Guild Wars 2

depends on 2 things;

1) Do they fix condition? (signs point to it getting better)
2) Do they make the fights hard enough to make mitigating/defensive stats worthwhile?

If 1 is fixed it might change, 2 determines whether there will still be an ‘all offense’ meta or not.

Latinkuro.9615:

a.net really must be stupid to do pre crafting and make the same kitten mistake all over again ! man im disappointed !!!

Someone beat me to the link ><

The new ones can’t be traded, so the ‘mistake’ isn’t made with those.

Except, he’s complaining about the current product not HoT. We already know that there are changes to some of the things he’s complaining about in the expansion.

They’re competing with Mortal Kombat, the jerks.

hazenvirus.8154:

Wonderly.1324:

Tigaseye.2047:

Linken.6345:

Tigaseye.2047:

Vague Memory.2817:

If the new lengendarys are like most of the old ones, I’m still not interested in them: a disco ball on a stick, a party gun, a bow that shoots unicorns etc. Most of this are joke shop items at best more suited to April 1st.

Yeah, they’re cute (almost sickeningly so, in some cases!), but they should just have been sold as skins in the store; not touted as legendaries.

In fact, personally, if I were ANet I would just produce a few more really pretty weapon skins for the store (most of the ones ATM are pretty underwhelming, TBH), that can also be crafted (for people who have far more time than they do RL money) and be done with it.

Game isn’t supposed to be a gear grind, after all, so stick with that premise.

Your right not a gear grind but a skin grind the differance is you have to do the former not the later

Ugh, well I guess…

Except, when you make most of the endgame about looks progression, you risk making people feel obliged to do that grind, to get the skins, even if they don’t want to.

So, although it is marginally better than a conventional gear grind, as it is not absolutely needed for further progression, it’s still potentially not so very different (or not really different enough).

No, there is an objective difference between grinding for stats and grinding for cosmetics. If you try to run the Arah dungeon in level 60 greens or join a fractal 50 group without AR, you will be obliterated or kicked from the party. If you try to run those dungeons with the appropriate stat gear looking like a hot mess, people might snicker at you or you might feel like a clown but you’ll do just fine. The difference is that a stats gear grind is required for you to enjoy certain content in the game, while cosmetics is optional regardless of your “feelings” of being pressured.

Also, I respect your desire for more options in the gem store and I suppose more options for everyone won’t ever be a bad thing. However, I feel like the more they do to make a clear and separate distinction between where skins come from, the better. I understand not all players are this way, but some players feel a greater sense of satisfaction obtaining skins through specific gameplay requirements. As many people have demonstrated with their “legendaries are meaningless because [even theoretically] anyone can swipe a credit card for gems for gold for a legendary” protest. So what I’m saying is, sure, add more gem store skins, but make them exclusive to the gem store (giving people the ever-present option of converting gold to gems of course). And also add more skins that are exclusive to gameplay, for the rest of us.

I’ve got bad news…

Did you know people buy and sell accounts too, how do we prove you didn’t buy that account with all the gen 2 legendaries?

You can’t, but I’m not worried, that’s a fairly trumped up concern.

You can just buy accounts, so doesn’t that mean that you can never trust any ingame achievement ever?

Konig Des Todes.2086:

I’m pretty sure the article said that journey-acquired precursors and the legendaries you make with them will be account bound. That means they won’t enter the market.

For the new precursors and legendaries. It isn’t clear about the old precursors, afaik.[/quote]

The final stage precursers for the old legendaries are explictly tradable, they made a point of mentioinng it in the article.

The middle steps are not tradable, and the new ones are also not tradable.

The thing with meta/stack is you can always choose not to. If somebody’s an kitten about it ignore them, and ‘meta’ players are pretty good about self-excluding, and are easy to avoid.

CutePicsHunter.7430:

Windsagio.1340:

I still don’t get these threads ><

What’s the goal exactly?

I’d say that one of the goals is to decrease efficiency of hype as a marketing strategy. It is very annoying and is a sign of untalanted manager(s) and/or devs irresponsibility – they didn’t even tell year of release.

That’s one hell of an armchair you got there.

I just love it when people call people with skills they almost certainly don’t have ‘incompetent’ at those skills.

Neox.3497:

^ Basically this ^

Also what I fear with specs is how the old weapons will be handled.
So far anet said nothing about that and I could imagine if the weapon skills stay the same that certain weapons will always be better in one of the two specs. Meaning using that weapon in the other spec is a mistake.

Or generally that one spec is better than the other.
Imagine you have a character that could swap between a necro and an ele. Why should you ever use the necro?

I hope you know what I’m meaning with that.

I keep all my 80s up to date, dunno maybe it’s that player-based focus on efficiency over fun.

edit: visual aid

http://www.newmexico.811magazines.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/kelly_pogo_earthday.png

Yes his obviously and totally true story about how they couldn’t beat Kholer without stacking was totally constructive. You’re right!

More directly, he’s complaining about things that exist in the current game which we either have no idea about whether they’re being addressed in the expansion, or about things we know are getting addressed at least somewhat in the expansion (and the patches coming up with it).

The post sums up to "I’m not hype for the expansion because stacking and meta also worldbosses that haven’t been revamped (ignoring those that have)’

Test.8734:

Windsagio.1340:

I still don’t get these threads ><

What’s the goal exactly?

To give ArenaNet feedback so they can improve the game.

What is there not to get? People are allowed to have an opinion different from yours and to express it, for the good of the game.

I’m gonna have to disagree with half of that. Of course everyones entitled to their opinions (People like to pretend folks don’t think that), but the hater thread is a longstanding tradition on the GW2 forum and they long ago lost any pretense of being anything else.

There are constructive criticism threads of course, it’s a matter of tone. You learn to smell ’em a mile away.

“Because you wanted it enough to go through XXX to get it” is the whole model though. You can’t be mad at someone who wanted it more and was willing to do more to get it, whether that ‘do more’ is spending their extra disposable income or their ‘do more’ was go through all the hoops to craft their own.

Edit: Note that I’m one of those who hasn’t been willing to put in the effort :p

I still don’t get these threads ><

What’s the goal exactly?

I still don’t understand why people want guardian to get longbow. It’s so dull compared to giving them a tech weapon.

Sodeni.6041:

IrishPotato.6327:

Keep in mind they also pointed out Aerin was someone who disconnected himself from the dream and was able to be influenced by Mordremoth. To our awareness Trahearne is still very connected to the Pale Tree and her protection. (As far as we know). Honestly though if Trahearne ended up being a traitor…I think we’d all be very happy

But why did the pact soldiers turn against all others? They should be under the mothertrees’ protection too? So why did they currupt and not Trahearne?

Why didn’t Laranthir turn? (We know he’s specifically not corrupted), and why don’t the PC Sylvari turn?

It got hit pretty well above though, it’s pretty clearly supposed to read Trahearne unwittingly led the pact fleet into an ambush

CureForLiving.5360:

Supply and demand. The supply won’t be affected given that precursors produced trough the mastery aren’t tradeable. However the demand side might decrease leading to people having to lower prices.

(bold mine)
People keep saying this, but Anet apparently disagrees, and in absolutely clear terms;

“For all of our existing precursors, this is a tradable exotic weapon, but they will all be updated to use new skins that look much like the legendary weapons they’ll one day become. "

supply will go up

Anet was very clear that the finished state of the old precursers will be nonbound like normal. Only the lesser states will be account bound.

“For all of our existing precursors, this is a tradable exotic weapon, but they will all be updated to use new skins that look much like the legendary weapons they’ll one day become. "

Toxsa.2701:

And hereby I gave my Beta experience like I should. Yet many people who’re not even on the Beta kept on criticizing by theory-crafting in their mind by watching some video, when I was actually testing out how each of the skills work and picturing how it’d be applied in pvp and pve.

I’ll be waiting for the time when the trait is actually complete and when mist released. If the skills stay as it is now, we’ll see.

People have this weird instinctive anti-nerf reaction, I’m not quite sure why… it happens in every game just about in every stiation.

@Others even in the stress-test, player feedback is valuable on the other gameplay elements. It’s not just a stress test, it’s also a way to get analytics and player response on all the things that players could do.

Revenant feedback (and it’s clearly not tuned yet) is just like the feedback about people being confused by the mushroom mastery being ‘broken’.

People have no idea how ‘betas’ work apparently.

They’re not going to ‘buff’ or ‘nerf’ revenent, but they still need to tune the class so its ready for release.

That’s one of the main reasons to get a bunch of people to play it is so they get more comprehensive balance information.

Conncept.7638:

Windsagio.1340:

A more complicated script isn’t what we need for a reactive game.

The problem is the script ANet chose to follow when designing GW2 seems to have had the exact same results as the script they were avoiding. There is still one single indisputably optimal team composition for the entire game, and encounters still come down to easily memorized rote and repetition. That single team composition ‘not’ being the trinity is really no step forward at all so long as it is replaced by something with the exact same results. WoW has its problems with finding support and tanks; GW2 just has that problem flipped on its head, where supports and tanks and any other role but DPS have problems finding groups.

ANet deliberately took a different road, only to end up at the exact same destination. There are still favored and unfavored playstyles, and there is still no diversity in team composition or play mechanics.

That’s the accessibility question, it’s less true in the harder fights (imo).

GW2 players are good, and they’ve managed to get most of the fights to where they don’t have to react in any way. At that point as you say, it’s flat rote 1 tactic.

In comparison, some of the harder fractal fights, while having some optimal setups force the reactive play;

It’s the combination of the large amount of AOE attacks and the dodge mechanic… for instance the Ice elemental or Dredge in the Underground (I think? Terrible with those names) fractal is a pretty straightforward ‘kite to spot, dps, kite to spot, dps’ with a bit of light CC thrown in. In easier fractals it’s a “weaken once and burn” even.

The sheer mass of aoe they throw out along with the specific of the dodge mechanic make that simple script still take a lot of reactive play. When GW2 fights work they’re simple fights that make you react and adjust constantly. When they don’t work they’re too easy (for either through ‘tricks’ or through just being too easy).

A more complicated script isn’t what we need for a reactive game.

Lord Faren, hero of the pact?

I am so happy at this moment.

map
(From this reddit: )

Or make another Liandri.

^So the same info as the english post, just about.

rotten.9753:

Windsagio.1340:

Increased nonrandom availability of sellable precursers (up to 1 per percurser per account). The “old” precursers are explicitly able to be sold.

Increased potential supply + reduced demand from people not needing to buy —> likely reduced prices.

So if an energizer will cost e.g. 500g to craft, do you really believe its price will decrease?

If a Dusk currently costs 1089g to buy and costs 250 to craft, then yes I’d expect the cost to go down for Dusk.

rotten.9753:

Windsagio.1340:

Except precurser prices are going to drop like crazy, because the precursors are still saleble (for existing legendaries anyways)

What makes you think like that? Precursor collections will not be easy and fast tasks, you still have to craft it and we have no clue how costly that would be.

Increased nonrandom availability of sellable precursers (up to 1 per percurser per account). The “old” precursers are explicitly able to be sold.

Increased potential supply + reduced demand from people not needing to buy —> likely reduced prices.

Jerus.4350:

I think you misunderstand me Windsagio because reading your post it sounds like we’re on basically the same page. Content shouldn’t be done for pure monetary optimization, but instead because we want to do it. We shouldn’t feel pushed to do chest farms and with that have trouble finding just normal SW maps. We shouldn’t be pushed to do certain dungeon paths and leave others barren taking forever to find groups to do it.

My point though was that I’d even go as far as to say difficulty shouldn’t matter either, as it can create an issue for newer players feeling unable to progress in the game in the general sense based on ascetics and general purchases. Instead we should simply have special things or even purely fun reasons to do various content and not feel at a loss because we’re doing something we like instead of what is most monetarily optimized.

(Of course more challenging content is even harder to balance as you have to factor in failure rates and all that, but yeah… /shrug talking ideals here)

Yeah we’re agreeing, I took Thadd’s post to be based on the following assumptions:

1) Rewards are scaled to expected completion time (probably put into brackets for clear communication)
2) As skill level increases, completion time would preferably stay proportional (so a ‘fast’ less rewarded dungeon is always faster than a ‘slow’ heavily rewarded dungeon regardless of skill level)

Otherwise we’re in sync

Jerus.4350:

Thaddeus.4891:

Windsagio.1340:

In the case of instanced content though; it sets an expectation, everything else (fractals, aether path) gets fairly commonly mentioned as ‘not rewarding enough’.

Instanced content or not have nothing to do with it. It’s a time vs reward vs challenge (or difficulty balance.

Dungeon is easier than Fractal 50 so Fractal should have a better reward/hour.
Silverwaste is easier than Dungeon so Dungeon should have a better reward/hour.
etc, etc

CoF path 1 is twice as fast as most other dungeon, so it should reward half as much. TA Aetherpath is 3-4 times longer than normal dungeon so it should reward 3-4 times more.

While that’s very logical, I don’t think that really connects with the philosophy of this game as well as it seems like it should.

This game is very much more for the casual player, pumping even more money into the more hardcore would create a large wealth gap and could create the feeling as if new/casual players have an impassible mountain to climb to reach their goal of owning say a legendary or something like mjolinar.

So I really don’t see scaling the monetary gains being the correct route. I think trying to have equality across the board in that if you’re playing you’re gaining, but let the choice on what you do be based on other variables. You may do SW for your Luminescent gear. Fractals for your weapons. Dungeons for token gear/achievement. Or just choose what you have fun doing.

But, this is kinda off topic.

main topic is the deadest of horses :p

I’d disagree with your thing though, this game is seriously plagued by what you might call Over-optimization.

It’s hard to get groups going for relatively unrewarding dungeons;
It’s hard to enjoy Silverwastes playing as intended because of people doing ‘optimized profits’ chest circuits.
In the past it was hard to enjoy some zone content because you’d tend to get into conflict with people doing champion trains for optimizing money income.

It’s a big problem, especially because it’s not something you can just make people not do. Many players think of their play time in this worklike way, and its their right to do so if they enjoy it.

So instead we have to consider normalizing rewards in such a way as to discourage these disruptive patterns (ie people choosing content based on these extremely static reward expectaitons, people playing areas ‘not as intended’).

This is super hard though, you don’t want to sandblast the experience down to nothing… just even it out enough so relative rewards is less likely to be the primary motivator.

Thaddeus.4891:

Windsagio.1340:

In the case of instanced content though; it sets an expectation, everything else (fractals, aether path) gets fairly commonly mentioned as ‘not rewarding enough’.

Instanced content or not have nothing to do with it. It’s a time vs reward vs challenge (or difficulty balance.

Dungeon is easier than Fractal 50 so Fractal should have a better reward/hour.
Silverwaste is easier than Dungeon so Dungeon should have a better reward/hour.
etc, etc

CoF path 1 is twice as fast as most other dungeon, so it should reward half as much. TA Aetherpath is 3-4 times longer than normal dungeon so it should reward 3-4 times more.

I think I’ve seen you propose this before; it would honestly solve a lot of problems if they’re careful about catching all the edge cases ><

spoj.9672:

Windsagio.1340:

I always have to repeat this, I’d love new dungeons, I just have come to the conclusion that they probably won’t happen, and that anet has good, or at least understandable reasons for not doing them.

People come into these threads with a “I like dungeons I want more dungeons so dungeons must be popular and a good idea for arenanet to do.”.

I really dont see why you need to keep repeating this. It adds nothing to the discussion. You have made your opinion clear. Theres no need to try and divert discussion by repeating your expections.

I repeat it because it’s frustrating partially, you see a pretty egregious example and the instinct/urge is to go over it agin..

Also, it’s something that we have to face and deal with if we ever want to have a serious discusison on the subject. There’s a cicle-jerk element of mutual reinforcment that gets into these discussions, and it only leads to longterm bitterness and dissatisfaction… And to be able to talk about what is going on we need to cut through the self-affirmation cycle.

Thaddeus.4891:

Windsagio.1340:

Part of the problem there is that the time/effort/reward on most of the old dungeons is pretty far out of whack. It sets up an impossible expectation.

I don’t think its far out of whack. Its about 7gold per hour in good pugs group and up to around 10 gold per hour in organized group.

Silverwaste on the other end can give you 15-20 gold per hours wihtout much problem and it can even go up to 30 gold per hour in the right conditions.

In the case of instanced content though; it sets an expectation, everything else (fractals, aether path) gets fairly commonly mentioned as ‘not rewarding enough’.

Many.8419:

Windsagio.1340:

You can’t make very good guesses if you’re working backwards from your conclusion.

its exactly what you do mr educated

Except no :p

I always have to repeat this, I’d love new dungeons, I just have come to the conclusion that they probably won’t happen, and that anet has good, or at least understandable reasons for not doing them.

People come into these threads with a “I like dungeons I want more dungeons so dungeons must be popular and a good idea for arenanet to do.”.

spoj.9672:

Rewards are the main driving force in all parts of PvE. This is a cosmetic game. Content can be be popular by design alone. But it wont hold true replayability if rewards are poor. And its perfectly reasonable to be rewarded appropriately for whatever content you choose to do. Anet have always said play the game how you want and get rewarded. But when the rewards arent correctly balanced players feel forced to farm certain content so they can get their cosmetic items. Its an important issue and mocking this concept is ridiculous.

It is, but there’s a pretty consistent feel that as it stands dungeon-running is reward-motivated out of scale, and it’s warping the whole experience.

It’s left us in a situation where people demand new content but won’t play new content because the old content (being quick and boring) is so very much more rewarding.

Somebody I respect up above (or maybe in the other thread that got locked) said something like ‘dungeons are nice for me when I don’t want to commit probably 30-50 minutes to a fractal and want to do a quick something’. (paraphrasing slightly, but that’s the gist). New dungeons won’t, especially at first, be like that. They’d be at least 20 minutes (probably more) even for fast players. From seeing many of these discussions over the last few months, there’s not much sign people will adopt them vs the quick bite-sized tidbits they have now.

It ends up being a bit of a catch-22.

Edit@Thaddeus

Part of the problem there is that the time/effort/reward on most of the old dungeons is pretty far out of whack. It sets up an impossible expectation.

You can’t make very good guesses if you’re working backwards from your conclusion.

tfcgeneralkmk.9508:

Many.8419:

Hyper Cutter.9376:

zaw.6741:

and you know: just because most of current dungeons/paths are easy and bit boring (most 80- ones, jade maw), doesnt mean they couldnt make new ones with more complex mechanics, more challenging.

They literally did that, Aetherpath exists and no one touches it with a ten foot pole.

because rewards are abyssmal

i have done aetherpath once i liked what i got out of it mainly the mini and its a different experience that i won’t go and do everyday but certainly willing to help a guild mate out with it

Every time I see the rewards argument, whether to aether or to fractals, I kind of eyeroll.

It seems to say “We want new content! But if it’s not the optimal GP/hour then we won’t do it anyways!”

Many.8419:

Windsagio.1340:

if there wasn’t why did they start to ‘neglect’ dungeons?

I dont know. You dont know. A red post could answer but that’s to hard for their PR to say up front why they neglect a part of their community.

So what we do is we try to get the best educated guess we can.

if there wasn’t why did they start to ‘neglect’ dungeons?

Who legitimately still makes multiples of the same legendary?

Most people I know pass it around when they need to.

Swagger.1459:

“This crafting system is an account-based activity, which means you’ll only be able to craft each precursor this way once. However, all of the currently existing precursor acquisition methods will remain intact in addition to this new acquisition method. That means that if you want a particular precursor more than once, you’ll have to fall back to the original methods of acquisition.”

Well that stinks for players who have multiple characters.

Except precurser prices are going to drop like crazy, because the precursors are still saleble (for existing legendaries anyways)

Many.8419:

Windsagio.1340:

If anyone here that says they agree with the OP (NO DUNGEONS NO CASH) comes on here and meets me in meguuma after release (or proves they’re in expanion content), I’ll gladly give them 5G, at the cost of taking a screenshot proving that they didn’t actually agree with the OP.

This thread isnt for you but for anet to read. Who are you I should care about reporting to you my game activity? You are noone here. Only red posts matter.

I don’t expect anyone to take me up, it’s more a prediction.

These threats are almost always empty air, and happen with every game now, regardless of the subject or the content

People on their own aren’t going to admit that they bought HoT despite the posturing, but I’d pay (a potentially sizable amount of) gold to prove the point.

Nike.2631:

Windsagio.1340:

I bet you that they’ll end up working the other way at the end of the day.

Whatever the intent was, there’s a massive amount of feedback about how confusing it is, and designers hate that.

With the time available to them, most designers will pitch it back to have a better UI and tutorial/hints attached to it LONG before they’ll give up the key time sink at the root of all future character progression.

Na, it’s better to give immediate bang for the buck and teach up front. We know from other things they’ve said that a large number of players don’t read the tutorials or tooltips (this is pretty well known in the design community, almost a truism).

There’s a huge communication disconnect when a mastery track says ‘this allows you to interact with mushrooms’ and then it doesn’t work… as the Beta feedback reveals.

I could be wrong (not working at anet), but this is about as cut-and-dried as it gets.

If anyone here that says they agree with the OP (NO DUNGEONS NO CASH) comes on here and meets me in meguuma after release (or proves they’re in expanion content), I’ll gladly give them 5G, at the cost of taking a screenshot proving that they didn’t actually agree with the OP.

Nike.2631:

Windsagio.1340:

I’d bet the mushroom thing was a mistake, you’d expect first ability to come with the unlock, as works with some of the others.

As it works with some of the others in the demo.

The mushroom track is the one working as intended. The others are gimmies to improve your odds against the wyvern when the world is going to implode within the hour…

I bet you that they’ll end up working the other way at the end of the day.

Whatever the intent was, there’s a massive amount of feedback about how confusing it is, and designers hate that.

serenke.4806:

Alternate reality much?

It’s pretty simple, whatever doesn’t directly benefit and massively please me is terrible business practice.

I’d bet the mushroom thing was a mistake, you’d expect first ability to come with the unlock, as works with some of the others.

if the dungeons were redesigned to skill levels they probably wouldn’t be so fast or easy though.

Even if there were new dungeons they wouldn’t be the 15 minute gimmies that the old ones are.

spoj.9672:

Its difficult to accept fractals as the solution with their current implementation and rewards. Most challenging content and the least rewarding. Also the fractured patch didnt exactly give us much faith in fractal improvements.

No matter how much we influence fractals it will never be the perfect alternative for people who just want to jump into a quick instance of their choice for semi decent rewards. I dont ever expect them to change the 3 fractal 1 boss setup.

I’d hope the desire for dungeons isn’t primarily about them being justified by rewards though ><

The other question that afaik hasn’t even been asked yet is “Why won’t new fractals work?”

We don’t know if new fractals are coming either (although new fractal support seems to be), but would that work?

Dungeons are (when you’re good) much easier and much more rewarding in pure cash, is that the thing?

So it’s a suggested variation

Muusic.2967:

What is hilarious is seeing players in this game mashing their 13 buttons and pretending to be elite. There’s nothing hard about GW2 and there isn’t supposed to be so whether or not you’re running dungeons or open world it all boils down to how many players are just sitting there on auto attack and how many are actually hitting all 13 buttons.

High level pvp is hard.

High level fractals, if not hard, are tricky.