The fact that the Studio Director states he will look into it tells me that it is a bug. The fact that the story itself is still in the game files tells me it is a trigger bug. I don’t see what you are seeing that supports a theory that it is not a bug.
The short answer is critical thinking.
You can also use “crying wolf”. This is what happens when the developer regularly applies nerfs to longstanding content rewards and calls them “bug fixes”.
Unfortunately, the player base isn’t nearly as stupid as Anet would prefer, and everything about the NPE seems geared toward making that ratio more favorable.
ArenaNet have proven to me a few times that they are willing to admit mistakes and change things. I see no reason at the moment to think otherwise.
Why are you so intent on proving to me that it is not a bug and is intentional? Again the statement from Jeff stated nothing in regards to removing anything story related from the game.
Because everything points to it being intentional, and if so then ArenaNet needs to know that it was a bad move.
The storyline itself was removed. That’s a pretty kitten massive bug! If it was a bug, you can bet their kitten they would have given a confirmation of such and an ETA on when it’ll show up. They always do for the major bugs. Without exception.
The fact that they haven’t shows that it isn’t a bug. That it is “working as intended.”
The fact that the Studio Director states he will look into it tells me that it is a bug. The fact that the story itself is still in the game files tells me it is a trigger bug. I don’t see what you are seeing that supports a theory that it is not a bug.
That said if it is not a bug they will need to re-do the entire last two chapters to fix the plot holes. I really don’t want them too either. I hate recon.
most people ive seen complain havent said they quit the game a long time ago. But even if they have, does that matter?
Do people need to try out the new system to know wether or not they like the idea of having basic skills and functions (such as downed state or even dye’s…) very slowly spoonfed over the course of 80 levels?
I dont think so. We can objectively say that these changes leave you with less skills to play with, and less diversity in your playstyle, for a longer time. Aswell as less room to experiment and find a playstyle you enjoy.
And that is something people either like, or dont like. Most tend to “not like”.
But if you like it so much, why dont we just roll the system back to the way it was? You can, for your own leisure, simply opt to not use that second utility slot untill lv24 (or later!) while those of us who do, can use it sooner.
And it shouldnt take a great deal of discipline to say “nope, one more level before i allow myself to dye my armor”. While those of us who dont want to enforce arbitrary benchmarks, can just make our character look the way we want from the very start.
Selection Bias due to title of thread.
Also a poll on a system that is not working as intended is due to have some negative bias.
Proposal Overview
Being able to send a recruit message in map chat but only show it to people on the same server however possible over multiple map instances.
Goal of Proposal
Better recruiting members for your guild.
Guilds are still very much server based because of WvW. Thats fine but because the PvE would is not so much server based anymore recruiting members for your guild has become extremely hard after the mega-server patch. (only option would be recruiting in WvW but for a PvX guild thats no option because they also want PvE players)
Proposal Functionality
An option to chat with your server basically. So map-server chat. That lets you chat with your server but over multiple instances of the same map.
Associated Risks
Not sure there are any risk.
I’d love to discuss this. How would you all expect a better recruiting system to work? This is a pretty rudimentary version. What other options are there? A guild recruiting board? I think one of the largest issues facing any guild or player looking for a guild is finding a guild that you want to join or finding members that you want to retain.
How do other social groups match people together? How do you meet like-minded people in real life. Some examples include:
Clubs with special interests.
Hangout areas that are themed
There are many steps here
1) Interacting with those people in a social setting
2) Remembering the contact info of the people you interact with.
3) Reasons to continue to interact
4) Eventually forming a formal social group.
There are probably steps in between as well but it would be good to brainstorm ways that GW2 can bridge these steps and what other steps there might be.
Jon
In guild wars 2 and MMO’s it is not always the case that you interact with them before you join with them in a guild. Often times there is a getting to know period.
Clubs in college and high school do this during club days. Members then compare their list of requirements an interest with those of clubs that are open to members. They then join the club in about a week or two they decide if they want to stay.
The problem is recruitment currently takes a lot of time out of game play from the officers to even advertise that they are recruiting. That would be the biggest hurdle to overcome.
Would be a good way to advertise similar to how a lot of clubs give out free swag to pull members in. The advantage is the guild members can advertise near places of similar interests. Dungeon guilds can advertise near dungeons. PvP guilds can advertise in Hearts of the mists and WvW.
The biggest QoL feature that I can think of, that ‘only’ a Guild Hall could provide is as a Megaserver Transportation system.
If only guild members (or invitees perhaps) can access the hall, then it would be an easy place to gather a large group together and be sure to all be on the same map. There could be an NPC that each player speaks to, and by speaking to them, megaserver system is able to get an exact count of the number of players wanting to travel together to a particular zone, BEFORE they try to travel.
Rather than each player loading a zone independently, and the system using predictive logic to try and group people together, it would know exactly how many spaces it needs to have on whichever map the collective attempts to load.
While obviously cool there are some details that would be required to start talking about this.
How big of a group would be required to create one of these zones?
Could you join half empty zones or would you always want them guild exclusive?
Would zones created for your guild stay exclusive to your guild?
etc.
I’d love to see your thoughts on the details of this proposal to talk through some of the issues and see if it is in fact realistic, knowing that obviously you don’t know how the server infrastructure for megaservers works but I’ll try and be here to guide you.
As I was one that proposed this idea I will respond.
How big of a group would be required to create one of these zones?
70-80% of server soft cap. Or higher then any percentage of the lowest population server. The idea is similar to what you did with guilds only allow friends of guild to join at the same time. TTS and Server runs sponsored by guilds is a good example of this use.
Could you join half empty zones or would you always want them guild exclusive?
**As long as all players that meet up before hand can easily meet up on the new map with no cap problems it could be a existing zone.
Would zones created for your guild stay exclusive to your guild?
**No I do not feel a need for that. I am sure there are some that would appreciate this but I feel that is a bit exclusive.
The key here is it is a prepping a megaserver feature not only for guild but for guild and guests of the guild.
I see this subject come up a lot in this thread and while we can talk about other aspects of Guild Halls at some point, let’s try another exercise.
What are the 3 top QOL features you think Guild Halls could provide that maybe couldn’t exist otherwise? Try not to list features that are beyond QOL, but I won’t hold it against you because its hard to do.
I’m out for the day hiking at Mt. Rainier but will try and return with my own top three later this weekend.
Just 3 I can think of so many more.
Easy access to city type NPCs (Crafters,Trading Post,Bank)
Gathering place for Guests and Guild members before triggering World bosses. Would be nice to have a ability to trigger a world boss with perhaps a 10-20 minute delay to allow some randoms to join.
This is one feature I think could be built to encourage reputation and a sense of belonging to a guild. Any guild member or guest to join the instance however perhaps a player set representation percentage could be set to only allow those who represent the most to interact with some of the services.
That is correct they are all vague. He did not say yes it is intentional not did he say it is a bug.
I am personally suspecting it is a bug as the game files for the quest are still in the game. If it was a intentional removal players would not be able to play the story.
Okham’s Razor
Them still being in the game files is outright (indirectly) explained:
They did not alter the story placement for those characters that were already in chapter 7 or chapter 8. To quote:
If you were on the storyline pre-patch, you’ll still be on it post-patch. (Thought it might not be visible until you reach L70, since it’s in Chapter 7.)
From this very thread.
In short: you will experience no loss of the greatest fear storyline if you have reached Forging the Pact. You will experience no reordering of Orr’s plot if you have reached Temple of the Forgotten God. If you had not reach them then you will experience the change. Ergo, the files must remain in the game. This was likely done to prevent confusion (lol) over those who are in the middle of said plots – or to prevent players from missing/repeating story steps if they’re in the middle of chapter 8.
Why are you so intent on proving to me that it is not a bug and is intentional? Again the statement from Jeff stated nothing in regards to removing anything story related from the game.
There’s a few more, they’re all very vague, but just scroll through here.
That is correct they are all vague. He did not say yes it is intentional not did he say it is a bug.
I am personally suspecting it is a bug as the game files for the quest are still in the game. If it was a intentional removal players would not be able to play the story.
Hi Chris, I was fortunate enough to check the instance in question that I mentioned to you about and it seems that the Greatest Fear portion of the story A Light in the Darkness is kept intact. No removals, no nothing. It was only modified on the Story Journal itself, which I still think sucks but nonetheless, I can confirm that the PS was not cut in anyway, shape or form.
Awesome Malkavian I really appreciate the info. Leah is looking into it and we will update when we have more info.
chris
Alright, I think I may have jumped the gun with what I said earlier. It seems that the issue lies in Chapter 7. Those who are in the middle of the quests related to their greatest fears in this case, Tonn and Apatia’s and your other quest were apparently skipped as a side effect of the consolidation of quests into chapters. Either way, please keep us posted.
Will do.
Probably an update Monday if you don’t mind. Super busy today.
I agree that options would be a great way to satisfy both groups here.
I think that default sell to highest buyer should actually be default to lowest seller. People will complain yes. But they don’t understand that doing that will actually net them the least coin. The game should not encourage play that is the least beneficial to the player.
Now default buy to highest buyer. That is a problem. Some orders will get fulfilled instantly others may take a while. This can lead to confusion with some players on why they did not get their item.
Honestly, this is just insulting. I sell to buy orders all the time and I know full well that I’m losing money in the long run. It is a matter of convenience for me. I can match the lowest seller or undercut him to try to get a bit more money, but there are two problems with it: 1) What if I want my money now, to use it? Now I have to wait for someone to buy. 2) What if some TP flipping guy or just another seller undercuts me? Guess what, now I have to wait for his stuff to sell before mine gets sold. Or I have to go watch the dang TP and relist my stuff to make sure it gets sold.
Undercutting is a headache for those of us who just want to sell our crap quickly and having it default to match lowest seller is not going to change my habits. It’s just going to give me more clicks. Furthermore, the more people you have matching lowest seller and/or undercutting each other, the more of a headache it will be for everyone trying to sell their crap at all.
If you are someone who tries to profit off of the TP, you should want people to sell to buy orders! They are playing right into your hands.
Edit: I mean, heck, you could make your same argument that people should be encouraged to place buy orders rather than directly buy what’s being sold (after all, it is more profitable), but if you put both that and match lowest seller together, you get a crowd of people who never actually exchange goods.
I know there are players that make the decision on a informed level. If so more power to them. However I feel that most don’t.
Frankly, and without meaning to sound controversial, it sounds like there is a difference of opinion here from people who use guilds in a utilitarian fashion and people who use them to try and build a community within the game. If anything, it demonstrates the importance of only giving rewards to a main guild, because anything else will just be used to game the system.
If we are going to get into things like guild halls, I can’t see how you can possibly have that conversation if you aren’t dedicated to the idea of a primary guild as a community.
I don’t consider me having a larger guild that I join only to do guild missions gaming the system. My smaller primary guild can not do a lot of the guild missions so I joined one that can. The guild I joined is ok with that so why let it stop them. Perhaps giving rewards for guild missions should be a rank feature. That way you can demote people who are not helping build the community while still not kicking them from the guild.
Well, the way I put it sounds like it has a worse connotation than it does. It implies some sort of deception or misconduct where none exists or is even intended. I don’t mean that the person should be punished who keeps the guild he has been in from start even though he doesn’t promote it or try to keep it active. I don’t mean that you should be punished for not doing guild activities in your social guild. I don’t mean that the dude who wants to rep all his guilds at once should be punished.
But I think that the future design of guilds should be built in the direction of providing the most rewards to people that have a primary guild that they stay in 90% of the time and chat/do activities with. Not everybody will benefit from this system, but it is the system that will most benefit the game as a whole.
The system that has people do things like represent TTS for big events or for runs on Teq is totally valid, but the goal of the game should be that you shouldn’t HAVE to do that to find a group to beat Tequatl or form a band for WvW.
Guilds are a place to organize players, something you say you belong to. Everything else is a workaround for having a better system for group chats or for shared banks. These are valid uses for guilds, but let’s not build the future of the game around them.
I think it completely depends on the reward. A lot of the rewards (minus the banners) in the economy and politics track I would agree. They are not that big to begin with in the first place. Guild Missions however I would disagree. An alliance to where allied members get rewards for guild missions however would negate this problem.
I understand why they did it however it removed quite a few cool activities. They were fun to do. They were engaging and partly what made some areas unique. A lot of the bundles in the beginning areas is what added the flavor to the races and helped you immerse yourself into the race.
I think the proper thing to do is have the compass guide players to the hearts and not show the heart on the UI until they have talked to the heart vendor and received their instructions. This would have got rid of a lot of confusion not only on the bundles themselves and why your skills suddenly changed. But it would be a perfect time to explain more the mechanics of a heart.
Frankly, and without meaning to sound controversial, it sounds like there is a difference of opinion here from people who use guilds in a utilitarian fashion and people who use them to try and build a community within the game. If anything, it demonstrates the importance of only giving rewards to a main guild, because anything else will just be used to game the system.
If we are going to get into things like guild halls, I can’t see how you can possibly have that conversation if you aren’t dedicated to the idea of a primary guild as a community.
I don’t consider me having a larger guild that I join only to do guild missions gaming the system. My smaller primary guild can not do a lot of the guild missions so I joined one that can. The guild I joined is ok with that so why let it stop them. Perhaps giving rewards for guild missions should be a rank feature. That way you can demote people who are not helping build the community while still not kicking them from the guild.
Proposal Overview
Changing the guild roster UI to better reflect guild leaders/officers.
Goal of Proposal
Currently, when viewing the guild roster, members/representers/officers/leaders are all scattered across the roster. Having a “call out” section that displays the guilds officers/leaders to be able to quickly identify those people allowing for quicker and easier means of communication for inter-guild issues/questions.
Proposal functionality
The top portion of the guild roster player slots being reserved for leaders and officers, in a seperate and distinct area. For example: When viewing the guild roster, instead of showing the players name first, and the other guild members (presumably according to their log in times), a dedicated section displaying the guild leaders and officers is displayed first on that list.
Associated risks
None.
You can currently sort by rank. Perhaps it should be the default.
Proposal Overview
Improve the LFG system so that it sends a alert to guild members that a guild member is looking for a group.
Goal of Proposal
All this talk of alliances, viewing multiple chats etc. I feel are trying to solve one problem. People like to pull from their group of friends for help before they group up with strangers. They do this currently by asking in chat. Swapping between all their relevant guilds asking for help. This proposed system will allow players to request assistance from multiple guilds at the same time without actually representing the guilds in question.
Proposal Functionality
A player determines that he wishes for some help from his guild members. Not many people are on his currently representing guild at the time. He would open up the LFG tool and put a advertisement that he is looking for a group. He would then select how he wants this advertised with the following options (Check-box options as you may want multiple guilds but exclude others no need to spam your WvW guild with a PvE advertisement).
The system will then send a filterable LFG message to the desired groups(With the exception of Everyone). Stating the players advertisement.
The player that wishes to join based on the advertisement would then go into the LFG system and request to join the party.
Associated Risks
LFG spam. Easily mitigated by chat filters. But these filters may cause people to revert back to the old way of doing thing. Represent advertise. Represent advertise.
Not as tight control of who to invite as talking in chat.
Influence is not gained for the guild members playing together.
I see a lot of talk about alliances. Two questions on that front:
1) What functionality would you like to get out of an alliance?
2) What makes you want alliances?
I’ll try to answer them myself.
1) Ability to play content that is made for larger guilds. Ability to connect some of my guilds and have them be able to chat together without the commitment of being in the same guild.
2) My guild is small and there is not enough content for small guilds. I think we could make more small guild content too which would help alleviate the need for alliances.
1.) Mostly the ability to chat with other guilds while representing one guild. Also increase the pool of players I can pull help from. If you want to see how much people would like this and how much it would help. Check in your metrics for instances where players rep 1 guilds for less then 5-10 minutes. Talk in chat. Then rep another guild for less then 5-10 minutes. Then another… In most cases this is a player trying to pull some friends to help them out….. I just came up with another proposal that might solve the issue people are trying to solve here.
2.) See answer to #1. Also your answers are good too.
The problem I see with alliances is if they were a replacement for multiple guilds it would make it so that I can’t associate with multiple guilds I choose.
Great points here and I think what I am hinting at is that if there was a way to maintain the current guild functionality of multiple guilds but also add a way to really commit to a singular guild what are the features old and new that you think are important for your basic guilds vs your, for lack of a better term, “home” guild.
Jon
That statement really fills me with dread. Please do not take anything currently available away from what I’ll call a non-primary guild, and if you are going to be adding functionality, please make sure that if it is something that grants any kind of in game advantage (access to raids, buffs, areas, gear, skins, whatever) that it is available to smaller guilds.
My primary guild is about a dozen active people and another dozen or two that we see occasionally. I’ve known most of these people for years before GW2, and gaming in the same MMO is mostly what keeps us together.
However, most of my primary guild is also member of another larger guild of maybe about 30 or so people that we do missions and other random things with frequently – it started because missions are (and remain) such an enormous pain to try to do as a small guild (seriously, try even a tier 1 bounty with 5 or 8 people online). Yet I’ve gotten to know some of this other guild and I want to keep playing with them.
Please don’t make me choose between the people I’ve known for years and some kind of game mechanics that penalizes me for not wanting to spend most of my time in a huge guild where you’re just another face in the crowd.
Point taken. I was simply asking as an exercise what are the things you really use on all your guilds vs the things you use on your primary guild and what QOL things that we talk about would be important to all guilds vs primary, because I think in order to make primary a meaningful choice it has to provide benefit beyond secondary guilds.
But the secondary guild of one person is the primary guild of another. The primary guild will be the one that fits the player the best. And that fit would be the benefit. That fits all guilds of all sizes and purposes.
Right, in now way would certain guilds be called primary and others secondary as a guild, it would be a rating you give that guild personally. For example:
I have a guild with my college friends that is my primary guild.
I am also in the ArenaNet guild.
For me I get extra functionality for my primary guild
Someone else might assign their primary guild to be the ArenaNet guild.
For them that additional functionality that helps attach them to that guild is tied to the ANet guild.
Here is a bad example of something I would be ok with as only being tied to primary guild:
When a guild completes a Guild mission it gains some rewards and when it has enough of these special rewards they are shared among all of the members of that guild who flagged it as their primary guild.
This example obviously has problems but that is sortof what I am talking about. Anyway I think I’ve talked enough about that issue. I’ll look for some other hot QOL issues to respond to now.
The problem is primary guilds tend to be social guilds not interactive. It is the players relationships that makes primary guilds. There is also some cases that a player could have two primary guilds.
So the only features that you would really want to enhance are items of social design. Rewards, Buffs and other social items to encourage players to represent more frequently. Without removing game play functionality. But a lot of social tools are used for communication so removing them from secondary guilds is not necessarily a option either.
I don’t think it’s a bug. It was mentioned in the patch notes, so it was definitely intended. Jeffery Vaungh’s comments cement the notion that it was intented.
I can interpret Chris in two ways:
He doesn’t know and is going to find out to relay that information to us.
ArenaNet has seen the outburst and are considering reverting the change.
I interpret it as #1
My comment that is a bug is me using logic. Please link me Jeffery Vaungh’s comments.
- And I seriously have no idea what the thought process about gating map exploration is. As someone who loves to explore with new alts, I find the story unlock system feasible, but it appears as if you are actively disincentivising exploration!
3.) Disable the compass. This was put in there for people who are not used to exploration inside of a game to give them a little guidance to explore.
That’s not what I meant. I meant “you can’t use vistas until this level” or “you can’t do diving spots until that level”. I could almost understand for skill points, if its lkevel gate equalled the unlock of Utility 1 – except that some very easy ones are placed in areas that scale 3-5, AND these can be used on unlocked-out-of-the-gate Healing skills.
Making you wait to explore, when exploring is what you’re meant to do to GET levels, is not conducive to making people want to explore.
Misinformation. You can do Vista’s before X level. Diving Spots…… I suspect that is a bug however it is unlocked before level 11. Skill Points I don’t like the fact they are behind a level gate but understand why they could be.
I think that default sell to highest buyer should actually be default to lowest seller. People will complain yes. But they don’t understand that doing that will actually net them the least coin. The game should not encourage play that is the least beneficial to the player.
Now default buy to highest buyer. That is a problem. Some orders will get fulfilled instantly others may take a while. This can lead to confusion with some players on why they did not get their item.
Y’all do realize that buy orders and sell orders can only exist because other players sell instantly/buy instantly? If all players placed orders, nobody would ever buy/sell ANYTHING.
Some players want to maximize on net profit, others want to maximize on time. Both are valid.
Hence ANet should not make the decision for or against either of those – like I said – just remember the mode I used in my last transaction and I’ll happily always sell instantly/buy instantly/sell order/buy order most of the time.
I think the problem is deeper then that though. I think there is a problem with people understanding the buy/sell interface.
The problem with too much focus on metrics is that you tend to design a game to match the metrics instead of innovating. I hope that ArenaNet understands this or they will fall pray to the same problem that the social game industry fell into. Too Many Clones. (Or is the AAA gaming industry already at that problem).
The above video explains another reason that is applicable to Guild Wars 2. Often metrics based games create inaccessible products only accessible to a niche player-base. This is perhaps what happened in the initial development of this game. Leading to a complete re-design of core systems.
I think that default sell to highest buyer should actually be default to lowest seller. People will complain yes. But they don’t understand that doing that will actually net them the least coin. The game should not encourage play that is the least beneficial to the player.
Now default buy to highest buyer. That is a problem. Some orders will get fulfilled instantly others may take a while. This can lead to confusion with some players on why they did not get their item.
Hello Chris. I am not sure if you are the right person I could ask for this job as the customer service thread doesn’t seem to tell me much, but this has something to do with the Personal Story.
Now I can understand rearranging certain chapters. I think I can live with it given time. But what caught my attention however is related to the quest A Light in the Darkness where you disabled the Your Greatest Fear portion of the quest, which in turn would disable the other quests related to that part (for example, the removal of Tonn and Apatia’s quests). I don’t know if this is really the case or not as I have finished Apatia’s quest after this patch was downloaded. I want to know if this is really true or not. And if so, I’d appreciate your insight as to why this happened.
Hey Malkavian,
Mind if i get back to you on this?
Chris
If this is true it is likely a bug. I have heard of a player playing this instance after patch so it is still in the game files.
PRO
Plenty of things are good about the new trading post.
Both the listing fee and transaction fee are listed clearly
Buying and Selling items in bulk is much faster: It is no longer necessary to re-type the amount (1-250) of good and the price I’d like to buy them when buying multiple stacks of an item. I simply need to adjust a bar or confirm and close several times.
It is a lot easier to buy and sell smartly with buy/sell orders being on the same page. I can look at the spread between the buy and sell as well as the quantity and differences between the top listings of the buy and sell orders
Filters are greatly improved extremely intuitive.
CON
Current supply is hard to see.
Obvious warning is not obvious.
Adjusted selling within the Trading Post so that the default is set to match the highest buyer instead of the lowest seller.
This should also happen with when buying it should default to the lowest seller. Or move the warning and adjust default when selling back.
My wife recently was buying items from the trading post to upgrade her gear. She is the type of player that the NPE was created for (She just has no experience with multiplayer games in general. I have had to teach her a few systems.) This was her story she said. Keep in mind I told her nothing about what was included in this patch.
She told me. I am going to go upgrade my gear. Then I heard her say. “I guess that item is out of stock. I guess no-one is selling it.” I was like what do you mean out of stock. So I went over to her computer and had her show me what she was doing. Filtered though the item she wanted just fine. At the buy screen she said she click the place order. I pointed out the text to her and the warning message about coins being held. Then showed her how to buy from a seller. I asked her for why she thought this. She said. I bought a few other items and got them instantly. I was wondering why I did not get this item. In short she did not see the warning message because it was after she made her decision to buy.
Feedback:
Match my level should be checked by default when buying. In most cases when you are buying you are buying something for your level. This is mostly a speed improvement that will help most buyers.
Move the warning message above the buttons. See the linked to images. This would make the warnings more obvious.
Perhaps change the default when buying to highest seller. But there are economic reasons for not doing so.
Hello Chris. I am not sure if you are the right person I could ask for this job as the customer service thread doesn’t seem to tell me much, but this has something to do with the Personal Story.
Now I can understand rearranging certain chapters. I think I can live with it given time. But what caught my attention however is related to the quest A Light in the Darkness where you disabled the Your Greatest Fear portion of the quest, which in turn would disable the other quests related to that part (for example, the removal of Tonn and Apatia’s quests). I don’t know if this is really the case or not as I have finished Apatia’s quest after this patch was downloaded. I want to know if this is really true or not. And if so, I’d appreciate your insight as to why this happened.
Hey Malkavian,
Mind if i get back to you on this?
Chris
Some more information on this. This time a record of someone who completed it post patch. It still looks to be bugged though as it does not appear in the journal. There is someone also disagreeing with him that it is only there because he was on that step pre-patch.
In short we still don’t know as a community if it got removed or not. However as the story itself is still in the game files I suspect it is a bug. Thanks for looking into this Chris.
Not Quite. Allow equal attachment to each guild I am in. Give my influence I earn equally to each guild. Give me the ability to view the guild chat of each guild (similar to alliances in gw1).
Now there is a idea. This would help the “Service” guilds and alleviate their pressure to require representation but still provide the function they were created for. Then the 100% rep requirements to player choice. Might be a good idea to add a last represented field just like there is a last logged in field. That way the leader of a guild can clean up their roster.
Though I would make that field only appear if your rank in guild allows you to view it.
Agreed there is really no reason for it to show to everyone same with last logged in.
Not Quite. Allow equal attachment to each guild I am in. Give my influence I earn equally to each guild. Give me the ability to view the guild chat of each guild (similar to alliances in gw1).
Now there is a idea. This would help the “Service” guilds and alleviate their pressure to require representation but still provide the function they were created for. Then the 100% rep requirements to player choice. Might be a good idea to add a last represented field just like there is a last logged in field. That way the leader of a guild can clean up their roster.
I see a variety of comments on feeling more attachment to a specific guild and a lot of talk of the # of guilds people are a part of and the fear that is causing a lack of attachment. This lack of attachment keeps players players from being compelled to belong to any of their guilds instead of being compelled to belong to all of them .
With all due respect Mr. Peters,
I believe the ability to join multiple guilds on this game is should not have existed at all. Very simply, it discourages guild loyalty and defeats the entire purpose of joining a guild in the first place.
Guilds are supposed to be a dedicated, close knit group of people. An ideal scenario would be a flourishing, active community in-game AND outside of the game, supported by communication programs such as IRC/forums/voice. The system now? Guilds having half the people not representing. Highly inactive/non-existent offsite interaction. Guilds are typically a hi-bye affair in the game.
People who say “I represent this guild today for WvW, then that guild tomorrow for PvE” – this isn’t how guilds are supposed to work. In my opinion anyway. Guilds are groups where people do different things together – not a “I come as I like” place. People who represent different guilds on different days as and when they like are akin to clan-hoppers.
But obviously, this isn’t just the fault of guild hoppers alone. The guild system design in this game is absolutely sub par – you want people to know as many different groups of people as possible, but do not allow players to participate in the chat of guilds they are not representing. This, to me is the biggest problem about the guild system, because it renders useless the participation of a player, simply because he/she does not know what is happening in other guilds.
I respect your decision to give people the ability to join multiple guilds, but I still believe it was a wrong one.
I can understand where this is coming from. I have played many MMORPGs which adapt the one guild per character system. So, basically, players will put their main characters in the main guild. Not only that, guilds in some MMORPGs have very limited slots. So, their alts might not even be allowed in the guild.
The players belonging to those guilds are much closer to each other in comparison to the players in Guild Wars 2. Perhaps, players are forced to interact with each other and these forceful interactions breed meaningful interactions.
Sadly, in guild wars 2, I have observed that many guilds are being treated like a service or running like a service provider while players are just numbers to perform certain activities. This type of guild is pretty meaningless, dull, uninteresting and pointless.
Some people might think that this is just a game and doesn’t have to get that serious into it; attachment, sense of belonging, loyalty, pride, etc. However, I think that a game can only be truly fun and interesting if people get that serious into it.
Great points here and I think what I am hinting at is that if there was a way to maintain the current guild functionality of multiple guilds but also add a way to really commit to a singular guild what are the features old and new that you think are important for your basic guilds vs your, for lack of a better term, “home” guild.
Jon
Yes there may be ways to maintain the current guild functionality of multiple guilds but also have a way to really commit to a singular guild players are already doing it that is why so many guilds have a massive amount of players not representing they are currently at that time likely representing their main guild. But are any changes really needed here. If a guild leader does not want to run the guild with low representation for players then they can simple part ways from the player that does not represent them a lot. Guilds already set login requirements. As much as I hate to say it as I am even personally against login requirements perhaps just like you added last login you should also add a last represented or a % represented field. That way guilds can govern themselves based upon their playstyle and what they are expecting from a guild. I personally don’t find anything wrong with having some guilds as a service. The problem being described I feel is a Guild Governance problem not a mechanics or game-play problem.
Proposal Overview
I would like to improve the Guild Banners so that they can be used more as a tool for recruitment in game.
Goal of Proposal
Make it easier to recruit new players. Making it so that guild officers can focus more on playing the game instead of
Proposal Functionality
When a player interacts with a banner to receive a buff it also displays some information about the guild.
At minimum I think that they should include the guild name of the guild that put it down and recruitment status. If they are accepting new members it would be nice to have a system where players could request more information, or request a invite to the guild this system would send a invite to the officers who can accept recruitment of players.
It would be even better if could include a small editable description of the guild. Or at minimum the play types that the guild participates in.
Associated Risks:
Massive influx of mail to a officer. To negate this have another system to handle recruitment.
I think that involves some discussion of the following.
1) What is currently a part of being in a guild that can’t be taken away, and why would it be bad to take it away?
2) Is there anything that is currently part of being in a guild that could be taken away and given to a more focused guild association? What could we do to mitigate some of the negativity of taking away current functionality? For example replace it on all guilds or enhance it for the one guild that it is tied to?
3) What kind of features are there that don’t even exist yet that would really only make sense with a more fixed association with a single guild?
Jon
The problem can not be solved with mechanics. Nothing currently in place can be taken away as they are needed for players to function in all guild types.The guild types are Social(small social group guilds), Functional(Server WvW Guilds to share resources in WvW. This type can be removed with some changes to WvW for information on how a functional guild is used look at Champions of Stormbluff [SBI] and Stormbluff Isle Invader [SBI] They are mostly server-wide Guilds.), Playtype (Extreamly large guilds).
Players also join other guilds as they have friends in other guilds.
2.) A lot of the guild buffs in economy can be tied to representation. I would say the buffs in Politics too however I think they were designed as a recruitment tool. They can be greatly enhanced to support this function. I will write up a proposal about that.
3.) Reduce the need to represent a guild to keep a tab on players in a guild forming events and parties for activities. This will allow a player to represent a single guild (social guild) but yet at the same time have the benefits of a playtype guild(Large guild).
3. The skill unlocks. While I really liked the idea of using a weapon to unlock the skills, unlocking each skill at a certain level gives new players time to learn how to use them (And because each low level takes about 5 minutes, it isn’t that bad).
Actually, it doesn’t.
Old version – you gradually unlock and learn skills for each weapon, starting with 1, then 2 and 3.
New version – skills are level locked, so if you levelup with one weapon, and then equip another – you have all the skills at once. Which is more confusing (isn’t “confusing” being the argument for new system?)
This is one of the things that I don’t like about the new system. I honestly think this trained the profession more using the old system. Perhaps displaying the skills you would get gave too much information. Or perhaps they wanted to give a feeling of progression tied to the leveling. If It is to give a feeling of progression tied to leveling I hope that skill unlocks are made account wide. See: ( https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Learning-Curve/first#post4389552)
Hey there. Playing for the first time in a very long time (over a year, minus a holiday or two), due to leveling changes. I still have my old 80 (created on the first day of GW2), but I’m starting over.
I like it better, so far. I’m hoping I’ll get direction to head to the city at some point, as I feel that’s lacking, and I really wish you offered a clearer understanding of the skill point achievements rather than “come back later”. It took me awhile to understand that was because I don’t have any skill points just yet.
Otherwise, I enjoyed creating my sylvan guardian – we’ll see how long I keep it up. gating the exploration points was a weird idea, though.
I’m not a WvW person. I want more Personal Story, and I want to see much more done with our housing area, as the backpedaling from what the company talked about during beta was very disappointing for someone who wants a unique experience.
Folks who think people who don’t raid or PvP are “casual” can go suck an egg – I did my time in WoW, I want something different (and unique) to play.
Thanks again for giving me a reason to come back.
The Personal Story will take you into the city. I think it is the level 20 episode that will.
Even after all my negative comments, I AM trying the new levelling system. I am following all the instructions given by the compass and it’s going ok. My gear is being refreshed reasonably frequently.
Can’t say its as fun though. There’s little adventure in it. I feel like Im playing a single player game.
That is not a problem with the NPE that is a problem with you are not doing what you usually do likely world bosses, Dungeons, Etc..
Tried it. Didn’t like it. Reasons are smeared all over the forum.
And yet, I can see how it would be helpful to new players. To think of it, the highlighted features should show up faster, rather than spaced between 1 and 23…
I’m hoping some of it was just a bug, because getting some of those notices as a veteran was just baffling.
And the limit of combat options is understandably infuriating for a veteran player. The pushback of utility slots to make characters even weaker by level 30, when dungeons open, is a terrible idea to prepare them (new or veteran) for more difficult content.
Diving goggles are accessible at or before level 11. Lions Arch is level 35.
This doesn’t seem particularly relevant, as since there are no longer hostiles in Lion’s Arch you can waltz in there with a level 2 character with no problems.
But it is the fact that you can at level 2 is irrelevant as most people (especially first time players) will not. The veterans that do already know about diving goggles. But that is irrelevant as the concern was regarding new players anyways.
You are assuming the people in question are all first time newbies. People don’t need to waste that extra time “learning” when they are making alts after leveling 18 lvl 80s.
The only thing that does is make player retention harder because people that try to keep playing and make new characters will be turned off by the tedious and annoying gating.
No that is not all what I am assuming. Please see the post Colin made that I link. A lot of things are likely bugs. If I make a new character I can expect I would have to unlock my skills just like before. Now instead of having it come from using the weapon it comes from leveling up. (Note I do not personally agree with this change see: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Learning-Curve/first#post4389552)
The only thing that I think are designed to unlock every time is skills and traits. For skills their needs to be some re-balance they have acknowledged that. For traits they are looking into it. They should all be unlocking at about the same time it was unlocking before.
Since this seems to be the go-to thread for this topic, I’m just going to ask if there is any official word on certain concerns I and others had noticed:
- Stat-ups being levels apart is now a serious concern when downscaled. Until you hit the next “stat level”, downscaling will actually weaken you as you level.
- Pushing Elite slots back to level 40 is going to cause many people to consider Ascalon Catacombs to require level 40 now.
- And I seriously have no idea what the thought process about gating map exploration is. As someone who loves to explore with new alts, I find the story unlock system feasible, but it appears as if you are actively disincentivising exploration!
Also, did I just hear right? The “Greatest Fear” story arc was removed? There’s still one variant of that I hadn’t yet tried! (Also, how would this impact people who were in progress on it?)
1.) This was a bug confirmed in another post somewhere. Scaling was not working as intended.
2.) Please see Colin’s post in this thread.
3.) Disable the compass. This was put in there for people who are not used to exploration inside of a game to give them a little guidance to explore.
I would like to know the answer if the “Greatest Fear” story arc was removed. It is possible it was just moved. So I either need to wait for a answer from ArenaNet or experience it myself.
As Colin stated above, we can’t talk in detail about the ongoing development to drive retention for our veteran players, but I just wanted to make the point that the NPE was deliberately designed to address the early game retention issues, and ensure that Guild Wars 2 can benefit from a strong and steady influx of new players into the game.
Adding level restrictions rather than tutorials will bore new players, causing them to leave.
PvP already has a tutorial area the first time you enter Heart of the Mists, and one of GW2’s selling points is that anyone can PvP from level 1. Hiding PvP behind a level gate will frustrate any PvP-minded new players, and make them feel like they’ve been lied to.
Diving goggles are really easy to use. The skills are just for show, and the goggles are generally away from combat. New players have often been excited to discover them. I remember first discovering the diving goggles in LA during a beta weekend, and telling my friends about it. They all brought their characters there and we dove off together. It was great. Low level characters are now met with the message “You cannot use this object at this time” and no explanation.
Low level characters in starter zones no longer encounter interrupts or conditions. Skill slots and class mechanics are behind steep level gates now. Any new players considering moving from another MMO to GW2 will now see combat as “move to enemy, autoattack until it dies, repeat”, and quickly come to the conclusion that GW2 combat is boring and repetitive.
This goes completely against the idea of trying to retain new players.
PvP is still accessible at level 1. Someone that came to the game for PvP was likely referred by a friend who told them it can be done at level 1. They are also likely a veteran gamer and are likely to look up instructions(Note to self update the wiki) and will find out that they can just use a hotkey to access it.
Diving goggles are accessible at or before level 11. Lions Arch is level 35. See my comment above on why they removed feeding the cow to understand why it may be gated. It may also be a thing that should have been a account-wide unlock.
As for point 3 conditions are introduced early on. Information about them happens at level 13. So within the first 3 hours of gameplay. You don’t want to frontload a player.
I can play my personal story once I exited the starting dungeon area in the old system. Now I have to grind all the way to level 10. That’s not " the things unlocked at later levels are earned at about the same time period you used to start using them in the old system in actual real game time " Colin.
That was not changed for that reason. The reason why they changed that was to fix the flow of the story itself. This in my opinion was a required change. my wife stated her big gripe was that she did not like the frequent interruptions to the story bits with leveling. Now she won’t be interrupted on new characters she plays. She was a little confused about the change (She does not read patch notes) but she basically took it as oh so I need to level up more to access them ok.
Can you tell us if the missing off the map POIs and Vistas are intended or bugs?
What about the skill point challenges? Are those meant to be locked out as well?
If it is a bug it would be something that should be a account-wide unlock. Because well obviously a level 80 already knows about them so no point on hiding it from them.
I’m also curious about the wardrobe, as i noticed (not on my toons, but others) that is also locked out early on. I wonder if that is intended as well?
Can’t confirm right now but I believe my level 11 I started just to try out the NPE was able to access the wardrobe. I could see this being a bug if it is not account-wide unlocked.
I am having a very hard time believing that “entertaining cows” was the proper solution for players that found “pick up food, give to cow” confusing.
This is only the case during the first few levels. The poor cows got the short end of the stick they may starve but will will be plenty entertained.
It was not that picking up something and feeding it to the cow was confusing. It was that the players skills were replaced while a player was learning the new skills. I personally think a better option for feeding the cow was to treat it as a collector event not a environmental weapon. Perhaps it can’t be a collector event as it is a heart.
Can you tell us if the missing off the map POIs and Vistas are intended or bugs?
What about the skill point challenges? Are those meant to be locked out as well?
If it is a bug it would be something that should be a account-wide unlock. Because well obviously a level 80 already knows about them so no point on hiding it from them.
Existing Players (already level 80) – no gated leveling for addition characters (Alts).
Your sixth character shouldn’t be more pain to level than your first!
It’s not. Level 1-15 is significantly faster now a lot of players can get there in 1-2 hours. This was not the case before. It is just different with something being different comes unlearning at times.
