Guild Wars 2

FourTwenty.4268:

critickitten.1498:

Ascended Average: (1-0.5)1209 + 0.52.07*1209 = 1855.8 average damage
Exotic Average: (1-0.49)1209 + 0.492.02*1209 = 1813.3 average damage

Which means that you’re actually dealing 2.3% more damage on average.

oh dear lord! please stop the production of this game because new gear gives players a 2.3% advantage over another player who choose not to grind. what a incredibly overpowered gearset that needs to be removed this instant! how DARE anet give those progression players a 2.3% increase for MONTHS of grinding

/sarcasm(you know, for those that just dont get it)

you all need to quit kitten and moaning about a 2.3% increase, it’s incredibly pathetic

Correction: it’s a 2.3% increase with only three pieces of gear. And those pieces of gear have some of the smallest stat boosts out of any equipment category.

The gulf will be MUCH wider once they introduce accessories, armor, and weapons.

For example, let’s just pretend that the increase in stats between an Ascended item and an Exotic is “only” 10% (it’s actually larger than that in many cases, especially Critical Damage, but we’ll just pretend it’s not).

So, given the established stats for an Exotic set of armor, we could reasonably expect that our armor set will boost us to 347 Power, 246 Precision, and 18% Critical Damage. And of course, we’ll be hitting harder with our new Ascended weapon, dealing 1095-1210 damage with 197 Power, 141 Precision, and 10% Critical Damage. And we’ll have some shiny new Ascended earrings and amulets, so we’ll be sitting at a cool 222 Power, 158 Precision, and 12% Critical Damage.

Meaning we’re now doing:
1152.5 * (916+197+300+347+222+262) / (916+968) = 1373 damage per strike
[4+((916+300+141+246+158+171)-916)/21] = 52% chance to deal (150+18+10+12+21) = 221% damage.

New Ascended Average: 1373*(1-0.52) + 1373*0.52*2.21 = 2236.9 average damage

Oh hey, look at that, we’re dealing 23% more damage than the Exotic equipped guy. But that’s still such a small number, surely it won’t affect WvW that much! Nevermind, of course, that these ballpark estimates are quite likely far below the actual figures, as Ascended rings and back items are far stronger than just +10% to Exotics in many cases. This clearly won’t impact the metagame, no sir.

And then of course the gulf will continue to grow after they raise the level cap and introduce the next tier of items after this one, because some people just hit that Ascended wall so early, ya know? Gotta make sure they still have stuff to do!

And viola, you’re already on the treadmill and you don’t even realize it.

GW1 completely avoided this with a hard level cap and a set power level for all items. GW2 tried to reinvent the wheel when all it had to do was look at its brother’s notes on the subject. There is no reason for Ascended gear to even exist, and the fact that it’s only just the start is plenty of reason to worry.

Kaizer.7135:

critickitten.1498:

Oglaf.1074:

critickitten.1498:

For example: Why the heck do charr females have a “breast cloth” when they clearly have no breasts, and thus no actual reason to conceal their chests?

She may not have breasts, but there are rows of visible nipples there as with all felines.

Er, no, their mammary glands are hidden under the fur.

No reason to cover something that we can’t see to begin with.

But I can see my kitties nipples all the times

….okay, two things.

1. Why are you looking at your cat’s nipples to begin with? ._.;
2. Charr nipples have been stated to be concealed under their fur. They would not be visible unless you were rooting around in their fur for them, and I imagine that the charr in question isn’t going to be very fond of that.

Given that context, I don’t think the “cloth bra” makes much sense. And it wouldn’t cover a set of six nipples anyways. It’s much too small. It just seems like it’s there to “feminize” the female charr from a human perspective, which seems silly.

Ehra.5240:

I’ve been familiar with how Anet does things since the GW1 beta events, thanks. It doesn’t really matter how much you want to ignore what was actually posted, adding the precursors to a few more mobs’ loot tables would in no way consist of a “new reward system.” If you want to ignore the answer you were given to your concern of how acquiring precursors is reliant on poor mob drop rates then that’s your choice, but let’s not pretend you weren’t given an answer that clearly stated they are working on a new way of obtaining them.

If you want to immediately rush to the defense of the team without knowing anything about what will be released and whether or not it will address any of the concerns that have been expressed, that’s your choice. But let’s not pretend that you’re trying to do anything other than white-knight for them.

See? I can do it, too. If you’re going to be rude then I’m not going to bother engaging in discussion with you. You don’t have to like my opinion but you do have to tolerate it and show me proper respect and tone. Be an adult.

As to the actual bulk of your post: No, we weren’t given an “answer”. We’ve been given a promise, and we’ve heard those before.

We were given promises that the loot tables would be fixed long ago, and to date, they’ve only gotten worse. We were given the promise of a scavenger hunt back in November, which apparently has not gone too far beyond the discussion stage of development and will not be released until at least April, according to Colin’s post. And now we’ve been promised a “new rewards system” that has absolutely no details behind it, with assurances that it will fix the rewards problem.

Forgive me if I don’t immediately rush to the conclusion that it’s going to be a mind-blowing, amazing mechanic that will make the game so much better than it is now. I’ll wait until we’ve actually been told what the heck this “rewards system” is before I jump to the conclusion that it will definitely fix the problems many players have expressed. If you want to just presume that it’ll fix everything, then that’s your prerogative, but I’m not obligated to put blind faith into Colin’s post and just assume it’ll all be perfectly fine.

Also, if you’re right and it is actually “new rewards system”, my question still stands: how does that, in any way, fix the problems with the loot tables? If indeed it’s a new system then that implies it’s either

1. a new system to determine drops that will be replacing the existing system (which doesn’t necessarily mean that it will improve drops, only that it will change them), or
2. a new mechanic (like giving loot rewards for achievements) that is being transposed into the game on top of the existing system (which means that loot tables will still be awful, thus not fixing the problem).

In either case, a “new rewards system” doesn’t necessarily fix the problem guaranteed. So yes, to you it just sounds like I’m whining, but to anyone else who is frustrated with the continual promises and hype, we’re going to sit here and grumble because we’ve come to expect less. And there’s nothing wrong with that, either. There’s nothing wrong with being disappointed in how things have played out so far, and it doesn’t make me or my opinion any less valid than yours because we’re both operating on no information. Which is why I’m doing the intelligent thing and saying that I’ll wait until we’re given some actual information before I try to draw any further conclusions.

Ehra.5240:

critickitten.1498:

That statement says absolutely nothing about how this will fix the problem of precursors being subject to the whims of the RNG, all it says is that there will be “new ways” to obtain them.

You said you don’t see how the new system will " fix the problem of precursors depending heavily on terrible loot tables." I think it’s safe to say that when a dev says they are working on a new reward system that will grant precursors, they mean that there will be a new way to obtain them that does not rely on you killing monsters until it drops. That is what “new reward system” tends to imply, that it will be different from the current method of obtaining them. But if you want to keep assuming it’s not going to change anything at all then I guess that makes sense too.

I’m not convinced that it means what you think it means, no. I’m not expecting much.

I’d be perfectly happy to be wrong, but until we have further details, I’m not going to take the optimistic route and assume that it’ll be some brand new wonderful amazing feature that will blow my socks off.

And if you can’t understand why some of us might be burnt out with what boils down to just hype right now, then you probably weren’t around for the last several years.

Bonefield.9813:

critickitten.1498:

How exactly is a “new rewards system” going to fix the problem of precursors depending heavily on terrible loot tables?

Because Colin said that one of the things the new systems were meant to address is availability of precursors. Whether or not that works out in practice remains to be seen, but it sounds like they’re doing massive work on how loot is awarded throughout the game, which is promising. The issue with precursors only being available through extremely slim chance reflects a game-wide problem with their current reward systems. Colin is talking about their plans to make improvements to those systems. That’s good.

A scavenger hunt was one of the things they wanted to do in order to address the precursor issue, but it was never stated to be the sole solution they were working on (and I’d be pretty disappointed if that were the case). What Colin is saying is that they’re implementing new ways to get precursors—just not that particular one. And I’m glad that they’re focusing on overall rewards in the open world. While having a scavenger hunt to get a precursor would be nice, it doesn’t fix the bigger problem, which is that efficiency and fun are at odds for a lot of players and luck plays far too much of a role in the game. The whole system needs tightening up, because right now the solution for almost anything cool you might want boils down to, “Save up your money until you can buy it from the person who won the lottery.”

It seems we don’t disagree for the most part.

What we disagree on, it seems, is what to expect in the coming months. You seem fairly optimistic that the upcoming changes will make a significant difference in the way precursors are being handled right now. As for me….I was hyped about these patches when it was announced that it was an expansion’s worth of content, but ever since, we’ve seen a decent number of posts that feel like the devs are trying to downplay the size and content of the releases, which instantly has me worrying.

I understand that they can’t just spoil the releases before they happen, but some specificity would do wonders here. Right now, all we’ve been told is that it’s kind of an expansion’s worth of content but not really, and there’s no races, professions, or zones, and no scavenger hunt. So beyond “changes to dungeons and loot tables”, we’ve got nothing to go on.

Ehra.5240:

critickitten.1498:

How exactly is a “new rewards system” going to fix the problem of precursors depending heavily on terrible loot tables?

I thought Colin’s post was pretty clear cut on this…. did you actually read it?

ColinJohanson.2394:

We are however working on expanding reward systems to make them more re-rewarding across all parts of the game, making the open world more rewarding, and adding new ways you can earn precursors as rewards via new reward systems taking advantage of our open persistent world.

Yes, I read it. But it seems you have a very interesting definition of “clear cut”.

That statement says absolutely nothing about how this will fix the problem of precursors being subject to the whims of the RNG, all it says is that there will be “new ways” to obtain them. All that really implies is that they will be adding precursors as possible drops to more locations in the game….but if they’re still absurdly rare drops, then you didn’t really fix the problem.

Legendaries should not boil down to RNG or TP, that doesn’t guarantee that the very best players get them. There’s no reason that they can’t introduce a system that relies on skill….and the only proposed solution that would at least take steps to move us towards such a system is not in active development.

So yes, I am getting a little bit worried to say the least. I’m glad they’re looking into it, but given the exact words he said, I’m not confident that we’re going to see anything more than just extra drop locations. I think you’re hyping yourself up for something that probably won’t happen.

Oglaf.1074:

critickitten.1498:

For example: Why the heck do charr females have a “breast cloth” when they clearly have no breasts, and thus no actual reason to conceal their chests?

She may not have breasts, but there are rows of visible nipples there as with all felines.

Er, no, their mammary glands are hidden under the fur.

No reason to cover something that we can’t see to begin with.

Gord.8654:

To be honest I read the official forums but I am very intimidated to post for two reasons. 1) As stated above there is no point to put up a well explained thought out point for discussion on important topics because if people don’t agree with you you get flamed into submission and 2) it is too heavily moderated. The CoC is in place and for the most part makes sense. I don’t feel I have ever violated the CoC yet I have had 3 posts deleted and 1 “friendly” warning issued by mods. Not going to get a 3 day ban for posting my opinion on a forum… it isn’t worth it!

This user nails it on the head.

The mods do not apply infractions fairly or equally. I’ve observed that complaint posts tend to get away with more inappropriate tone than posts by those defending the game, as well, which is probably not the best way to do business.

Perhaps the greatest weakness of these forums is the lack of communication, however. You can’t protest any warning or infraction without emailing the official mod email and hoping that they get around to looking at your email. I sent them an email addressing my concerns about the forums back on the 6th, and still have not gotten a reply. And still haven’t gotten a reply to questions I raised about an infraction I received on the same day. The impression that sends to us as customers is that we’re not worth their time, and considering that moderators are the most direct face of Public Relations in a company, that’s a bad message to be sending to your fans.

Why can’t we just PM the moderator directly? I work in a game-related forum elsewhere on the internet, and our users can appeal directly to the moderator who issued the warning via PM. That little touch of personal attention is meaningful and shows that you care enough to dedicate a fraction of your time to helping explain what they did wrong. This is something these forums severely lack.

Bonefield.9813:

critickitten.1498:

And you’re telling us that you’re not going to address this problem for at least three more months? And your only effective step towards fixing this problem is to introduce even more “incredibly rare RNG drop” locations for precursors in the coming months?

That’s not what he said. He said that they weren’t specifically working on a scavenger hunt for precursors, but that the issues with getting them would begin to be addressed. I think it’s best to wait and see what the “new reward systems” consist of before assuming they’re just going to add them as rare drops to more locations.

How exactly is a “new rewards system” going to fix the problem of precursors depending heavily on terrible loot tables?

Keep in mind that they previously introduced a patch into the game which would make it so that veteran and champion mobs always drop rewards, and claimed it would improve the loot tables. Yet all statistical analysis via repeated sampling suggests that neither of these things are true, in fact, loot tables are worse than when the game first released.

I’m not going to deny I’m curious what will be done as far as this “new rewards system”, but right now, I haven’t seen anything to suggest that the upcoming patches will improve the rate of precursor drops much, if at all.

Mackdose.6504:

Since you decide to want to talk about what’s “currently” in game, let’s talk about how those minor accessories equate to about 1% more relative stat effectiveness.

Yeah. Let that sink in.

Er, actually I very directly state that I already know the devs have said they intend to expand where Ascended items can be found. My point is that they said this AFTER they rolled out the Ascended tier, which means they honestly didn’t think it’d be a problem until people complained about it in droves.

Are you quite sure you read my post, or did you just skim it and are trying to summarize my points in an incorrect fashion?

And I love how you talk about it like that. It’s only 1%.

A 1% increase in the population of the United States would be like if 3.15 million people suddenly dropped out of the sky. 1% is a pretty significant margin, and it only gets worse as the numbers get bigger. That’s how percentages work, after all.

Oh, and just to give you another quick lesson in numbers, let’s set up a scenario. Two warriors in full Berserker gear, specced to 30 in Power/Precision trait trees. One will wear Ascended rings, and the other Exotic, otherwise they’re stacked with full Exotic gear. This means that both players have this stuff.

Base Stats: 916 Power, 916 Precision, 916 Toughness, 916 Vitality
Weapon: 995-1100 Base Damage, 179 Power, 128 Precision, 9% Critical Damage
Traits: 300 Power, 300 Precision
Armor (sans upgrades): 968 Base Defense, 315 Power, 224 Precision, 16% Critical Damage
Accessories/Amulets (sans upgrades): 202 Power, 144 Precision, and 11% Critical Damage
Final Stats: 1912 Power, 1712 Precision (including 36% Critical Damage), 916 Toughness, 916 Vitality, 995-1100 Base Damage, 968 Base Defense

Ascended Back/Rings (without infusions): 262 Power, 171 Precision, 21% Critical Damage
Exotic Back/Rings (+rubies): 231 Power, 157 Precision, 16% Critical Damage

The Ascended Player will be dealing 1047.5 * (1912+262) / (916+968) = 1209 damage per strike on any skill with a modifier of 1, and will have a [4+(1712+171-916)/21] = 50% chance to deal (150+36+21) = 207% damage.

The Exotic Player will be dealing 1047.5 * (1912+231) / (916+968) = 1192 damage per strike on any skill with a modifier of 1, and will have a [4+(1712+157-916)/21] = 49% chance to deal (150+36+16) = 202% damage.

So as long as you look at the numbers in the most shallow sense, yes, the Ascended player is dealing only about 1.4% more damage per strike. Of course, he’s also getting criticals 1% more often and dealing 5% more critical damage when he does. So in actuality….

Ascended Average: 1209*(1-0.5) + 1209*0.5*2.07 = 1855.8 average damage
Exotic Average: 1209*(1-0.49) + 1209*0.49*2.02 = 1813.3 average damage

Which means that you’re actually dealing 2.3% more damage on average. And this is with only three ascended items in the game….and they’re among the smallest stat-boosting items out of all the equipment slots in the game! People have already done estimations of probable stats on ascended weapons and gear, and estimates suggest that it may increase your efficiency in combat by as much as 20% overall.

If you really think that won’t be a factor in WvW, then we have nothing further to discuss, as I think the math speaks for itself.

I also addressed that vertical progression in this game has more than one outcome. Iteration also isn’t a newfangled concept, and the way vertical progression is handled isn’t set in stone.

Can you provide examples of a game where vertical progression did not lead to a system whereby the players were ‘encouraged’ to farm up new items on a regular basis? Because I don’t think any such game exists.

When you continue to push the upper bounds regarding the max stats available to a player, you automatically encourage players to grind for that gear in order to remain optimally competitive in any PvP scenario. That is why it’s called “vertical progression”: it’s “progression” that drives the power levels of the game ever upwards, without end, eventually obligating a player to change gear in order to avoid falling behind. It’s already starting in Fractals, where players are hitting a difficulty wall and can’t progress further until more Ascended gear is introduced. When your game is designed such that you actually can’t complete content at all without grinding for new gear, that’s how power creep gets in.

Also, this is a non-issue for sPvP.

We’ll see. sPvP was designed with the intentions of everyone being at max power and thus equal, after all….but you may notice that everyone is “only” wielding Exotic gear. It’s not out of the question that this may change in the future, in exchange for very large numbers of Badges of Honor. I hope it doesn’t, because it would have the potential to ruin sPvP….but this wouldn’t be the first game to make that error.

ColinJohanson.2394:

Hey guys,

Just a quick update on where the whole scavenger hunt system stands since I know that’s a topic many of you have brought up recently. We’re not currently actively working on building any sort of legendary precursor scavenger hunt, this is something we want to do in the future and we’re in the midst of designing how this would function, but no one is actively building this feature and you should not expect in the Jan/Feb/March releases at this point.

We are however working on expanding reward systems to make them more re-rewarding across all parts of the game, making the open world more rewarding, and adding new ways you can earn precursors as rewards via new reward systems taking advantage of our open persistent world.

Some of these additions will come as early as the January release, and will get covered in more detail in the next week or two as well release all the details about this release once testing has signed off it’s all ready to go in January. (we’ll also provide a high level summary of our goals with reward systems, etc. in our 2013 blog post, which should be out next week)

I just became significantly less excited about these patches.

I was already starting to worry a little when you came out and said “the amount of content we’re changing makes these patches an expansion’s worth of work”, which to me is almost an admission not to expect a true expansion’s worth of content. But I was still okay with that because you said your end goal for these patches was to strengthen the core game. Okay, fair enough, faith restored. Until now.

Legendaries are one of your game’s biggest problem areas (with the one exception of dungeons) in terms of endgame PvE content. They’re being bought and sold on the Trading Post for countless gold amounts. The precursors boil down to being an item that you either have to get very lucky obtaining (via sacrifice to the RNG Gods) or else be very rich and play the TP like it’s a full-time stock job at Wall Street. And the rest of the Legendary model is equally as ugly, with an excessive amount of grinding. But perhaps the worst offense is that “Legendaries”….just aren’t. There’s nothing skill-based about them, and indeed, it’s entirely possible to obtain them without ever really challenging yourself in this game.

And you’re telling us that you’re not going to address this problem for at least three more months? And your only effective step towards fixing this problem is to introduce even more “incredibly rare RNG drop” locations for precursors in the coming months?

I don’t mean to sound so disappointed, but I really am. This isn’t a dealbreaker for these patches, but I had thought that the dev team understood how serious of a problem they have with regards to Legendaries and providing more high-end gear in more ways and more places. But it seems we differ significantly on what this game’s problems are.

I’m glad that at least it seems we agree that the game’s rewards system is woefully inefficient right now, though. So maybe these patches will still be the decisive boost this game needs. I’m just really sad that one of the game’s weakest areas isn’t currently deemed important enough to fix.

Mackdose.6504:

Ascended items don’t grant agony resistance, infusions do. Get your facts straight.

I do have my facts straight, you’re simply trying to fabricate a difference where none exists.

Yes, infusions grant AR. And only Ascended items can be infused (and Legendaries show no indication of being changed to add AR, meaning this is likely to be a trait exclusive to Ascended gear). Ergo, only Ascended items have AR.

This is simple deductive reasoning, and you’re trying to pretend there’s a difference between infusions granting AR (a feature exclusive to Ascended items) and Ascended items themselves granting AR. There isn’t. If it’s only accessible from those items, then it’s fair to claim that a player must grind for those items in order to get AR. Don’t fabricate strawmen, please.

And besides, you’re wrong anyways, in that Ascended items can become infused themselves via unique crafting recipes in the Mystic Forge, and thus perform the duty of providing AR, with or without any offensive/defensive/omni infusion slotted into them.

To quote Lindsay Murdock: “We designed the process of getting Legendary gear to be a long term goal, but players were ready to start on that path much sooner than we expected and were becoming frustrated with a lack of personal progression.” – I’m pretty sure “grinding for gear” wasn’t the intention. Other players in this thread (which you didn’t read, clearly) didn’t have a problem acquiring the gear.

It’s not a matter of how “tough” it is, which you clearly don’t understand. It’s never about how “tough” it is, no one is complaining about the difficulty required. It’s the concept itself that’s flawed and that’s what people hate.

You are obligated to grind in one place, and only one place, to obtain them. Which is currently an undeniable fact. That goes directly against their initial promises for the game not to be “forced to grind dungeons at endgame”, a fact they themselves have admitted and have said they intend to fix.

And they will play a role in combat, especially WvW, just as every other item set did. The only way you can claim otherwise is if you actually believe that a Lvl 1 player in WvW upscaled to 80 is exactly as strong as a Lvl 80….and I have news for you, their power levels aren’t actually all that close. Scaling is designed to provide everyone an equal opportunity, but the gear you wear makes a significant difference in your final scaled strength, and higher tiers of gear (as well as higher leveled players) benefit from better scaling in both directions. This is precisely why players fought so hard to get Exotic gear right away….and why they protested so vehemently when a new gear set was already being released a mere three months into the game’s release.

Yes, some people grinded to the top, hit a wall, and complained about it. But those people were not the majority, and never will be. If GW2 intends to cater to a crowd that it can’t possibly cater to (because the grinders will always obtain the new gear far faster than you can make it), everyone else will be left behind eventually.

No one needs infused gear to see all of the content in FoTM, therefore grinding the dungeon is optional. You’re only “forced” to “grind” (I prefer the term “play”) the content if you absolutely must reach the pinnacle of gear. This is a self-imposed, not a game-imposed problem.

I prefer not mincing words, myself. A “grind” is simply defined as repetition of the same task over and over, usually for the sake of gear, which is exactly what this is.

And again, the only way you can believe this to be a “self-imposed” problem is if you actually think that those extra stats don’t mean anything. In which case, you don’t understand how the game works at all.

Read my other posts in the thread for more on why the “gear treadmill” is more or less irrelevant to anyone who enjoys playing the game for fun as opposed to playing the game to increase their ego.

I’m not going to go read your asserted opinions because you’re wrong. It’s not like vertical progression is a newfangled concept, years of other MMOs have proven that a vertical progression system always affects the game. Especially in PvP, which is very bad for a game that proudly proclaims it intends to make its PvP into an “e-sport”.

I’ve played several other MMOs in the past and while I agree that the effects in PvE are significantly lessened, that isn’t (and never was) what people were complaining about in the first place. People aren’t mad about Ascended gear because of PvE, they’re worried about the effects on sPvP and WvW, because in both cases, having stronger gear with less scaling penalties attached means you will be stronger than the other guys out there. And that is a problem for a game that wants to flaunt its combat system as entirely skill-based.

Laufey.5129:

As for revealing clothes, I personally dislike them since the female version is generally sexualized in some way, whereas the male version may show skin, but hardly ever makes the character look like a stripper.

The funny thing here is that the only reason some races feel sexualized is because of their underwear in the first place.

For example: Why the heck do charr females have a “breast cloth” when they clearly have no breasts, and thus no actual reason to conceal their chests? I can’t imagine it’s a habit they’d pick up from humans because they HATE humans, and I doubt they trade fashion statements with Norn. And it’s been stated there are no nipples, either, so that’s not the reason. Why conceal your chest, then, if you’re not concealing anything? It’d be like putting a bra on your cat’s chest,: you’re not covering anything, and you only seem weirder to everyone else because you felt the need to cover it up in the first place.

Similarly: the Sylvari are plants, what purpose does underwear serve? I know they’re meant to resemble human biology and thus have “plant parts”, but the act of sex is very likely meaningless to them. It’s not even known if they gain any form of “pleasure” from it, and they can’t breed in this fashion, so it’s left in doubt if they actually gain anything from the act. And their relationships often form regardless of gender so it’s not likely that, sans underwear, there’d be tons of sylvari out there “flaunting their bodies” for mates, given how pure in spirit the sylvari are established to be for the most part (except the Nightmare Court, but honestly I’m not even sure they’d be doing that sort of thing). By wearing “plant underwear”, they’ve added sexuality to characters who honestly have no attachment to it.

And lastly: Why, in the name of the Six, do Asura females wear “jumpsuits” for underwear? This isn’t a sexuality thing, it’s just WEIRD. And I don’t have the foggiest idea how they’d remove them, either, because they’re skintight and don’t have any visible zippers, latches, or such things. Are they “magitech jumpsuits” that just fall off when the asuran female strokes it a certain way, or what? Seriously, I’d never even ask myself about how an asuran gets busy if they didn’t wear such absurdly impractical-looking underwear. ._.

Mackdose.6504:

Raine.1394:

With vertical progression there is a forced grind required in order to continue playing the game. No matter how low the power curve there will be a point at which you need to hop on the treadmill if you want to continue playing the game.

But that’s demonstrably false in this game thus far. You can’t just insert your experience from previous games’ vertical progression into this one and state it as an inevitable fact. You’re going to need some evidence to support this statement, and thus far you’ve provided nothing but rhetoric.

How about the fact that Ascended items are only obtained via the Fractals, forcing players to fight there in order to obtain them? Sounds like a forced grind to me. And while I have a lot of fun with Fractals, there’s no question that it’s a grind. You’re obligated to play it to obtain items that show up nowhere else.

This complaint is precisely why the devs stated that they are going to add Ascended items elsewhere in the game, because of how badly botched the initial release was and how it forced their players to grind one piece of content and nothing else.

And yet even in Fractals there’s already a hard limit starting to emerge on player ability and Agony Resistance, making it insurmountable without….you guessed it….more Ascended items to grant even more Agony Resistance. Yes, it’s currently only applied to Fractals which means it won’t affect most other PvE content, but if you honestly expect this to remain the case forever, then I’m afraid you’re being rather naive. This mechanic was only introduced so that they could “encourage” players to grind for these items, there’s no way that Agony will remain applicable only to the Fractals if they wish to continue pushing this new tier of items on us as the new top gear. In fact, I wouldn’t be that shocked if the dev team revamped the older dungeons to have Agony as well.

So yeah, I’d agree with anyone claiming that Ascended items are an indication of the game’s future in vertical progression: needing to grind different areas of content in order to keep on top of the gear curve. And when you’re being forced to play in certain areas, that keeps you from playing the game the way you want to play it. It’s honestly quite fair for people to ‘rebel’ against that, even if it’s potentially an overreaction.

ExDead.3945:

Honestly why not have gear progression. Once you max out gears and have done the content to death to get it what are people seriously just gonna pvp 24/7? no they will quit.

Again, not to sound like a broken record, but seriously people….Guild Wars 1 is proof that you are completely and totally wrong.

The game was built around all Lvl 20 items, weapons and armors alike, being “Best in Slot” with a focus on extremely rare skins and vanity items. It was a game that focused on diversity in terms of appearance, and had a number of great PvP modes in the game to suit a variety of tastes.

Not only did it “survive” on this model for nearly 8 years, it made so much money that it got two full campaigns and one expansion added. Oh yeah, and it helped to fund this game.

So it’s preposterous for people to be claiming that a game can’t survive without vertical progression. It’s already been done before and it’s been proven that it works. The devs are not battling some sort of impossible-to-avoid foe, here, they built a game that defeated it once before. They should know how to avoid vertical progression better than anyone on the market. So the fact that vertical progression does exist in this game is honestly quite baffling, and it’s made worse by the fact that people defend it as something that can’t be avoided when that’s simply not true.

Nuka Cola.8520:

I would like for them to release a patch and give like 1000 skills for us to chose from. This is my biggest complain as of late. I want much more skills. If they give us like 1 new weapon (that’s 2-5 new skills) it will be impossible for me to play this game for years. im already tired of using same freaking skills for hundreds of hours and using the same crap for year? Not possible and boring.

I think that’s far too many. GW1 had a serious problem with having tons of skills and only a handful of them actually leading to optimal play.

I do think there’s too few skills though, especially in the elite section. Some classes have ONE underwater elite, that’s just awful and severely hampers them.

How many “ultra-casual players” do you know that dump thousands of dollars into a game they only play for an hour a day or so?

Yeah, thought so.

And before someone replies….no, if you have several hundred hours logged on a game that’s been out for less than five full months, you’re not a “casual” player. Having “just 500 hours” logged means you were playing roughly 3.7 hours per day since the game started. That ain’t casual gaming, much less “ultra-casual”, that’s a part time job.

Oxstar.7643:

I never said it’s the only one. I said that aqquiring new gear which always takes some work must feel rewarding. Otherwise there’s no point, and people need progression&reward to stay interested. If you don’t understand this then you’re sorta… Yeah.

As for your other question, what do you think made Dark Souls so popular? Hard work complete is a very satisfying reward in itself.

How do I prove all this? Because gaming history, both in multi and non multiplayer, and the general gamer disgust for easy mode games, stands as testement to my words. You’re honestly demanding evidence for something that has already been proven by the masses multiple times.

They may be demanding proof because there’s this great game out there that stands as a complete testament against everything you just said.

In this game, new weapons were added all the time, but they acted as skins. The power levels of the top weapons never advanced despite multiple patches and expansions. And it turns out that people were happy to grind for countless hours to acquire these new skins, even knowing that they didn’t grant the player any noticeable advantage in combat at all. People just loved the new art and looking cool. Turns out this was a rather popular move by a rather popular game.

In fact, you may have heard of this game. It was called Guild Wars 1.

So yes, I’m going to join the chorus against you and ask for your proof that players need a vertical progression system to feel rewarded.

Yes, this is a great game and I’ve loved playing it.

Yes, people will always complain even if there is no reason to.

Yet despite those facts, this game has a number of serious issues that desperately need addressing. I think it’s better that they be addressed than avoided.

Nibiru.1423:

ranting for the fact this patch wasnt that kitten important to kick us all without notice!!

Its not the fact its a bug fix, its the way they go about it!

People in this very forum were ranting and raving about how the Ogre Pet Whistle created massive lag issues in towns because of this bug.

They fix that bug, but now suddenly “THIS FIX WASN’T IMPORTANT ENOUGH TO KICK US”. No, but it was important enough to make several threads complaining about it, right?

I think I see a problem in your thought process there.

I’m not actually sure what to think of this thread.

I did find it rather funny that my charr thief has a strip of cloth across her chest, though, considering that charr were designed without breasts. So it’s not actually doing anything, it’s just there. What’s the point of that strip of cloth, exactly? To look more “feminine” from a human perspective? And given how charr feel about humans, would a charr female actually WANT to look more humanly feminine?

Red Falcon.8257:

Quit applying P2P logics to GW2, none apply.
GW1 was up for 8 years until GW2 which will be up for X years until GW3 which will be up for X years until GW4 etc.

Plenty of comparisons can and should be made.

The most important one is this: regardless of any given MMO’s choice of payment model, a new MMO in today’s world faces unprecedented competition from a massive number of MMOs already well established that would be happy to take those players off your hands.

An MMO in today’s market doesn’t have years to “prove itself”, it has a few months. GW2 has already had 4, and it’s already getting pretty bad word of mouth nowadays compared to when it released. If they haven’t nailed it by March, that’ll be the 7 month mark….much too late for the game to become a real contender ever again.

Or, to put it more clearly: yes, the game will survive. But it won’t be contending with WoW, or TERA, or Rift, or other big games like that. It may not even be a multi-million player game. It’ll end up fighting for scraps with the smaller games if it can’t turn itself around. And if it gets that bad, you can forget about GW3. NCSoft won’t fund it, they’re not doing so great as things stand even with GW2’s impressive numbers.

Think of it like the TES franchise, it’s not like there will be no more TES games after Skyrim, it will continue forever.

Clearly you weren’t alive back when Ultima 9 was released, a game which had major hype behind it….a game so terrible that it completely destroyed the franchise as a single-player property, and significantly weakened it elsewhere as well (outright killing Ultima Online 2, and weakening development on the original Ultima Online). Even now, a full 14 years later, EA still doesn’t have the courage to bring the single player games back, instead resorting to simple mobile games and downright tacky-looking F2P MMOs with the franchise label slapped on.

No major franchise is so well-insulated that it cannot die. Especially not Guild Wars.

Vorch.2985:

As to the OP, I feel that this game NEEDS more weapon skins that drop exclusively from certain champions in dungeons and in the open world. I would love to see a UNIQUE rare weapon, backpiece, head gear, and/or rebreather in EVERY area in the game. Hell, have a 2-4% chance that it drops from a veteran and a 6-10% chance that it drops from a champ, with a 2-4% chance for an exotic variant.

This is how they kept people doing otherwise ridiculous farms in GW1 (Voltaic spear and BDS)…I truly have no idea why these are not in GW2.

Oh, they are in GW2.

So long as you only play in starter zones.

See, there’s those little colored leather bags and such, which make me think that at one point the team wanted to create special unique drops from bosses for the entire game, but then just gave up on it. In fact, that’s the sense I got from a lot of the later game content: it’s like they were dedicated to making creative content in the early levels, then they slowly got less motivated, and by the time they hit Orr, they were like “meh, let’s just make them fight waves of Risen over and over everywhere they go, and get no unique rewards”. Legendaries smack of this same design: they’re a mindless grind rather than any sort of interactive and interesting story. Hell, “Saladbowl” has a better epic story than any legendary in GW2, and it wields like a piece of garbage in combat!

And they shouldn’t have given up on unique content at every level, because the total lack of individuality in this game is staggering. This is definitely one area that GW2 needs to take a page from its older, wiser brother in.

Vermillion Hawk.9037:

Omen.1879:

It’s sad, GW1 rocked from the start, GW2 does not even come close.

It’s funny. I see a lot people saying this, but to me I recall the first year of Guild Wars 1 being filled with maybe as much negativity as this game. That game went on to have 6 more years of success.

What’s funny is that this is completely correct, but the sentiment behind it is wrong.

GW1 did indeed take years to hit its stride, but it was also made in 2005, back when a person’s choices for MMOs were still fairly limited, and F2P actually stood for “piece of garbage”.

Nowadays there’s a brand new AAA MMO released every year. Oftentimes two or three. And there’s countless F2P games with much more varying degrees of quality, some of which are fantastic and put other high-end titles to shame. There is a much larger selection, and players can’t truly dedicate themselves to several MMOs at once.

GW2 doesn’t have years to hit its own stride. It has roughly until the release of the next big MMO, and if it hasn’t hit the mark by then….yeah, the game will probably still survive. But it will never be a major contender in the MMO market again.

Jan, Feb, and March are GW2’s chance to make it or break it. And I, along with many players on this forum, will be watching closely to see how GW2’s staff defines “strengthening the core game”. And if we don’t agree….yeah, it’s possible we’ll be gone. I love this game, and I want to see it get better, but if the staff keep going in their current direction, eventually I may be obligated to leave this game simply out of principle. I’ve left MMOs that I really loved playing before because I disliked the way their staff ran things, and at present I can’t say I fully approve of the way ANet has treated its players of late.

Mirta.5029:

they sold 2 million copies in the first 2 weeks. The real copies sold number is between 6 and 11 million. I don’t see that massive people shed and I haven’t met a single person that has quit GW2 besides those that come to complain on the forums.

This is outright false.

http://www.vgchartz.com/game/37350/guild-wars-2/

Even if we assume that every single one of the 2 million copies sold in the first two weeks is a digital copy and thus not counted among the above figures (which we know isn’t true), that still only totals to under 4 million copies sold.

And given that many of the copies in that 2 million overlap with the retail sales in the link above, it would be far more accurate to predict a conservative 3 million or so copies sold. Nowhere NEAR 6 to 11 million copies of GW2 have left the shelves.

Amos.8760:

Marrow. The word is marrow.

Think you missed the joke. Namely that it’s not really bleeding if there’s no blood. :p

Nuka Cola.8520:

As i said, i don’t want powerful elites such as Time Warp to be spammable, BUT, have other less powerful (but not useless garbage) skills much more spammable than once per 180+sec.

I’d rather have them buffed to make them worth that cooldown, myself.

I don’t disagree there’s a lack of selection (it’s kinda why I’m surprised there are so few elites), but I’d rather see the skills buffed to make them worth my time using than to cut their cooldowns, because honestly….if they’re more spam-able but still weak, I’m still not gonna bother.

Suddenflame.2601:

So your taking 2 very harmful situations which lead to the entire wealth being in the hands of a select few (namely Hitler and Stallion) in this context? I don’t think they work very well here.

Stallion?

Does he look like this?

My ranger is a glass cannon for the most part, and can still take a few hits and survive even in harder maps. If you’re not taking hits well, then you’re doing one of a list of things wrong (take your pick based on which apply to you):

1. Your gear is too weak for your level.
2. You’re running content intended for players above your level (I’ve done that on accident before).
3. You’re standing still far too much, instead of dodging obvious tells.
4. You’re overaggroing mobs or trying to fight mobs that you’re not experienced enough to beat on your own.
5. You’re making the sad mistake of trying to run an explorable mode dungeon (they’re absolutely full of that cheap shot garbage right now).

This game takes practice. I was dying a lot at first, too. But now I’ve gotten so much better at the game’s combat system that I can face off against lots of mobs, or even vet/champ mobs and still survive. Practice makes perfect. Get used to the combat and you’ll get better at it.

Nuka Cola.8520:

Is there a reason why every single elite in this game (all classes) takes five weeks to recharge? Its an elite, you’re supposed to us it more than three times per dungeon!!!!!!!!!!!!! Why did gw1 has tones of powerful elite spells that took >10-15sec to CD and in gw2 it seems like its 1000% longer? Im not asking for a spell such as time warp to be a 30sec recharge but i do want fast recharging elite skills that aren’t useless bs like melandru/grenth avatars and by fast recharging im talking about 25sec or under, not 100sec.

Because the only thing keeping you from spamming them are the large cooldowns. And several of these skills are pretty darn powerful, capable of flipping the tide of battle if you use them correctly. If they were spam-able, they’d be downright broken.

And you may notice that most of GW1’s major balance issues tended to revolve around spam-able elite skills. This is, strangely enough, not a mere coincidence.

I’d honestly rather have them rare and powerful, than to have them frequent and weak.

I’d be fine with shorter cooldowns. But spam-able? Hell no.

Vasham.2408:

To your first claim: Variety in build does not equal variety in role. You can have a million different builds but it’s all pointless if the only available role is DPS.

I guess GW1 got it wrong, then, because that’s basically what 6 of the game’s classes boil down to. A million different builds but it’s all about DPS. GW1 is all about DPS, too. Oh sure, having a healer is important, but really, healing doesn’t help you kill things, right? It doesn’t in GW2 so obviously it doesn’t in GW1 either. Game’s all about DPS, man.

As long as we continue to use your very narrow view of what constitutes “differentiation” in an MMO, I will continue to point out that your description can be applied to every other MMO out there. Until you’re willing to have an actual discussion and acknowledge that how you deliver the damage actually constitutes differentiation, then I’ll continue to insist that every MMO is exactly the same because they all boil down to DPS, and as you’ve said, the delivery method doesn’t matter.

Come up with an appropriate model of what constitutes “differentiation” and we’ll talk. Until then, you’re wasting my time.

To the second: Casual content is easy to reflect the casual player’s time allotment. It’s also a known fact that casual players devote less time to perfecting their play style and thus are lesser players than more hardcore gamers.

….congrats. You have now lost absolutely any credibility you or your argument might have had.

This discussion ends here. If you’re going to actually go so far as to try and pretend that gaming is some sort of elitist clique that you can only join if you play games 5 hours a day, and that anyone who doesn’t behave in this fashion is a lesser being who is not worthy of having a fun experience with video games….then we have nothing to discuss here. Goodbye.

Chessrook.8643:

critickitten.1498:

Zandiya.8475:

Don’t forget the amazing ability of making ghosts bleed…

Well, obviously they’re bleeding, um….ghost fluids….

Ectoplasm? Because yeah, I can understand ghosts or wraiths bleeding ectoplasm, or golems bleeding oil.

Now when you get to games that allow SKELETONS to bleed… that’s when you gotta wonder what the bloody eff.

….um….they’re bleeding…..skeleton fluids?

>_> <_<

Angelus.1042:

we shall see what Elder scrolls online will do….this year 2013 i bet many people will be saying that its MMO of the year…

its a vicious cycle my friends

never ending

TES Online was dead to me the moment it announced a subscription model. If people want to go back to the pay-to-play style of gaming, hey, it’s your money.

And it’s not being built by Bethesda, so it’s honestly not going to be as good as people are drumming it up to be.

Bottom line: it’s not a WoW killer either. In fact it’ll probably hold at right about the same population levels as SWTOR and GW2.

lothefallen.7081:

In reality though, it is a bad thing because it forces homogenization and lack of engagement from the skill system and encounter design. When you have to dumb down a game for a very liberal, casual-feeding structure, no one really wins.

People keep saying that there is no variation to this game, that everyone is the same. The only way someone can claim this is by creating an alternate universe for themselves in which this is true. There is plenty of build variation, and plenty of class diversity. The fact that any class can build themselves as a glass cannon, or as a tank, or even a support or healer type, is honestly rather astonishing and allows players to enjoy the diversity of a game with multiple classes while still playing the classes in a variety of ways.

Second, “casual” is not a synonym for “easy” and I do wish that gamers would properly educate themselves on the meanings of these terms. “Casual” refers to a time commitment, not a difficulty setting.

Hellkaiser.6025:

-snip-

That’s an improvement.

Again, though, I remind you that there’s nothing wrong with someone claiming this is a great or “amazing” game. That’s an opinion and they’re welcome to it. And you are not the grand authority of all things gaming, who has the right to come into another person’s opinion thread and rant about how they’re totally wrong and ignorant and dumb. In the future, please show respect for other people’s opinions even if you don’t agree with them.

As to the last point, there are objective measures by which any game can be compared and contrasted with its competition.
- Do the controls work as intended? (they do)
- Does the game have an excessive number of bugs by comparison to its competition? (not really, though I agree there are still too many)
- Do the graphics hold up by comparison to its rivals? (they do)
- Does it provide a significant amount of game play in terms of content and time (I’d say a few hundred hours of content is pretty good for $60, compared to some games which can be played and finished in less than 10 hours)

And so on.

And by those measures, yeah, it’s fair to say that GW2 is not a bad game. There are lots of games that are far, far more broken by comparison. Is it a good/great/amazing game? Eh, that boils down to more subjective stuff. But it’s a very hard sell to try and argue that this is a bad game, as I’ve seen far too many people claim.

Heinel.6548:

It is simple if you dumb the issue down. It’s not like people can accumulate an infinite amount of wealth through snowflakes, all the while market manipulators are accumulating an infinite amount of wealth even as we speak. Snowflakes are one of the few time-limited scarce resource in game. Why would it not have special properties?

I assume you’ve never played GW1, because (coincidentally) stuff that came from the holiday events in those games didn’t have massive market-breaking special properties, either.

You have to really stretch your thinking (and I mean REALLY stretch it) to rationalize an infinite money generation recipe as an intentional design choice.

The wintersday and new year sale also gave you more returns per gem than without the offer. So what’s next, ban everyone who took the offer?

Slippery slope.

Vasham.2408:

But the definition of gimmick clearly defines the classes in GW2. Each one is a DPS class that is only defined by it’s gimmick:

• Warriors – Can build Adrenaline
• Guardians – Can give people Aegis
• Mesmers – Clones and Phantasms
• Thieves – Can steal from people for an extra attack
• Engineers – Kits and the toolbelt
• Elementalists – Can switch attunements
• Rangers – Have pets that fight with them
• Necromancers – Can shift into Death Shroud

Now yes, WoW classes have similar resource gimmicks with their classes but it’s different. The resources (Runes/Runic Power, Rage, Energy/Chi) are just something to draw upon to perform your role within the group and each class/spec has other defining features within each individual role as well. However there is only one role though in GW2. To make an analogy it would be like each WoW class is a different flavor of ice cream while in Guild Wars 2 everything is a variant of vanilla. And like such it gets boring and stale quickly.

This is a completely false statement that (again) illustrates that you don’t understand what a “gimmick” is.

Every class uses different sets of weapons, and each weapon set functions differently by class. Every class uses different primary mechanics to perform the roles of damage/control/support. Every class has traits which allow them to perform these roles but the method in which they are implemented is different.

Every class is different. To pretend otherwise is being dishonest.

You’re insisting on creating the illusion that GW2 is all about DPS, but the rationale you’re using can be applied to literally every other MMO (and indeed every RPG in general) in existence. You’re generalizing to the point of total absurdity.

Again, this is like arguing that all damage in GW1 is exactly the same, and how all combat in GW1 boils down to killing the enemies as fast as possible. It’s generalization to such a degree that it’s meaningless, and it’s extremely dishonest and unfair to the massive variation available in the game.

We get it, you like the trinity and you can’t detach yourself from the mindset it creates. And what that means is that GW2 is not the game for you, because GW2 has always advertised itself as a game that would not have the trinity in it.

Zandiya.8475:

Don’t forget the amazing ability of making ghosts bleed…

Well, obviously they’re bleeding, um….ghost fluids….

>_> <_<

Yeah, it boils down to the game not having obvious immunities and functionality applied properly to monsters.

Gregori.5807:

My keybindings are very strange and others will give you better advice than me.

I am commenting to recommend a gaming mouse. Combining keyboard keybindings with a gaming mouse keybindings is excellent.

I used to use a Razer Naga and now use a Logitech G-600. I recommend both.

This.

I bought a Naga recently and can’t imagine playing GW2 without it any more. Having my 6-0 skills binded to the side of the mouse where they’re a mere thumb click away is a HUGE help, and significantly improves my speed and reactivity in combat.

Gluttony.2017:

I mean, they dont have eyes, and blind doesnt work against them either…. so why does going invisible work against themi if they cant see you anyway oO? Fix this bug, buff dredge!

….ya know, that’s actually a really good point.

Dredge supposedly sense you via hearing and other methods….unless stealth somehow conceals the noise you make too (through the power of fairy magic), dredge shouldn’t be affected by stealth.

Vasham.2408:

Honestly it’s a moot point. Every class’s role is “deal damage” even if it’s through a gimmick like kits, clones, or pets. With no defining trinity roles the gimmicks that form the backbones of classes are pointless window dressing, nothing more.

I’m not sure you understand the meaning of the term “gimmick”. This seems to be a common problem with gamers nowadays, ever since the Wii’s release.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gimmick

In marketing language, a gimmick is a unique or quirky special feature that makes something “stand out” from its contemporaries. However, the special feature is typically thought to be of little relevance or use. Thus, a gimmick is a special feature for the sake of having a special feature.

Pets do not function at all like clones which do not function at all like turrets. These are special features that not only define the class but also differentiate how that class conducts the roles of offense and defense, as well as how it functions in regards to the “loose trinity” of damage/control/support.

If you’re going to boil everything down to such an absurd degree as “everything does damage, ergo the way in which they do damage is a gimmick”, then I’d argue that GW1 is a game built upon thousands of gimmicks. Because what’s the difference between heal + condition removal and regen and just straight healing….aren’t they all just heals in the end after all?

Heck, I guess that means WoW’s built on gimmicks too. And every other MMO, to boot.

How about we take a stance that’s a bit more grounded in reality, please? Delivery methods for damage are perfectly valid forms of differentiation in every other game so let’s stop pretending it doesn’t count in GW2.

Kurakura.7281:

There, I changed the title to something less confrontational.

Appreciated.

I still want to like this game very much because I loved GW1 so much…. and I still love it. There is something wrong with this game that someone who still loves GW1 can’t love GW2.

Oh I don’t know about that. GW2 is definitely not GW1.

And to be fair, the developers made that fact pretty clear when they wrote the “Manifesto” and were making all kinds of public statements against MMO conventions, several of which would very accurately describe GW1.

And I think that’s the core problem behind most people’s complaints. They expected GW1 but with new paint, when the devs were never promising GW1 to begin with. What they were promising was an MMO that provides a different experience than most MMOs out there (and to be fair, it really does), but still takes place in the same world of Tyria (though vastly different than we remember it).

Now for the record, I did enjoy the game for the first 10-20 hours or so. The first 5 hours was a blast. But something happened around 50-70 hours into the game. Everything that I liked about the game like dynamic events started to feel stale, the hearts started to feel grindy and boring, and even the environment started to feel like the same.

And to be fair to you? That’s because there isn’t as much variation in later maps as there was in early maps.

And this is why people like me were begging ANet to hold off on releasing this game. Because it’s clear they were rushing the late-game content with too much repetition, and that this game wasn’t ready for release. It still came out and it’s still quite polished, but there are a lot of things in the game which have very similar structure, both in a literal in-game sense and in a coding sense.

For example, I’ve noticed that a lot of those winding-staircase-like ramps have a very similar layout to them, leading me to believe that design was copy/pasted a bit too much. And as far as coding goes, a lot of the late-game events start to blur together and feel a bit too identical….especially in Orr, where most events boil down to one of two things: “defend an outpost from swarms of Risen” or “attack this location filled with swarms of Risen”.

This is what happens when you rush the late game content.

However, I remain hopeful that this is something they’ll address in the coming months.

Kurakura.7281:

I totally agree.
GW1 had very distinct variations between the gameplay across the 10 professions. GW2 is more like…. most ranged is the same, most melee is the same.

Erm, wat?

No, they really didn’t. In fact, the dual profession system only blurred the lines between professions even more.

It was entirely possible for me to run a very effective necromancer leeching build on my ranger. Or a ritualist spirit build. Or a scythe build, or even a dagger build. All while still having the primary purpose of playing a Barrage ranger.

GW1’s profession lines are far more blurry than WoW, to be honest.

Whereas in GW2, I am never confused when I see another player. I can tell precisely what prof that player is, just by watching him in action. I see a pet, I know he’s a ranger. Turrets? Engineer. Clones pop up, it’s a mesmer. There’s never a question of which prof I’m looking at.

And what makes this game work for me is the fact that all of these distinct professions can perform a lot of the same roles, just in different ways. To those not paying attention, that just seems like “everyone’s the same”. To those who are, it’s the sign of a game which has done away with defined roles and is allowing everybody to play the game the way they want to play it, without being shoved forcibly into the situation of “you’re running this build because we need an X in our party”.

And that’s honestly not a bad thing. It’s just a lot different than you’re used to.

Kurakura.7281:

I posted this question at the end. “So please tell me… what’s fun in this game,”
Out of all the white knighters and haters, no one has answered that question. Doesn’t that really say a lot about the game if you can’t come up with something compelling?

I’m not asking what I would think is fun but rather why people can spend 1000+ hours and still have fun. What makes you keep coming back to the game?

Then you should change your thread title, because it implies that you think so highly of yourself that it’s everyone else’s obligation to “convince you to play again”.

Except….it’s not our job to talk you into playing again. We don’t care if you never log in again or not. It’s not “white knighting” to just bluntly tell you “we don’t care”, it’s being honest.

It’s your job to decide whether a game is fun or not, and if you don’t find it fun, then move on to the next game.

As for why I keep playing? Because I find the combat far more engaging than any other game, because I appreciate the diversity in character builds (though I think they need to add more), because I can play the game however I like and still feel validated in my selection rather than punished, because the in-game community is very friendly and helpful (though the forum community is positively atrocious), and because even when I know I’m grinding, I never feel like I’m not having fun. And that last one is the key, really. I’ve played a lot of MMOs, and the point at which the grind stops being fun is usually the end of that game. I’ve never felt like that with GW2.

Dailies are plenty casual as they are. They can be realistically completed in about 30 minutes to an hour of gameplay on most maps.

cNcHellShadow.7691:

While it isn’t price fixing, it can be considered monopolizing, and abusing the power that a monopoly may confer, is definitely illegal. It really isn’t fair to newer players that older players, or rich people, can determine what I am supposed to pay, and should be the developer to decide this. I can understand if there was an investment standpoint, but this is not investing. This is people deciding to put a chokehold on items because they can, and -only- benefits the people that already have the money. Less money for the masses, means terrible economic downturn. It also leads to a lot of unhappy consumers. I’m not arguing here, but what is happening in the Market is definitely not good for business. In life, you have to pay bills, you have to pay for food, appliances, etc… However, this is a game, and should not ever be tied in to real life, as games are supposed to be an enjoyable experience, not a struggle to survive.

It’s not a monopoly either. That implies that the person who bought up all the supply is the only person who can possibly own any of that item and no one else can possibly put up the item for sale.

I already stated exactly what it is, using terms that more accurately resemble the sort of behavior it models in the real world. It’s market manipulation, and I believe the technical term is ramping. And as I said, a lot of games don’t do anything about it.

Uh, actually, daily achievements are perfect.

Why? Because they allow more variety than any other achievements, period. Kill count? Variety of kills? Events? Gathering? You can do this literally on any map in the entire game, save perhaps Orr.

I’m actually curious how you intend to argue that it’s somehow a grind that you can complete your daily achievements while playing in any location in the entire game. And what you think are more appropriate requirements for the daily achievements.

Let’s hear it.

Minos.5168:

Price-fixing is a very serious offense in the real-world. Sony and Samsung are still facing charges in several countries for price-fixing on displays.

The price-fixing on displays caused all products using them (like TVs, monitors, tablets, and laptops) to be more expensive because of it… Thus hurting the consumer.

But the described behavior isn’t price-fixing, so your example is rather useless.

Price-fixing is when all vendors of particular products agree to sell that product for a particular price. What the OP is complaining about is the notion that a person can buy all of the stock of a certain item and then sell it for a much higher price. That’s not price-fixing. It’d be more correct to call it market manipulation….I believe the technical term is “ramping”, but I’m not exactly a business major. :P

And I’m not actually sure whether this should be punishable or not. A lot of games permit it, it might be pushing into the realm of too much direct interference if ANet disallows it.

And for the last time, the snowflake thing was an obvious exploit. A very, very obvious exploit. Like, I could describe it to a child and they’d understand that something’s amiss. I’m rather tired of people complaining about the darn thing. “I don’t know what I did wrong! I just crafted this item with 1 ecto and consistently received two or more back every time, that’s all! And then I decided to repeat this process a few hundred times for some easy money. Is that so wrong?” Yes, yes it is, now stop complaining and accept your ban.

subpotent.7625:

steelwolf.9864:

The main idea of the game is to get good looking armor sets, hence the motivating factor for leveling is so you can get armor skins, at 80 the number of armor sets available to you pretty much doubles from the amount available at 79.

You expect a casual gamer who works and attends college to WAIT to see content at 80?

Come on man, if that’s the case, this game is horrible and I wasted $60

So, because you don’t feel there are enough armor skins at low levels, the entire game is horrible and a waste of $60.

Just want to put your point in perspective so that maybe you’ll realize how ridiculous that sounds.

Asglarek.8976:

Do degrees mean anything to you. Let me explain your generality of the word grind lacks degree as in level but lets use the word degree from one end of the spectrum you have freezing the other end you have boiling somewhere in the middle you have a comfort zone say around 68 degrees now this will fluctuate to personal preference by a matter of a few degrees but nobody can stand the extremes for very long except maybe for Eskimo’s and The Devil.

Guild Wars ( not gw1 GW has nothing to do with gw2 two totally separate games) “grind” was the comfort zone insofar as mmorpg defintion of what a grind is.

and as for terminology grind outside of sex and or dancing never makes you think of something you like to spend your time on.

Daily grind…often meant as work

….this is one of the weakest straw-man posts I’ve ever read in my life.

Mostly because it completely disregards the part of my previous post where I say (and I’ll bold for emphasis):

GW1 was still a grind according to the definition of the term. You just don’t care that it was a grind because you’re having fun in it. And that’s fine, actually, because grinding itself isn’t necessary a bad thing and can even make a game fun to play if implemented correctly. It’s the amount and type of grinding which determines how much of a chore it is.

So not only have you created a false weak point to attack, you’re attacking a point that I’ve already directly addressed in my own post.

There are absolutely variations to grind, and levels of grind….but a grind is still a grind, and pretending it’s not there doesn’t make it disappear.

Next time, don’t post a reply to someone if you’re not going to read the entirety of what they said.