(edited by chemiclord.3978)
You’re only hurting yourselves.
You Did This ANet.
Arena.net should not negotiate with terrorists.
I guess I do understand why people don’t want dueling implemented this way. I am just being selfish. If it’s not in the open world I really wouldn’t benefit from it.
I won’t be upset if its never added to the game.
I understand the desire of some people who would rather do SOMETHING rather than sit waiting for a boss to appear.
But open-world dueling is one of those, “this is why we can’t have nice things” sort of deals. Dueling, by my experience, tends to draw a very toxic group of people who only have fun making other players miserable.
I’d rather not encourage that group of players.
Oh look, this topic AGAIN.
It’s as if the other 20 or so threads the past 2 years don’t exist at all.
Did all the Dueling Topics mention the use of ACTUAL places for the system to work? Cause the idea is to have specific places for Dueling, not Open World Dueling.
Make dueling like an Activity like Keg Brawl, Crab Toss, Belcher’s Bluff, etc. but for DR Crown Pavilion, and my fav. place, The Bane from Black Citadel.
I am all for dueling in prescribed dueling arenas, and there ARE several great places for it. I’m not sure about the Crown Pavilion, though, as that seems to be dedicated to specific seasonal events.
I am NOT in favor of open world dueling; it invites a certain type of obnoxious irritant of a player that I’d rather not encourage in this game.
Implement a decline duels toggle and people shouldn’t be bothered.
I’d rather not have to deal with whisper spam “duel me fgt.”
No to open world dueling. I’ll straight up quit if it ever happens.
Yeah, that is such a problem in other mmos.
Where exactly does this irrational fear of yours stem from?
From playing other mmos with open world dueling.
Give people more means to be irritants, and they will use those means.
No thanks. Go somewhere else if you want open world dueling. This game doesn’t need it.
Implement a decline duels toggle and people shouldn’t be bothered.
I’d rather not have to deal with whisper spam “duel me fgt.”
No to open world dueling. I’ll straight up quit if it ever happens.
Thanks everyone for your replies. When I say broken, I referring to the things that could use improvement for said profession. Speaking of the Necromancer, Minion AI is horrible for example. It should be a viable build in all aspects of gameplay. Right now, berserker builds are good in all forms of gameplay. I think this should be the case for every type of build for every class.
What you’re asking for is impossible.
There is a difference between “viable” and “meta.” Indeed, every build is “viable.” You can complete any content in this game with whatever build you want. But only one is considered “best.” And no matter what you do, there will always be one build, one setup, one type of gear that (even if marginally) will be better than others, and players will flock to those builds and gear in droves, and demand everyone else do so as well in order to play with them.
That’s a player-side problem, and there’s little a developer can do about it.
I’m not terribly concerned by the change, as you still do need a certain number of badges and WvW rank to get the Gift of Battle. Sure, if you absolutely despise PvP in all forms, you now have your workaround and CAN get those things without ever entering WvW, but it’s more engaging to go in there and crank out the requirements.
I suspect that’s what Arena.net eventually decided as well.
I have found the general thrust of these sort of threads can boil down to:
“I want this, but don’t want to have to pay for it.”
Arena.net seems to have a fairly long history of telling players, “Be careful what you wish for.”
I guess it really depends on what you mean by “working out.”
It does not appear the mix-n-match crowd was large enough to support that sort of development. Sounds like it’s working out exactly how it should be.
I mean, there was a 500+ page RIOT about this very issue, and Arena.net didn’t budge. I’m dubious another thread voicing this displeasure is going to change their mind.
Questions about Pricing and Payment [merged]
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: chemiclord.3978
I suspect you will see a price point of $39.99, which is pretty much the market rate for MMO expansions by my experience.
Except, if you read the comment directly above yours, you’d discover City of Heroes WASN’T making a substantial amount of money (GW2 this last quarter even BEFORE the expansion announcement pulled in approaching DOUBLE what CoH did its entire last YEAR).
Ya know… for the last year or so, all I heard on these forums was that Arena.net HAD to release a traditional expansion or the game was going to wither on the vine and die.
Now these players get what they claimed they wanted, and it’s evidence the game is dying.
There’s not much detail because… well… there aren’t any real details yet. All we have to work with is the initial announcement.
You DO understand that they are a business that wants to make money… right?
So… how many times are we gonna let our speculation run rampant, then blame Arena.net when it doesn’t match our self-hyped desires?
Seriously, how many times are the fans going to do this to themselves?
Whenever I have that problem, I actually switch to a different connection in range and then it works fine.
Can I have your stuff?
Something that I’ve noticed over these two years is the player base’s insistence on dividing themselves. They want to be able to exclude themselves from whatever segment of the player base they want (be it hard modes to filter out the “casuals”, or gear checks to filter out people who don’t have the “right” gear, or raids to filter out the “noobs” dragging them down, etc…)
I suspect you’re not seeing these tools because the last thing Arena.net has wanted to do is fragment the player base. They don’t want you filtering out swaths of players for whatever reason.
Not giving us the proper tools to avoid players we dont want to play with is exactly what causes all these arguements and toxicity. A fragmented community is healthier so long as there is not too many fragments.
If everyone is forced to play with each other then people of differing opinions collide and hostile behaviour and griefing occurs. This is the case with people disliking path selling or lfg requirements so whenever they see a seller or zerk group on the lfg, instead of ignoring it, they decide to grief or whisper abuse.
I think the problem Arena.net has is that by the very nature of players, it creates that dreaded too many fragments you yourself worry about. Think about all the different suggestions that would fragment the player base that have come through this forum alone.
Gear check.
Hard mode.
Raids.
RP tag.
Open world PvP.
Expansions.
And those are just the ones that I can think of off the top of my head. I’m sure there are others. It’s hard to say, “Oh, a gear check is okay… but we can’t do any of the others because it would fragment the player base too much”… because let’s be honest, everyone who ISN’T a part of that group would be FURIOUSLY kittened off.
I can certainly understand a developer not want to implicitly show favoritism in such a form.
Something that I’ve noticed over these two years is the player base’s insistence on dividing themselves. They want to be able to exclude themselves from whatever segment of the player base they want (be it hard modes to filter out the “casuals”, or gear checks to filter out people who don’t have the “right” gear, or raids to filter out the “noobs” dragging them down, etc…)
I suspect you’re not seeing these tools because the last thing Arena.net has wanted to do is fragment the player base. They don’t want you filtering out swaths of players for whatever reason.
Yeah, that’s something you’d have to ask your local Gamestop.
Arena.net as a whole doesn’t do hype very well, and really doesn’t try very hard.
Their problem stems from being way too vague with initial announcements, and fans running with it, hyping it up themselves to ridiculous levels with all sorts of grand theories about what it could possibly be that said fans are inevitably disappointed when the details that come later don’t match the narrative they pretty much conjured whole cloth from their imaginations.
Honestly, I think the best approach would be to say, “This is what we want and are planning to do. No, there is no time table to this, stop asking. It will be done when it’s done, and we’ll update it as we are more comfortable with saying so.”
Make it an item easily attainable, and people complain it’s not special when everyone has it.
We can ignore those people and have fun. Honestly, I figured that out as a kid when it came to toys.
That would be great, wouldn’t – it?
Yet I have yet to see ANY MMO developer go that route consistently. I suspect it’s because far too many people demand rarity and exclusiveness. Too many people want to feel special and unique.
Liadri was reward behind challenge….novel concept.
And how many people were pitching a fit because it was “too hard?” I remember several threads complaining about it.
while it usually will produce a gift box, may produce one of those valuable tonics, instead!
I wonder which part of this 15 page thread about RNG and this 13 page thread about Halloween mini, or the multiple threads about Black Lion Chests, Mystic Forge and Tequatl weapons made the designers think that players love RNG.
Because even if they made it a guaranteed item if you put in [x] number of items for, players would complain that it’s too grindy.
Make it an item easily attainable, and people complain it’s not special when everyone has it.
What’s your suggestion that pleases everyone? Because I (and I’m sure Arena.net) would love to hear it.
At the core of the issue is… there’s really no way to discourage kitteny player behavior. If a player wants to be a leech and not pull his/her weight, no mechanic or incentive is going to change that.
Meh, if you don’t think the Living Story is doing it for you, you shouldn’t have any guilt not supporting it with gem store purchases.
Let me assure you, if Arena.net thought that the game was “dying” and that an expansion would “save” it… they’d be able to get the money to make it.
The one thing an expansion can do that the living story can’t is generate interest outside of the game’s existing player base. A new shiny box on store shelves also has the added benefit of attracting casual people.
Take WoW for example. I don’t hear people talking about the patches, though there might be a single headline on a gaming news site. With the expansion however, not only is there headlines everywhere, but it also generates a large amount of hype and is talked about all over, including here for example.
It’s simply a mindset people have. An expansion is seen as something new, whereas a patch is just a patch. Patches also don’t typically cause major changes whereas this is expected in an expansion, creating a sense of unknown and creating a lot more buzz.
That’s really the thrust of it. It’s all mental… “hardcore” MMO players have conditioned themselves to expect certain things from an MMO, and boxed expansions are one of those things you “have” to do, or your game isn’t providing “real” content.
As much as this forum kittens about getting “hyped up”… in truth we want, and in fact, DEMAND to be hyped and fed promises.
2005 just called and it wants it’s boxes back. Really, who buys boxed MMO expansions anyway?
Boxes aren’t needed as just about every online gaming magazine writes an article whenever Anet releases a new LS episode or feature update anyways.
An expansion just isn’t needed.
I think there’s nothing inherently wrong with a large “expansion” that adds a ton of content to explore and do. I certainly don’t think WoW for example is “doin’ it rong.”
At issue is that I’m not sure a lot of the things that would fit what players consider an “expansion” (new skills and professions and maps with instanced dungeons) are things Arena.net is terribly interested in pursuing.
With that in mind, I wonder what the point of a more traditional “expansion” would be. It really wouldn’t be more than the Living Story just thrown at us all at once every year or so. Why would I pay money for that if I don’t have to?
Yeah, it really doesn’t matter if a WP is close by, I’ve noticed. Players will lay there dead and ask for a res if there’s an ongoing event.
I said I wanted maps big as at the beginning of the game ( GW2) and many of them together as a whole “continent” too (like in GW1). And you just read what you want out of my post, and yes your interpretation makes less sense.
Well, that’s kinda the problem though. Because I’m not sure that Arena.net’s development allows you to have both in anything resembling a timely manner. Whether that’s because of poor management not using resources optimally, or that the event system makes programming zones much more complex than traditional MMOs… I really can’t say… but I think players are going to have to accept having one or the other. You’re either going to have to accept GW1’s “narrowness” or expect to wait a very, very long time for more “full” areas.
New ones are boring and… small. Maybe area is not that small, but in fact you are forced to run through NARROW CORRIDORS. I would like underwater expansion, but it has to be something BIG.
See, now here is where I kinda go cross-eyed.
Because THAT’S what maps in Guild Wars 1 pretty much exactly WERE. The zones were very narrow and limited in where you could actually go. So the idea that you want continents like in GW1 then complain about how the maps in GW1 actually were… it just doesn’t follow, man.
Many players don’t consider LS to be real content. It’s sole purpose is to drive gem sales.
What do these players consider “real content” then?
If they can’t answer that in concrete terms, within the framework of GW2’s existing basic foundation, then they’re adding nothing to the conversation.
I think you’re seeing the fanbase trying to pull GW2 in two different directions, many of which have desires mutually exclusive to each other. Both sides want the same thing on the surface (expansions and more content):
You have the Guild Wars 1 veterans who want the franchise to return to its “roots.” They want 150+ skills they can arrange however they want, the ability to play by themselves if they desire (using AI assistants rather than rely on other players), they want smaller scale content that can’t simply be “zerged”, and they want to return to Cantha and Elona and the places they remember from GW1.
Then you have the other side that wants GW2 to go full into the traditional MMO experience. They want trinity combat, mounts, raid dungeons with “phat lewt”, open world dueling (if not open world PvP entirely), level increases and a gear treadmill (though not too many admit to wanting those last two anymore), etc…
And yes, I know the divide isn’t nearly that neat, and that’s a lot of bleed over of players who want some of column A and some of column B. It’s a simplistic breakdown that makes a mostly all encompassing Venn diagram.
Doing a quick bit of maths, comparing the price of an expansion to the price of buying Living story episodes – if you added up all the episodes of one and two( yes I know you cant buy season 1 but this gives an idea of output over 2 years) excluding all the festivals it comes to about 23 episodes.
Episodes cost £2.13 each so £48.99 for all the content released over 2 years which is about the time frame for an expansion release o Wow’s expansion is currently shipping for £27.99 for most likely a darn sight more content than the LS has given…
I know which I would prefer..
The problem with that is much of that content in WoW was “endgame raiding”, which less than 5% of the player base would ever actually see at the time it was relevant. It really was a horribly inefficient model, which is why now you see “Looking for Raid” difficulty.
It’s easy to SAY, “I want WoW Expansion-like content.” It’s a little more difficult to fit it into GW2’s model without kittening off a LOT of people.
Remember the rage when Arena.net added ONE tier of gear? Try selling those people on the traditional raid model that was the backbone of WoW expansion content. I’ll bring the squeegie to mop up what’s left of you.
Make no mistake, there’s nothing wrong with asking, “Where’s the content?” But it’s not something you can just point at another game and say, “Do it like that!” Even pointing back to GW1 is kinda problematic (GW1 was actually a pretty linear game with some very narrow progression, it’s exponentially harder to capture that same essence in an open world).
Oh. I forgot one:
6) Cantha. Cantha Cantha Cantha Cantha Cantha Cantha Cantha Cantha CANTHA!!!!
So I’m really curious, and I’m only partially trying to rile the hornet’s nest here…
What specific content does everyone feel ArenaNet should include in an expansion?
Remember that a wide majority of those who participate on this forum do not want any level increase or gear “treadmill” progression, so you should probably consider these concepts off the table. And raids are currently being discussed in a CDI, so you should probably consider this is something they’d already add.
So what else?
If I had to wager a guess, players want:
1) New races. Which would be perfectly fine, but I see no reason why that couldn’t be implemented into the framework of the Living Story (though it hasn’t yet, obviously).
2) New classes. Which to me I think is a non-starter as far as Arena.net is concerned. They’ve shown no real interest in adding new professions with the exception of MAYBE one more heavy armor class.
3) A clump of new zones, rather than single zones slowly being released piecemeal. Personally, I find that to be a fairly legitimate criticism, but I’m not convinced that it really would satisfy players for very long.
4) New weapon skills. Which is another thing Arena.net has been lukewarm on, most likely because of the balance nightmare GW1 proved to be. They don’t want to create a system where people simply bounce to a different broken build with each patch. I suspect this is a non-starter as well on the developers’ end.
5) New dungeons. That IS a non-starter, considering Arena.net outright dropped their dungeon team, apparently finding dungeons not worth the investment.
Basically, many of the things that players want that normally comes with an expansion are things that Arena.net isn’t keen on doing. Any expansion that they WOULD produce would in effect be a Living Story season unloaded all at once.
And I’m personally not interested in spending $40 for that.
In closing, boxed expansions can expand the progression of the world and the game in a much broader sense in a shorter amount of time. It also provides more than one path to take; meaning you can enjoy another area of the game while other players explore another path of story/map/race/etc.
Discredit boxed expansions all you want, but there are many of us who prefer that type of release versus the current living world.
What that tells me is that gamers are sheep who need to be constantly hyped by the “next shiny thing” or they’ll be easily distracted by the “next shiny thing” that catches their eye, then spend months complaining about having nothing to do THERE before the NEXT “next shiny thing” catches their eye.
Rinse, lather, repeat.
I’ve seen the content locusts come and go, and frankly, if they never come back, that’s perfectly fine with me. I certainly won’t shed a tear if they NEVER release a traditional expansion.
The biggest problem is and remains that there are too many skills that apply bleed too quickly, and too many skills (and traits) that allow bleeding to be applied by the “1” skill.
And it’s not something that can be fixed in large scale battles without completely overhauling the entire system, which Arena.net isn’t going to do at this point in the game.
The condition mechanic needs to be completely scrapped and rebuilt from the ground up. There’s no “fixing it.”
It would hardly be a return if we just uncover information about him. I wouldn’t mind learning more about all of the gods, the dragons or even the older races. At this point though I view any reference to Abaddon should be considered with care because he had his run of the mill – it would be as disgusting as referencing back to Scarlet. They had their place, and that place is in the past. There are still secrets to be learned but we’ll learn those secrets about people/things that are very, very, very, very dead.
I mean, that’s really it. I disliked Abaddon as a character for pretty much the exact same reason everyone hated Scarlet… Nightfall basically devolved into, “Because Abaddon.”
It confounds me that one is lauded by the GW1 veterans while the other is despised. They were both terrible, but one has the benefit of nostalgia and rose-colored glasses, I guess.
Don’t forget to give away all your stuff and delete your characters before uninstalling. Also might as well stop coming to the forums. I mean, if you quit for good, why would you care about anything related to the game anymore?
There’s a difference between a former player who checks in every so often to see what has changed, and a troll who uses outdated information to continue to bash the game and pick fights with “white knights.”
Can we give the OP the benefit of the doubt?
Or did I miss some not-so-subtle sarcasm there?
Well, there are two factors at play here:
1) “Hardcore” players like the idea of exclusiveness, of having something few others do. They have delusions that other players look up to them in amazement as they sit in whatever capital city they choose with an air of, “You will never be as good as me, because I have this and you don’t.”
Exclusive items make them feel like a special little snowflake, admired by all, when in most cases it’s really just a matter of having more time invested (either through practice that allows them to overcome tougher challenges or more opportunities to get a rare drop).
In truth, no one else cares that some “hardcore” player has [x]… perhaps a moment’s interest of “Where did you get that? Oh. Yeah, I’ll never do that. Cool. See ya.” before said “hardcore” player is forgotten within thirty seconds. But the cries for exclusiveness are loud and they are plentiful, so the concept is (sadly) here to stay.
2) RNG is the most evil of necessary evils for MMO developers. There’s simply no way to maintain content faster than players can consume it, so you have to entice them to repeat already existing content. Thus, the odds are created that you won’t get that shiny exclusive thing you desire on your first (or even thirtieth) try.
Developers know the moment you get what you covet, if there isn’t something else ready that will get you salivating… you’ll quit playing. RNG is the simplest and most development efficient way to keep you in game.
Complaining customers are actually a good thing, it shows they are still invested in your brand and product. if they weren’t they’d play, leave and not say a thing as to why.
Ehhhhh… yes and no.
On one hand, you are correct that customers that complain are customers that want to still like your product, on the other, being a customer does not give you carte blanche to act as kitteny or as terribly as you wish to customer service reps or companies without consequence.
There comes a point where the money you give a company isn’t worth the headache you give them. There’s a line between being an invested customer and being an entitled brat. Players of MMOs (especially ones that take their complaints to official forums) tend to cross that line far too easily.
Stop complaining? No. That’s absolutely absurd. If you don’t like something, you have every right to voice that dislike.
Now if you meant, “Stop raging like an entitled brat and throwing a temper tantrum and instead voice your displeasure respectfully like a rational human being”, then I think you’d find more people willing to get behind the sentiment.
Maybe use a fixed time, but always with a disclaimer, like :
“We hope it will be ready next week, but we are not 100% sure if some problems may make it take a little longer.”
The problem is they TRIED that method, even with multiple disclaimers, and were raked over the coals for it.
It’s why I kinda roll my eyes whenever fans complain Arena.net never talks to them. The attitude of far too many players could use adjustment as well.
From my experience, it seems that Tassi’s AI is programmed with the assumption you’re in a group and not stacking (yeah, I know). Even when trying it solo, her tendency seems to be one glaze shot in melee followed by a glaze shot at range, regardless if there is a player at either of those ranges or not.
From what I understand, this seasonal stuff is all developed together and just released at the suitable time of year (which would be why the wintersday town clothes came out a month or so before town clothes got the axe entirely).
So, guess what I’m saying is you’re already too late. Anything new they were planning (IF they were planning anything new) is already done.
And yet they go the complete opposite for most stuff. Look at the new rewards. Pillowcase, refractor gems/necklace, zuzu (granted that can be bought with cobs), gwynerfyrd (or however the kitten its spelled), Foil wrappers (non gemstore purchased), etc. are all RNG based (with horrible odds). And lets not even start on the double RNG lottery bullkitten thats happening with the skritt npc.
Because, as you can see in this thread alone, different people want different things.
I don’t like RNG either. I despise the very concept of Black Lion Chests. But other people like to gamble. They like that RNG element.
I accepted long ago that everything isn’t going to be “for” me. I’m going to like some things, I’m going to hate some things. Companies have to cater to a large swath of people, they can’t give you what you’d like every single time.
I really don’t understand the point of this.
Seriously, so what? What does it prove? That Guild Wars 2 isn’t going to shut its doors anytime soon? Everyone here already knows that, even if they don’t want to admit it.
It’s not going to sway any opinions.