me already said… the new AC seems awfully hard for new players who only just started the game and experience this as their first dungeon. Actually I feel sorry for all the new people who wander in there now at level 35.

I remember how me and my guildies felt back then, despite being a full guild group and having played several different MMOS before, GW2 has very different combat mechanics that took us all a long time to get used to. Using all your dodges, actually casting while moving etc etc. Even in the old AC, we were constantly dying and never even had a clue what hit us for most of the time.
Eventually we gave up on this and tried the next dungeon instead – CM, which isn’t really any more forgiving (knockbacks etc..) and I still consider that one a pain in the butt nowadays.

The bottom line is, hard encounters like this so early in the game can be very disheartening for new players, please don’t underestimate this.
Two friends and guildies of mine who we used to play MMOs with for several years gave up on this game within the first few months after release because they felt they just couldn’t get the hang of dungeon fights at all.
It really was a very steep learning curve for all of us, because there is no “easy” place to practise. Even AC and CM story modes are awfully hard for people at level 30/40 imho. AC path 2 used to be easier than those and a good place to recommend to new players, but those days are over now.

Maybe it would be a good idea to introduce a rather easy-mode “introduction” dungeon for new players at some point. One to learn the ropes bit by bit, where you learn about traps and all those little things without being overwhelmed by them cause you are still busy trying to find your attack buttons.
That way the “farmable” token-rewarding dungeons for level 80 people can be treated as a seperate and challenging thing without totally scaring off new people who will find it harder and harder to get comfortable with this game.

This is a bit confusing.
I guess solo players usually stick to solo RPGs (or for duos, those solo-RPGs that can be played with one or two friends, a la Baldur’s Gate), but not MMOs. The latter are naturally made to cater for people who enjoy socializing with lots of people and playing in groups.
If you want more solo/duo content and more story, maybe you are looking at the wrong kind of games for this focus… or am I missing something?

Geoffroy.3685:

That being said, when I run with guildies, we always take along anyone’s coming, with no distinction of lvl, achievement points or profession.

Same here. Plus we ask if everyone has done that path before or if someone might need explanations. Geez, it’s not like these dungeons take hours to complete (except Arah), what’s a few more minutes?
Hurts my heart to see how the human aspect doesn’t seem to matter at all to most people in this.. I guess I enjoy MMOs because you meet actual people in there, rather than running around with NPCs.

MagnumOpus.5469:

To the people who say the trash mobs drop trash loot, I suppose that’s where I differ. I get atrocious drops from bosses and chests – like, drops that would make a weaker person cry. Where do I get my rares and exotics? From the trash mobs. Honest to Grenth, when I get a good drop it’s off a mob most would have skipped, hence why I’ve made it a practice to avoid skipping mobs. It’s not like my time is worth money – I have five minutes to cut down a few grunts along the way without sacrificing anything else.

I may be in the minority with how the trash mobs reward me, but it’s shaped the way I approach the game.

Kill everything.

Same here! We usually kill everything and also tell people so in advance (which sometimes results in whining but hey if you don’t like it, you are free to leave).

A few days ago a guildie dropped a set of 3 miniatures and a Black Lion key off two trash mobs in a single CM run.
I didn’t even know it was possible to drop shop items…

Remember when Sylvari characters were…emitting pollen?

I’m in only one guild (a small one at that), and normally can find a guildie or two that want to go to a dungeon with me without any problems. Then one person asks for players on map chat where the dungeon is located and one in Lions Arch, and the group is full in less than 10 minutes. No matter if it’s peak time or late at night or early in the morning. I never used that LFG website once in my life and I do dungeons more or less on a daily basis.

I really can’t see where the problem is, unless your server is totally different than mine.
Don’t see anything wrong at all with having to actually make contact and talk to people before you jump into the action.

If I liked playing together with whoever I ended up with, people go on my friend list and I have even more players to ask if not enough guildies are around.
That’s community, and a nice way to get to know people on your server.

I do like it that way because things are personal and you make friends you actually care to see again, unlike that anonymous mass phenomenon LFG tools create.

I’m using the 1 clover recipe only and got 12 clovers out of my 25 attempts so far. Must be lucky?

I have to say I’ve never come across any kind of “discrimination” against ANY class in this game. I run dungeons almost every day, also with strangers, and haven’t seen any of what you describe happen even once.

Generally, I think it doesn’t even work in this game to talk about “class xyz” as a category, because there are so many build possibilities that you don’t know what you are facing anyway. Just because there are popular build choices and stereotypes doesn’t mean that a class is all about them and everybody is playing that way.

As for rangers, everybody seems to expect archers, but I keep running with a very tough melee ranger who does his job just fine. My own mesmer is a staff heavy support/healer build, doesn’t have anything to do with the shatter ones people seem to expect.

So overall, wouldn’t it make more sense to talk about specific builds and their flaws rather than whole classes?

I have a spirits/beastmaster build for PvP that I use for defending points and I think I am doing pretty well with it? Can take down two attackers if i am lucky and the only thing that completely blasted me away so far was an engineer who just dumped his turrets etc and knocked me dead in three seconds.

I’ve only just reached the deer PvP rank, so maybe it’s due to general noobishness in that tier, but.. I really like playing this ranger so far and I think the spirits are fine.

Thanks for your replies!

The armor is neither the Twilight Arbor not the sylvari cultural one though. It does look very similar to the dryad one, but if you look at the hip, where the “skirt” wraps around the side, the dryad cultural set has leaves coming down and on the NPC it is twigs. Also hand, leg, shoulder and head pieces are rather different.

I assumed (or hoped^^) that it is medium armor, because the NPC is a ranger (her pet is nearby) and she is together with another ranger NPC who is wearing the tier3 sylvari cultural set.

I checked the PvP locker and couldn’t find these skins there. However, I also didn’t see some of the “named exotic” skins, such as Zho’s set for example.
Maybe I just didn’t recognize the female version because I’ve only seen it on a male before, so I’ll look again later. But are you 100% sure that all armor that can be worn by players in the game is in that locker?

While exploring Fields of Ruin, I came across a sylvari ranger NPC called Cymbel (POI Cymbel’s rescue). She is wearing the coolest looking sylvari-style armor I have ever seen and I’d love to get those skins for my ranger. It’s not one of the sylvari cultural tiers though, so I have no idea where to get it (if possible at all).

The GW2 wiki has a picture of the NPC: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/File:Cymbel.jpg

All the armor image galleries I could find on the web seem to only show cultural and dungeon/crafted armor skins, so any help would be much appreciated!

No. Not ever.

I already loved the first version of The Dreamer and am actually leveling a shortbow ranger just to wear that one day. But I adore this new one even more. It is absolutely AWESOME. <3

Like I already said elsewhere, there is enough evil manly looking stuff out there already, more unicorns, rainbows and princess wands please. Girls like me are playing this game, too.

I really enjoyed housing in Ultima Online, LOTRO and Runes of Magic, too. Actually I think I liked the LOTRO version with the instanced neighbourhood best, where you have your home right between other people’s player and guild houses. Decorating them with trophies and watching that collection grow was awesome, especially for the guildy ones..

shawn.6793:

like an instanced cottage type thing, just to hang my trusty greatsword.

…and that just randomly made me think of a kind of “coat rack” in a guild house. Wouldn’t it be kind of cool to have a wall in there where every guild member is represented by a symbol? Like maybe a personal coat of arms/flag/colours and their primary weapon hanging on the wall, right next to the feast table?

Ok, in theory I get all the arguments that people have for why MF gear is selfish and maybe shouldn’t exist. But in practise, how much of a problem is this, really?

I have both a MF and a regular exotic set with “proper” stats. From my experience when running the easier dungeons, experienced players wearing MF gear still die a lot less (as in once, or not at all) than inexperienced ones who are wearing exotics. If everybody knows their way around, the whole group can wear MF gear and still breeze through the dungeon. No problem exists!
At some point you can afford going for those extra drops because you have done the dungeon so many times you can basically rock it in your sleep and no harm done.

If I go into Arah or a path of a harder dungeon that I don’t know yet, I wear my regular exotics set because I don’t want to keep failing and dying when I can possibly prevent that, either. It’s my time wasted as much as everyone else’s and no fun.

So basically I don’t really see where the problem is, have a lot of you actually experienced dungeon groups failing solely because of somebody wearing MF gear? Seems hard to imagine for me..

What I really like the MF gear for is doing things in the open world, though. Completing maps and being able to gather as many mats as possible, and also possibly being challenged harder by the mobs as a result. That’s fun and very optional, doesn’t affect anyone else and it’s like getting a reward for choosing a slightly higher difficulty.

Edit: I guess I’d be fine with having MF gear banned from dungeons for sake of everyone contributing equally to the cause, but for PvE in the open world it’s really a nice thing I like a lot. ;(

I’m not sure if this helps or is too much off the point Khai, but I think what we are really lacking is a sub-forum for every server. The guild-recruit forum here is such a mess and impossible to see through, it gives me a headache every time I open it and I sure as hell wouldn’t look in there for a guild either.

There is an external inofficial website (gw2guilds.org) that has a nice overview and descriptions for a lot of guilds, it might help finding a guild that suits your personal play style/humor/attitude.
But yeah, it is kind of sad having to depend on that and other inofficial websites and communities that some people might never hear about…

Direksone.3867:

A lot of 5 year old arguments made by the ‘anti raiding group’. “I don’t like raids, so I don’t want them implemented.” Embarrassing really. The people against it make no decent arguments at all. If those people don’t like it, why do they even care? They would not be in it anyway. Ridiculous.

I wrote something about just that part earlier on in this thread. Are you actually reading what “the people against it” are saying?

The very existence of raids can put stress and pressure on people, especially in small guilds that might not always have ten people online to complete a raid group. Others who don’t really care about raids might feel obliged or pressured into joining because they don’t want to let people down, when there is always just one or two missing and bad experiences with random players have happened.
It creates stress that I’d much much rather do without, because I’ve seen it all happen before and I appreciate the fact that there are no raids to worry about in this game to begin with.

I’d even go as far as assuming that there are a lot of of the people who think and feel the same, as one of the lines about GW2 that comes to my mind straight away is “if you hate MMOs, check out this…” cause it just works without all the stuff we hate in other games. Raids are definitely high on the list for me, and the mentality they create in a playerbase as well.

Even if I never set foot in a raid in GW2, I am very sure that their very existence would already affect me and my gaming experience in a negative way.

No, what I mean was actually to point out how it wouldn’t just affect the people who want to play raids anyway, but create dynamics among the playerbase that affect others as well.
This was a constant struggle in other MMOs with raids that I played and I am glad it is not present in this game, thanks to lack of raids.

Ganzo.5079:

Its like buy a product sugar free, advertised as sugar free, then cry because its not so sweet and ask to the manufaturer to add some sugar, because the product will really benefit with it.

W.T.F.!

I agree. I’m so tired of reading the word “raids” on this forum even. I’m glad that they don’t exist and that fact is part of why I like this game!

I don’t like the idea of extra content that requires 10 or more people to enter at all. I don’t want to be in a huge anonymous guild with loads of people in order to get “organized” for that, and our small comfy place doesn’t ever have ten people online at the same time.

It was the same situation in another MMO where there were raids – you end up with half the people being desperate to raid and play that content, while the other half doesn’t care but feels pushed because they don’t want to let their friends down. No thanks, go away with your raid stuff please. Too much stress.

Ursan.7846:

But yea, I main a Ranger and I use a shortbow like 90% of the time. Naturally I want a legendary shortbow, but the current skin has absolutely no appeal to me. It’s a “joke” weapon.

I hope they come out with better legendary skins in the future, or make the current ones better.

There are girls (like me) playing GW2 too, who absolutely LOVE the shortbow skin and are happy that the developers actually designed some legendary stuff for our tastes as well. Enough super evil manly stuff out there already, more unicorns and rainbows please!

Erasculio.2914:

Some other parts cannot be earned through common play. You are not going to get Charged Lodestones playing the way you do. You won’t find yourself with almost 500 globs of ectoplasm unless you focus on earning them. You won’t get 250 of all T6 materials just by playing casually.

And even if you were to get all of those playing the game normally… It would be very underwhelming. Earning a Legendary shouldn’t be a matter of just playing a bit every day for a few years; using an example above, the One Ring in Lord of the Rings wasn’t something dealt with after Frodo spent every day tending to the Shrine. Those items sould have lore, be part of a fun task, almost small events by themselves.

To the first part, I do believe it is quite possible, seeing what amount of stuff I have already accumulated during the past few months. Like I said, I am fine with the idea of this whole thing taking a year or two, playing the way I do. Feels just right to me.
(Charged Lodestones can also be created via mystic forge from charged cores etc).

I agree that it would be nice to have more individual lore and background for each weapon, can never have enough lore in my opinion. But personally I really don’t need it in order to have this feel special and I’m kind of glad that there isn’t a mandatory quest chain to play through at this point because I’m not into that kind of thing and don’t enjoy scavenger hunts and the like.. but again, I see your point and more lore and story sure wouldn’t hurt.

Zeldain.5710:

Velkyn.5168:

I also don’t need an epic story, spectacular this, spectacular that in order to have this feel big and special, because at the end I’ll know and remember the journey it’s been to get there. And at least for me, it won’t be a grindy one but just the fun of having played this game that I love for a long time.

Edit: I’m going after The Bifrost, so 500 Arah shards are also part of the fun. ^^

How can you call doing something a thousand times a “journey” and not a grind? There’s nothing different or unique about doing that vs. everything else in the game. There is nothing about it that makes it “legendary” by any stretch of the definition.

I call it a journey because I don’t log into the game and plan to grind a certain amount of xyz. I log in and have fun with friends and guildies and whatever I do, I also get things out of it that add to my overall progress on getting the legendary weapon. And those fun times are what I remember fondly and will most likely think of symbolized in the achievement of that shiny weapon some day, too.

Running dungeons I simply like or haven’t seen or fully completed yet, helping friends achieve their goals or complete their dungeon sets, playing WvW together, leveling alts.. whatever I end up doing is fun and good times with people in a fun game in first place.

It doesn’t feel repetitive to me because while at the end I might have run a hundred dungeons in order to earn gold, it’s not a grind with a set purpose but just a result of time “naturally” spent in the game. Doing whatever I feel like and enjoy at that moment, without letting any of that get boring or tedious. No “I spent a whole weekend running Arah in order to ‘farm’ my 500 tokens”. I just don’t do that.

The epic or legendary feeling for me is simply in knowing what a mamooth task it is to collect all these things, and that it isn’t something to complete on one weekend but a long journey. Basically a collection of fun memories and little adventures shared with friends in all sorts of aspects of this game.

In the end I guess it’s really what you make of it…
I’m going to look at my Bifrost some day and think about what I did in order to get it, where I went, who was there and what happened, what we laughed and raged about. That’s much more epic to me than any pre-made quest chain would possibly be that just tells the same story to everybody anyway.

Red Falcon.8257:

There is no such thing as a legendary “grind” because you’re not meant to grind them, you’re meant to save for them in the very long run – infact, legendaries are merely aesthetic so I don’t see why one would want to grind them.

I totally agree.
I’d consider myself a casual player, and for me getting my legendary is a long-term goal and something special to work towards to.

I hate any sort of grinding – I don’t go out in the world and “farm gold” hitting things for an hour, I don’t go and “farm dungeons” either. I just do whatever I feel like and usually none of that for an extended amount of time because I get bored when things feel tedious. It’s a game and my free time after all.

Initially I thought gathering all the mats for crafting the legendary would probably take me a year or two, which would have been just fine with me.
Now by just having played the game “my way” for a couple months I’m basically watching those objectives complete themselves bit by bit. Several hundred skill points on a character, crafting mats accumulating in my bank, WvW badges piling up etc etc.

For me, crafting a legendary is no grind at all because I refuse to make it one. I see it as my big long-term goal and find it very motivating because there is satisfaction in completing the little steps on the way and having the bigger thing in mind.

I also don’t need an epic story, spectacular this, spectacular that in order to have this feel big and special, because at the end I’ll know and remember the journey it’s been to get there. And at least for me, it won’t be a grindy one but just the fun of having played this game that I love for a long time.

Edit: I’m going after The Bifrost, so 500 Arah shards are also part of the fun. ^^

Me too, same problem. Was just transferring from one PvP match to the next while this happened.

I have to say I really love the event so far.

Well, the jumping puzzle is too hard for me (or rather I just suck at them), I tried about 10 times and never got past the snowflakes, so I gave up on that.

I really enjoy the bell choir though, kinda wish this was a permanent feature of the game almost. ^^ Snowball fighting PvP is hilarious, nothing beats rolling into people as a giant snowball… And I absolutely love randomly dropping present boxes from mobs, makes me grin every time I get one.

The two Tixx dungeons I’ve done were loads of fun and look adorable, I really like the flair of all this and it’s nice that they are relaxed and rather easy to do. Fun times and lots of laughs with friends.

I’m not a big miniature collector, but I guess it’s not too strange to not be able to get all possible rewards in the first year an event takes places. If you are really serious about collecting, it will make you want to log back later the same way people still log into GW around this time for their chance at a super rare polar bear mini I guess.

So all in all, awesome event so far!

I just got 25 glue from a present I dropped from a mob. So it might be quite possible that we can get the other crafting materials for the minis from gift boxes as well and be able to make more than just 2 of them after all.

I finally got my chest too, thank you so much
<3

Hello,

I am one of the players who took part in the final Karka event and still haven’t received their chest in the mail.
Whenever I log into the game now, my mailbox window pops up though. The mailbox is empty (I usually delete every mail right after reading it).
This is a little weird, and I never had this happen before.
I got a mail from a gold seller earlier on today which I reported, other than that there was no mail.

I just had a friend send me a mail which I received and deleted, but nothing showed up after that either and I still get the empty pop-up when I relog.

I also attended the final event, didn’t get to loot a chest and haven’t received a chest in the mail yet.

What is weird however is that every time I log into the game now, my mailbox window pops up. The mailbox is empty (it always is normally, because I delete every mail right after reading it) – but maybe this has something to do with the mailbox bug?

attended/no loot/no mail

My mailbox is always empty, because I delete new mails right after reading them.

Lots of respect for Chris Whiteside for how he is handling this. I had expected the AMA to be over after an hour or two, with most questions unanswered or only vaguely touched.
What he is doing right there, even going through our mammooth forum list of questions one by one and saying he will continue doing so well into the night and even at home (!!) really exceeds what anyone can rightfully ask for in my opinion.

I think he is demonstrating that they do care about our concerns at Anet, even if this session comes a bit late maybe. But this is the impression I had of the devs before this whole Lost Shores/Ascended Gear disaster and the silence that followed. I’m glad to see some of that side again, because it really gives me hope that they will act on our feedback and take it to heart in future updates. I think we were heard alright, now give them a chance to take consequences..

I mean what can he realistically do right now? He is already admitting to a lot of mistakes they made and that seems very human to me. I hope they give the poor guy a few days off after this, really don’t want to be in his shoes doing his job right now.

Thanks for this AMA and all the dedication and commitment, I really appreciate it.

Thanks for posting. I’m totally with you in this, Wintyre.

Do any of you guys play mobile games by chance?
There is a pretty successful one called PocketLegends, with its two successors DarkLegends and ArcaneLegends. All of them are officially named and marketed as “mobile MMOs” or “mobile MMORPGs”, without offering any static world apart from quest/social hubs (towns), and instanced content for up to 5 players at the same time.
So in that sense they are very similar to the Diablo series or GW1, and totally claiming that MMO title, too.

Drake Phoenix.6158:

My suggestion to the players. Before you complain any more, try looking through the tools that we have to track what the devs are actually saying to us. Read through the News and Announcement section of the forums. Check out the Dev Tracker and see what has actually been said within actual threads. Stop complaining about how the company never responds to our concerns, and start actually looking for those responses.

I’m pretty sure that most of us are very aware of those announcements. Personally, I have read every one of them at least twice meanwhile, some even more than that.

The problem is, it still doesn’t make sense to me how the introduction of this new gear with new stats does not contradict previous quotes and official statements. Unless those are just not valid anymore from one day to the next.

People want an explanation and a real statement that addresses what our concerns are about. Being able to know what the whole deal about the game is now, so we can at least decide to leave the game and forums for good because the game has taken on another direction.

Right now there is still hope that maybe all of this is really just a bad dream and only a huge misunderstanding. But we don’t know.
I also don’t really understand why a Q&A session instead of an official statement here on the forums. There is already a lot of mistrust among players that got disappointed and feel betrayed, what if questions about these issues will just get censored or ignored on the Q&A the same way we feel ignored already? Or if we only get vague answers all over again that don’t really tell us anything? Well, I guess we won’t know before monday.

I already mentioned it in another post, but one of the things that confuses me the most is that initially it was said that this new gear and progression was supposedly implemented “due to player feedback”, but now noone seems to be willing to deal with the feedback they are actually getting from players in response.

I never read too many complaints about a lack of stat gear progression on these forums before. Some of course, sure, but a relatively small amount compared to all the rest of topics on here. But it was reason enough to add a new idea of progression into the game, even if it contradicts things that were supposed to be the game’s philosophy before?
Now feedback on that move speaks volumes, but what is the consequence, is there any at all? We all wonder.

Urxx.6840:

The reason we keep posting is ArenaNet hasn’t even aknowledged the existence of our negative feedback, let alone saying they are doing something with it. So we keep repeating things because it’s the only way we have to let them know that ignoring our feedback is not making us magically accept their new direction or get accustomed with it.

We want them to know that, if they want to settle things, they have to confront us honestly and not ignore us.

That’s exactly why I am here, too. I stopped playing the game because I am confused about the changes in the game and the way they seem to contradict all the game seemed to be from what the developers said before.

I am on the forums instead because I am still waiting and hoping for an explanation, a real effort to address and clear up this mess.
If all of us are really just misunderstanding Anet’s intentions with this new Ascended Gear and the much feared “treadmill”, it can’t be so hard to just let us know as much. Let people know that they actually hear and understand what we are saying and why we are saying it, and then explain why there is no reason to be concerned. Put people’s minds at ease.

As it is, there was this very vague statement from Chris Whiteside a week ago, that said they are not going to add new gear for everyone to chase after every 3 months now.
Since there was no explanation at all about how the devs find that this new gear concept does not contradict their own manifesto and several statements they made before, one has to wonder more about what he did NOT say. Maybe no new gear with new stats every 3 months, but every 6 then? Gear based progress is a new core part of the game now all of a sudden but they don’t know how to explain it either so they just ignore all our asking about it?

We just want to know what we are in for, and the longer this lack of information or communication (or even acknowledgement!) from their side keeps up, the more people will get frustrated and upset about it. It won’t simply go away by iself.

The new blog post talked at length about the event and mentioned technical issues and who knows what, but not even a single word about the giant uproar about the new gear, which was also a major content of the patch.

Getting ignored makes people feel disrespected and not valued, and many of us are convinced to have legitimate concerns that we have a right to voice. Unless we actually feel heard and understood, I’m afraid this might not calm down anytime soon, because we still care.

Many of us feel attached to this game because we used to love it and all we assumed it to stand for. We need to know a direction now, what to think, if all is going to be ok again for what we hoped it to be or if it’s time to leave for good.
If I didn’t care anymore, I wouldn’t keep being on the forums, hoping for words and information from the officials.

1) I used to read the forums every couple of days, looking for news and announcements and I think I asked for help in a class forum once or twice. In the last couple of days I have posted more than I did in all my months of playing this game, including the beta.
In short, used to be a very happy customer too and thought GW2 was the one wonderful game I had been looking for and would be playing for the next couple of years.

2) I haven’t really logged into the game since the patch weekend because I pretty much lost all desire to play at the moment.

3) I am disappointed about the new added gear, and by the lack of any clear statement by Anet on what this means for the game’s future. If we are in for more of that sort because they changed their vision, or how else we players are supposed to understand this move that seems to go against all their previous statements that people keep quoting everywhere, including the manifesto. It doesn’t make sense to me.

If this happened due to “player feedback”, I don’t understand why there is virtually no reaction whatsoever to the enormous feedback that keeps coming from players that are not happy with the new gear at all.

Until there is a clear statement about what to expect in the future, I don’t want to be spending time on something I might give up on for good soon enough anyway, in case it becomes official that GW2 is going to support stat/gear progression in the future.

I stopped playing the game, but I keep spending time on these forums, still looking and hoping for some official response to people’s concerns.

JemL.3501:

Velkyn.5168:

JemL.3501:

@Velkyn.5168: let me tell you something i bet i can outlvl, grind, progress, etc any so called ’’casual’’ in one hour race between him and me.

Well thank you for telling me that, but what does that have to do with my post?

hi velkyn, it was regarding to this comment

Velkyn.5168:

many hours they spent on getting something

I still don’t understand what you are saying. The full sentence goes:
“Players who love to grind and show off with the many hours they spent on getting something would still visibly stand out from the crowd like that just the same.” (e.g. if that gear was cosmetic only)

My question to you is, why would that not be good enough, why do you need extra stats on top of it already looking special and showing off your achievement to the public?

JemL.3501:

@Velkyn.5168: let me tell you something i bet i can outlvl, grind, progress, etc any so called ’’casual’’ in one hour race between him and me.

Well thank you for telling me that, but what does that have to do with my post?

DegoLocc.5976:

None of thee mentioned above are personal insults or attacks.

I don’t really want to step into the crossfire, but maybe somebody here could do with some reading up on communication styles. Personally I’d recommend Marshall Rosenberg.

JemL.3501:

dont matter if i give you an essay with examples of why not, these days and apparently some old community which comes from x game is used to get spoon-feed.

and the jealousy between players these days is even bigger, the way the think is ‘’if i dont want or cant get something, nobody should, they all should be equally to me because i dont want or cant get that pixel’’ and make excuses of why they dont want or cant.

Whatever would be wrong with only having purely cosmetic items as grind-rewards then, like many of us are asking for and what we thought would be the case in this game as it was in GW1?

Players who love to grind and show off with the many hours they spent on getting something would still visibly stand out from the crowd like that just the same. They’d have the advantage of looking better than anyone else and I really don’t think that anybody would have a problem with that. They’d get a reward for their efforts without anyone else having anything taken away from them.

What we do have a problem with is that non-grinding people get punished for it. They get excluded from certain PvE content, they can’t be on par with others in WvW.

I’d rather turn this around and ask the pro-gear progression faction why they feel they need those extra stats and power for their ego, and why looking flashier than everyone else wouldn’t be good enough to keep them motivated.

For me it is a different game, because I was looking for a game without stat progression. GW2 seemed to be just that until this new patch came out. I am not interested in a game that rewards grind with more powerful stats.

I would be happy with a truly optional grind by means that the upgrades you get from it are purely cosmetic. People with hamster wheel mindset who need “something to do” or work towards to in order to feel that a game is worth playing could go after hard-to-get cosmetic gear like that just the same. They’d still look more awesome than everyone else and I really wouldn’t have a problem with that at all.

Even though I really hate grinds personally, I still thought it would be a nice thing to work towards a (cosmetic) legendary weapon at my own pace, let it take a year or two or however long it will.
I have no desire to go stat-chasing in order to stop having a disadvantage in WvW until I catch up with the top though. Not worth it and not fun, I’d rather just stop spending my time in the game altogether because I don’t like these conditions.

Hydrophidian.4319:

This was covered in the opening of the initial post.

I’ll expound:

Certain participants in these forums use the declaration, “Guild Wars is not an MMO” as a deflection. Expressions of desire to see GW2 adopt its predecessor’s approach to gear progression are often met with this retort.

The implication is that, because Guild Wars is not an MMO, said approach will not translate to GW2.

This is, of course, a dubious claim, even if the premise were true. But it’s not.

That. The number of people you see on the same screen has nothing to do with how progression works, and it’s not a valid point to argue that GW1’s playing philosophy and main principles wouldn’t work for a game with a larger persistent world.

Fact is that GW1 is a game with a huge (massive ;P) community with many many people playing very cooperatively together at the same time, so in that sense it does make sense to call it an MMORPG. Whether you see 100 or 1000 of them in the same town as your character is in doesn’t matter when the discussion is about how progress in the game works as such.
All of how GW1 worked in that regard would still fit very well into a bigger persistent world like GW2 just as well, no matter with what capital letters you do or don’t label either game.

Opsfor.2814:

Which games isn’t about Grinding? name one pls. other than FPS-type.

Shadowbane, PvP-based MMORPG. (RIP )

Thanks for this post, Sumii. I think it’s a wonderful presentation of what a lot of us feel.

Xeres.3724:

No. Getting the best gear should be an achievement or reward, not a given. My biggest pet peeve about gamers these days is they feel that just because they log into your game, everything should be handed to them on a silver platter. But actually put some effort into this? No. You can insert the typical reasons – lack of time, lack of desire to do what is required, etc. Sorry, that’s the way it goes – everywhere. Generally, you don’t get rewarded for doing nothing – unless you work for congress.

I think a lot of players’ problem with MMO games these days is that most of them follow the same pattern of grind and gear treadmill, where players with the most time always have an advantage over others via the grinded gear. A lot of us were delighted that GW2 promised to be different in that regard, just like GW1 is, a niche game that sets itself apart from the rest.

Of course if you spend a lot of time in a game, you will develop better skills than someone who only plays once a week or so, too. And in my opinion THAT is what should make you better and more successful than them. Real skill and experience, knowledge, tactics to think up strategies for tackling and mastering more difficult content. Not stats that automatically boost you and make you put out/resist more damage while you push the same buttons as before.
That’s just how 99% of all the MMORPGs out there work, and just because that’s a trend that has successfully established itself doesn’t mean that everybody who wants to play this genre has to like that idea at all.

In fact we were hoping for GW2 to give us a much desired change in approach and mentality, and it’s sad that it didn’t happen in the end. ;(

GW1 is very unique in offering tons and tons of skills from which you are required to make your own individual character build, there are no “talent trees” or whatever people might be used to from other games. And I don’t think that getting into that kind of gameplay and developing skillsets and builds that complement each other together with your teammates is any less challenging than grinding for a long time to obtain super gear. Quite the opposite – it requires brainpower and teamwork. Some of us just prefer to be challenged that way rather than by mere time sinks.

And yes, that aspect is what absolutely makes GW1 a MMO too, because you need to communicate and work together in order to be successful way more than in your standard treadmill/grind MMORPG where you go out and do repetitive things over and over again.
GW1 might be a niche game, but it’s definitely proven that this system provides a lot of long-term motivation for those who are looking for these priorities…more than any grind will ever do.

I assume that these players are also the majority of those who pre-ordered GW2 and are disappointed with this change of direction now. We have nowhere else to go but maybe back to GW1, because no other game out there successfully caters for our ideas of what a game should contain and be about.