Guild Wars 2

Blackworm.2167:

This topic has been done to death.
The horse has been beaten to a bloody pulp. Enough already.

While I agree that there are some topics that are beating a dead horse and need to stop (mounts come to mind), this is one of those that if not kept in the forefront, will be forgotten. This is an easily rectifiable change that can be implemented going forward if devs are reminded of it on occasion.

I think armor variety is the key. Why should all light armor be skimpy for females and dresses for males. Medium armor consists of trench coats for both classes, and warriors are bulky/huge armors for males and skimpy version of the heavy male armors for females.

Couldn’t we just have a variety of armors for ALL classes and genders? Pants, skirts, shirts, boots, shoes, bulky, skimpy, long, short, spiky, smooth, etc. in all classes. Since we all mix and match, having a variety of styles for each class and gender would make for a lot of diversity across all players’ toons.

Paulytnz.7619:

This was my original thought too. There have been people now and then on these forums asking for more “exclusive” sets. I don’t recall if they have been asking for them to be in game rewards or straight up cash spending. But I do very much doubt being behind the BLTC gambling, no one would want that would they? O.O

Bazs.1470:

“Exclusive” rewards should be earn through playing their godforsaken game, not something that anybody can buy for money. And they actually realised this, when they made the new legendaries account bound, but now here we are again… you can buy “exclusive” and “special” stuff for money, you don’t have to earn it.

Sarah’s explonation was cute about this weapon set is special, but it’s a dumb thing to believe is a good and beliveable reason. So well, congrats, Anet, the ship is still sinking.

I agree with both of you. Some of the areas that I know from my own experience and seeing the conversations of others online is that something comes out, it is supposed to be a one time reward and you feel actually “rewarded” for doing the content and what you had to do to obtain something and then they make them purchasable from a vendor or make them available in the Mystic Forge. “What? I worked my behind off to get this and now anyone can get it easily? It was only supposed to be available during ‘_’ content.”

I have felt that sting a little too. I think exclusive rewards should be from content as well, but as I said, it was a stretch to explain why they MIGHT have made them account bound. They offer skins that would be semi-exclusive and they could make money from it too. I honestly don’t think that is the real explanation, but was just offering it up as an “out there” possibility.

First off, I agree with most here that it feels like a cash grab.

I honestly do feel that this is ANet testing the waters. Result: The water is toxic. Poor move on Anet’s part I believe.

The only good reason I can see them doing this (and it is a huge stretch) is that many people also gripe about not having any exclusive items. By making them account bound there would be a lot less people with them. Again, I know that is a stretch for some type of justification.

paShadoWn.5723:

As an avid salvager of sPvP rewards amount of clicking i did on that gear is in thousands. And inability to deposit account bound mats is an annoyance too.

Auto mat deposits would be problematic as some mats have to be in a characters inventory in order to complete tasks. Like mystic forge items for example.

If they were auto deposited once in inventory, you would never be able to keep them on a character if you needed them to be there.

Serophous.9085:

Anise is cunning and can usually predict one’s actions. I wouldn’t be surprised though, if there is something on canach to keep him in line. If anything, Anise more than likely sent him to “help”, then report back any important information he learned, like, lets say, a certain egg…

As for redeeming himself, yes, he can do that, and I do believe he is on the path to do so. The thing is though, I feel he’ll answer to Anise first and then the commander.

Honestly, I don’t care if he does report back. DE2 is working toward a better Tyria, so who cares what he reports? Nothing to hide and there is nothing DE is trying to hide.

I think the more time he spends with DE2 the more he will redeem himself and the more compassion he will gain. As long as he doesn’t loose the snarky banter.

Serophous.9085:

Because he went and stirred up the karka to attack innocent people and tried to murder everyone?

The reason he is out of jail atm (or even life spared), is because of Anise and to protect the Queen. The reason he even joined us in the first place was to stop us from touching a decoy mordrem set to explode, after already having infiltrated the Pact. After that, he just….stuck around for some reason…

Well, 1. If he is still so terrible why would Anise send him to help, and why when free would he actually not just run away? and 2. He has mentioned in round about ways that he sees things differently now. Is he not allowed to redeem himself?

egzius.9031:

Guild puzzles are about cooperating. Raids are competitive. Take your fresh lvl 80 toon with your guild to a raid and we’ll see how cooperation will save you. If you want Raids to be cooperative, normalize all the stats inside and the levels, much like in PVP so that everyone has equal grounds (you would have to go further to normalize builds too in order to claim cooperation), then you can say it’s about coperation.

Who are you competing against? You are NOT competing against other players. You are ALL fighting NPC’s. You have to work together to accomplish that. You are in no way being competitive. How do you not get that? SMDH

Your logic does not resemble our earth logic.

egzius.9031:

I agree that they could have done better, that’s why I’m giving them suggestions on how to improve the competitive aspect of PVE.

Um… There is no competitive aspect of PvE.

Raids are all about 10 people cooperating to beat something in the environment. PvE is meant to be exactly what it is. Any improvements it needs have nothing to do with being competitive with other players.

What many people declare is “too easy” is not at all easy for everybody. Just because it may be easy for you does not mean it is easy for someone else. PvE has to be an environment for a wide spectrum of skill levels.

I think they have set Canach up very well to be the Sylvari part of DE2. He was with us throughout HoT.

He may work for Anise, but our characters work for the pact and whatever order we chose yet we are still part of DE2. Why couldn’t Canach be also?

Also, Canach is the anti-Trahearne. It seems that Canach is liked as much as Trahearne was hated. Why wouldn’t they put him on our team? Making the player base happy wouldn’t be a bad thing right?

Thaddeus.4891:

jheryn.8390:

I don’t believe you. It is pretty obvious that you do care what others choose to do or you would let them express their opinions and not say a word. If you really don’t care, why bother to comment at all?

Because people try to actively change the current raid that he like. It’s a content that he enjoy, and people that don’t like it are trying to change it. In the case of this particular tread it happen that we find the ley-line glinging an extremely good idea. Something different that will add fun to new raid fight and we don’t want Anet to scrap that idea entirely because a bunch of people don’t want to put a couple of hours to level up their masteries. We don’t give a kitten if you don’t like the content, but we care when people want to change what we like about the game.

Did you even read the post I was responding to? Did you even read what I said? He or she said they didn’t care what we choose to do and don’t care about our opinions. I said “IF YOU DON’T CARE…” Read.

But you did put us on equal ground. I don’t give a kitten if you do like the content. If I and others don’t like something, we have as much right to express our opinions as you do. We have the right to ask for something to be changed if we want to.

Some of these people don’t want to do the ley line gliding. Then End. You can have your opinion just respect that others have theirs as well.

NikeEU.7690:

Actually, we aren’t trying to convince you to drink the wine. We don’t care what you choose to do. all we want you to do is not make mountains out of molehills with these QQ posts about how much you dislike getting leyline gliding. This is the most minor issue imaginable being blown to epic proportions by people who would be best off remaining quiet.

I don’t believe you. It is pretty obvious that you do care what others choose to do or you would let them express their opinions and not say a word. If you really don’t care, why bother to comment at all?

It only becomes a mountain issue when people start telling others that their opinions don’t matter and why they are stupid for those opinions, etc., etc. Belittling others is never going to get people to your way of thinking. Most people would let it drop after they express their opinions, but to many unnecessarily feel the need to be rude.

To make a statement like “people who would be best off remaining quiet” requires a lot of arrogance and self importance. Who are you to say who should and who should not comment on anything no matter what the subject?

Vinceman.4572:

Why so aggressive about things that are so easily done and no need to argue about. The time you are investing here should be spend to help your friends. ^^

Why are you assuming that my friends want to spend time doing that stuff at all? Any aggression I may have toward you is derived from your inability to see something from someone else’s perspective but your own and yet question them about it.

Vinceman.4572:

jheryn.8390:

Doubt all you want, they are out there whether you have blessed their presence or not.

Yeah, I still want to know the actual number of those players. Compared to the huge amount of raid runs I’ve made. The number is small and because it is so easy to get the required things done the number is negligible.

Thank you! Thank you for making my point. You don’t know the numbers yet you still make unfounded assumptions about them.

Vinceman.4572:

Ye ye, blah blah yourself. Very mature, kiddo! I told you: Pick them up, 30 minutes mastery point run together and you are ready to go in several weeks for the third wing. The xp is no issue because you guys are constantly raiding and you gain enough.

So you insult my maturity with the very thing you found immature? Way to prove you are the better, “more mature” person. I stand fully not admonished. As for your broken record “spend x amount of time getting the masteries…” I’m done trying to explain to you. You obviously just don’t or don’t want to get it. You are right about one thing, my (and anyone else I would imagine) spending time arguing with you is a waste of time. You only see your own perspective. So what is the use?

Vinceman.4572:

I read your statement that you are not the said player but that was after my post, so you better read properly and don’t mix timed posts!

I said many times before that it was friends/guild members I was referring to and never gave any indication it was me I was speaking about. So my statement stands. I wasn’t mixing timed posts.

NikeEU.7690:

jheryn.8390:

o far, no HoT mechanic is necessary for any other part of the raid and people have come to expect that.

Since this is demonstrably wrong, would you care to walk back your point? Or will you post-hoc rationalize it away? I’m curious to see how you react to this!

No not going to rationalize it away. I just didn’t think about it TBH. I haven’t done sloth yet, so I shouldn’t have made any assumptions about that. I was wrong about that. Sorry to disappoint you by admitting that as it seems you were hoping for an argument.

Vinceman.4572:

Well, then your friends are a rare species in GW2 if that would be true. But the fact stands: You and your friends are gaining tremendously much xp from raiding only so that is not your problem. You also gain many mastery points and I think you will agree that if your friends are that focused on raids, they already have (almost) all points from both wing because they are easy to achieve. Otherwise they won’t deserve to be called “raiders” in this game.

Again, you act as if you have the most incredible vast knowledge about all players that play the game. Get over yourself. You don’t know how “rare” or “common” any type of player is. They don’t have the points, because they have never bothered with the masteries. And again, who said you get to decide who deserves anything in this game? Was there a vote to elect you that I missed?

Vinceman.4572:

That’s why I mentioned Nuhoch and Exalted (50 useless points of 117 existing). Maxing Itzel first is legit. Focusing on Nuhoch and Exalted would have been bs for an intelligent player that has sympathy for content like raids. You can’t tell me it wasn’t possible to get the points along the way. That would be lie and you know it!

Again, they have never cared about HoT masteries or invested in them, because they don’t care about HoT content. What is it you don’t get about that?

Vinceman.4572:

I don’t set the standards but I doubt many players were buying HoT only because of raid implementation.

Doubt all you want, they are out there whether you have blessed their presence or not.

Vinceman.4572:

There are other games with a bigger focus on such stuff. GW2 is a rookie on that field. [SNIP] blah, blah more blathering about people playing PvE that has nothing to do with the kind of people I am talking about. [SNIP] I really really don’t believe that there were so many players who haven’t played this game before, just heard Arenanet is releasing a raid and bought this game without doing research about the history with all the desasters and the actual target audience!

The people I am talking about were big PvP players in GW1 and moved to PvP and WvW in GW2. They didn’t play PvE in the first game and haven’t in the second. Some of them did buy HoT just for raids. Others heard that the content was more difficult and decided to give PvE another go. All of them quit PvE after a matter of days because it was just more boring PvE to them.

Vinceman.4572:

Edit:
Yourself are over 3 years playing this game. You have played this game all time without having a raid and you knew about this game, the designers, the philosophy and the implementation and you were still playing. So stop the anti-argumentative discussion, it’s ridiculous.

Apparently, so is your reading comprehension and ability to see/have empathy for something beyond your own views.

Dinosaurs.8674:

I have been raiding since day 1 and raids are still my favorite part of the game. Anyone who has been raiding seriously already has advanced gliding

There is no way you can make such a claim. The “I want it to be true, therefore it is” approach doesn’t work for anyone.

Dinosaurs.8674:

If you took nuhoch alchemy before than then you deserve the longer grind lol).

I believe I said that Itzel was my first completion not Nuhoch.

Dinosaurs.8674:

That’s like 4-5 hours of time tops if you just look up videos/guide of achievement points.

4-5 hours that some players have absolutely no desire to invest.

Dinosaurs.8674:

I still don’t have nuchoch alchemy because I don’t care about maxing my achievement points, but if I needed to pick it up for raiding then I would just go out and do it because it’s faster to unlock it than to complain about it on the forums. It seems ridiculous to me that someone would be willing to spend hours and hours each week raiding but won’t put in 4-5 hours one time to be able to continue raiding.

Well, because it is ridiculous to you, then it must be for everybody. #facepalm

Dinosaurs.8674:

You seem to have some weird profile for someone who loves to raid more than anything but apparently hates the PvE aspect of gw2 so much that he won’t spend a few hours running around grabbing strongboxes and insights in order to continue raiding.

Before you make comments like this, I suggest you pay attention to what you read (or don’t bother reading). It isn’t me, it is a few of my friends. Mostly WvW players and a couple of PvP players. I happen to love PvE. And their position on PvE isn’t weird at all. They don’t care about PvE because to them there is no challenge.

Dinosaurs.8674:

Raiding has always involved a huge amount of PvE preparation, starting with the ascended gear grind eve, and I can’t imagine that someone is willing to go through all that crap but won’t put in a comparatively small effort to unlock ley line gliding. I have not met this theoretical player, and I’ve raided with a whole lot of different people.

Well again, because you haven’t met them, they must not exist. #eyeroll. Most of these people I know are WvW’ers and have had no problem with ascended weapon or armor creation/acquisition. Many have had ascended box drops they used for their raid armor/weapons and have more to spare. So what other “PvE crap preparation” does anyone have to go through?

Dinosaurs.8674:

On a separate note its also silly to assume anet would keep a HoT mechanic out of the HoT raid just because people don’t want to put in the effort to unlock it.

I don’t disagree with this except that so far, no HoT mechanic is necessary for any other part of the raid and people have come to expect that. Two of these friends of mine bought HoT only and solely for the raids. Now they are regretting their purchase.

Vinceman.4572:

Really? You got the announcement some weeks before so you can gain the XP via raiding only if you already haven’t! Raid experience points are enough for that!
On the contrary, while almost all serious raiders/sc’lers I’ve seen in raids so far are owning all or almost 166 points, I doubt that they aren’t or weren’t willing to play any other content than raids. ^^ They also had a look on the new maps and played them when the addon had been released.
Nevertheless, even though a person that is focused on raids followed a minimum to gain the points, he or she would have maxed gliding before Exalted or Nuhoch Lore. I don’t see any little kind of grind here.

Yes, really. Missing the point much? The ones I know don’t WANT to PvE in order to raid no matter what “advance notice” they are given. Is that a hard concept? Several of my friends in raiding groups have not even bothered to step foot in HoT other than to raid. They don’t care one wit about PvE content other than raids.

And all those that do raid and PvE like myself, did not max out gliding first. I maxed Itzel first. It depends on your focus.

But, since all “serious” raiders you have encountered so far are maxed at 166 or close, then I and every other person who doesn’t like this is wrong. Because, well, you set the standard for the rest of us playing GW2 right? If you don’t see it, then how can it be?

Ubi.4136:

I don’t see how this is any different than any other raiding requirement. Be thankful they told you in advance.

What other “raiding requirement” is there? None.

Ubi.4136:

If you are not willing to put in the time and effort necessary to clear a raid, don’t raid. (doesn’t that sound familiar?)

I guess you are choosing to ignore that many posters here who say they are being forced to play PvE in order to raid to the end. Even though raids are poorly deemed PvE, many people who don’t PvE love to raid. Now they are forced to PvE in order to play content they wish to play.

It isn’t advancing in level to play in higher level maps or gain crafting ability. It isn’t progressing a story like getting to the end in DS. This is making them play a genre of GW2 they don’t wish to play but are now forced to do so.

For them it isn’t putting in time and effort to do something for them it is more like “You have to play this different/unrelated game before you can play the game you actually want to play.”

Zomaarwat.3912:

Pointing out that “people who don’t do PvE” would then also not do raids, because raids are PvE, see?

Um… No. As I said, many people who do not do PvE do raids because of the challenge. And Raids are niche section of PvE that are significantly more challenging (for some impossible) than the rest of PvE. That is why many of those people don’t play PvE because it offers no challenge.

So to assume that just because raids fall into the official PvE category, doesn’t mean that it appeals to just the PvE set.

In fact, I know many PvE only people in my mid sized guild that want nothing to do with raids because of the difficulty level. They don’t view raids as PvE content no matter if that is where it is officially placed by ANet or not.

Zomaarwat.3912:

First of all, raiding is PvE. Second of all, if those people are really looking for a challenge, then they can try and do it without ley-line gliding. Which isn’t necessary, as the new wing will only require half of the players on the team (so five (5) out of ten (10) players) to have ley-line gliding.

Did I say that it WASN’T PvE? I said that a lot of people who don’t do PvE do raids for the challenge.

Also, I read everything, not just the part I wanted to argue with someone about, and the end boss WILL require EVERYONE to Ley-Line Glide.

So, your “first of all” was for what purpose? and your “second of all” is obviously short of the mark. So again, what was the point of your post?

Rising Dusk.2408:

katz.8376:

and my interest in raiding has now dropped off the bottom of the scale. thanks at least for the heads up… so i can stop worrying about bothering.

If you refuse to finish the gliding mastery line for whatever reason, there are still two other raid wings you can play that don’t require Ley Line Gliding.

IMO the problem here is that there are many non-PvE players that play and don’t bother with the masteries. They Raid for the challenge. This effectively forces them to PvE whether they want to do so or not.

What is bothersome with this reply is that you are basically belittling Katz’s frustration. Not cool.

I’m having fun with them. They are nice little bits of new content to have fun with. Also I think they work well as hints of things to come.

I also like it that they are “secret”. I like discovering things like this whether it be in game or on the net.

garrettx.3452:

I was wondering if it would be a good idea (I certainly think so) that the gathering tools slots be shared between our characters…

Nice idea in theory, but selling those tools in the Gem Store is a big source of income for the company. I just don’t see that happening.

Just a flesh wound.3589:

As I recall, the reason given a long time ago was that it was too confusing to the players to have a PvP and a PvE set of skills, or words to that effect.

That may be what they say, but it is funny that no one had a problem with it in GW1 or other multi format MMO’s.

Apparently we have gotten more easily confused since GW1. Old age?

PvE – Can’t decide between Reaper & Ranger

WvW – Depends on my play style mood; either Chrono or Reaper.

I noticed them too. I liked it a lot. I am always listening to the sound to see if they capture what is going on.

I like places where ambient sounds should reflect the area you are in and I like sounds in events that are appropriate. That doesn’t always happen, but here it was awesome. Good job to the sound team on the cool and very appropriate sounds on this event.

“Oh… I didn’t see you there.”

This happens in many places but in the DR bank it is the worst. Not only do they repeat this over and over, but all the vendors/tellers say it. Monotonous much?

Dear forum moderators,

Please stop the ANet people from derailing the thread.

I don’t really think it would suck if it were not a dragon at all. Even if the expansion had a non-dragon big bad that would lead up to a Dragon later on.

Like Palawa Joko could be the big bad and that expansion could lead up to Kralk in the next for example. If they took us to the Crystal Desert, then they could give us the dessert areas of Elona as part of the expansion in which to battle Palawa and his forces.

IMO I think it will be Kralk, but it could go anywhere. Trahearne saying the pact was going to go after Kralk next could be a giant red herring. It wouldn’t be the first time devs tried to divert our attentions and then surprise us.

The 5k requirement does weed out many of the f2p people. But I know a few people over 10k that are HORRIBLE players.

AP points are hardly an indication of a person’s skill level.

SkyShroud.2865:

a lot of veteran players have quit the game, in my own guild, i have a few members who played 2 years+ quit the game just because of HOT.

the game is noticeably shrinking

the white knights will continue to say the game is fun and all but the reality is, it isn’t as fun as they think it is. the white knights argument is centered on HOT specified maps while players are not looking at just those maps, but the whole game itself.

anet need to look at the bigger picture and fix all the things and complete the incomplete contents

personally, im also looking out for new games

And then there are people like you who believe that if someone doesn’t agree with you they must be “white knights”.

I like the game, not because I am sticking up for ANet or anyone else. I like the game period. It isn’t white knighting to like what you like.

And what kind of inane statement is “it isn’t as fun as they think it is”? The game is exactly as fun as each person thinks it is. If it isn’t fun for you then it isn’t fun for you. If it is great fun for someone else then it is great fun for them. You are not the gauge or decision maker for fun for anyone but you.

While I have seen a drop in players in my guild as well, it hasn’t lessened the fun I have playing the game.

So please state your case about anything you want, but don’t call people such things as white knights because they don’t agree with you. B_tching about the game doesn’t make you right or one of the cool kids.

Make some of the current toys into gliders.

Such as:

Magic Carpet
Broom
Kites
Balloons
etc.

I agree with you 100%. I wanted to buy a character slot for a friend of mine, and I wound up having to buy a Visa gift card for him to do so.

I think the company is missing out on revenue by not making everything giftable.

Piejoe.7268:

1. The point is that you have to deal with it continuously to the point that it feels like a chore and it’s downright annoying. What’s the point of destroying stuff if you get spammed with it every other 5 minutes anyway? Might as well leave them in your inventory and let them stack. It’ll cause inventory crisis either way.

I can sort of see your point, but dealing with inventory can be a problem if you have one bank pane or all bank panes and 6 mules. People tend to horde. So, you have a choice to either manage your inventory to a working level or buy more space.

Inventory consumes server space. More servers costs money. So while I agree it takes time to manage, no one is immune to that no matter how much space they have or have purchased. It is a fact of life even in game.

Piejoe.7268:

And for a casual friendly game, this isn’t exactly casual friendly. Returning players… [SNIP] …We don’t want to play inventory simulator or click wars, thank you.

Sorry, but this is subjective. We, which all players are a part of, do not all feel as you do. You may feel this way. Others may too. On the flip side others like me don’t see or have a problem with it.

Piejoe.7268:

2. Do you really need evidence to see what is happening? [SNIP] …Assuming everyone bought the basic package of HoT at $50, this means that they’ve only sold about 200.000 copies of HoT in Q4.

Yes, I do need evidence before I accept broad sweeping statements based on speculation. Assuming and speculation are not evidence. Assuming who did or did not buy anything is speculation. Also, despite sales, there is nothing on the reports that show profit or loss. You and I have no way of knowing if they are doing well financially or not. Also, since they do not release how many players buy what or how many players are coming and going, it is all speculation backed up with highly subjective guessing.

Piejoe.7268:

Considering how the majority of the in game players have HoT and guilds reporting that nobody’s logging in anymore, I don’t even dare to guess how many concurrent players there are at the moment. Well, I could make a guess: if half of the HoT buyers quit and 90% of the players you see have HoT, there would be a total of ~111.000 active players. Assuming everyone plays 3 hours per day, every day spread evenly globally, this would mean there are 111.000/8 = ~14.000 concurrent players at the moment. Don’t pin me on this though. This is a VERY rough estimate based on a lot of assumptions.

Again, huge hyperbole. With all certainty, I know you do not know the majority of in game players so saying they are claiming that nobody is logging in anymore is just hyperbole to make your argument seem sound.

Also, the only way you know for certain if the majority of players have HoT or not is if you have access to those figures, which no one does. More guessing, no evidence.

You have offered no real evidence to back up your statements. Just guessing. When that is the only evidence you offer, it only makes your statements of fact mere rants and rhetoric. I just can’t give anything you offered credibility.[/quote]

OtterPaws.2036:

jheryn.8390:

I don’t disagree. There are no raid builds that are not specialized. Except for one of my toons that I use for a very specific purpose, all others use the specialization lines.

I have to believe there will be some balance in order to make all lines equal. Whether that happens or not, who knows.

Well, theres normal condi engi at least and D/D Trickery Thief isnt too bad.

Probably should be some more balancing though.

True. And the one I use that is non-specialized is the Shout Tank/Condi Stripper Guardian for fractals. He can take a beating and provide amazing condi stripping, protection, and some heals for party support.

It is pretty sad, however that between you and I we can only think of three builds.

Yes, I am sure there are more, but I rarely see players without specializations unless they do not have HoT.

I think if the specializations (which I happily use) are meant just for an alternate way of playing classes, they should be equal in power to other builds, not superior on every class. Just my opinion.

I don’t disagree. There are no raid builds that are not specialized. Except for one of my toons that I use for a very specific purpose, all others use the specialization lines.

I have to believe there will be some balance in order to make all lines equal. Whether that happens or not, who knows.

Piejoe.7268:

4 friends of mine already got put off by the inventory crisis in this game and got overwhelmed by the sheer amount of fancynamed, but useless loot. In their defense, why would they spend even more money for bag slots in a game that fails to deliver? And that is after buying the base game. They quit the game long before I did and I guess it’s time for me to quit as well now.

But at least A-net should know why it’s losing its playerbase rapidly. And I addressed only a small part of the problem.

Questions:

1. Why hold on to fancy useless loot to begin with? Sell it or destroy it.

2. I see so many players claiming that ANet is “rapidly losing its player base” but no one ever provides evidence other than "me and my friends are quitting. Where is the real proof that the player base is leaving? If the Q4 2015 reports put out by NCSoft are any indication, GW2 is doing just fine.

Piejoe.7268:

Because this shows that they have no intention of preserving the longevity of this game. They use wings and other over the top cosmetics as quick cashgrabs, but in the long run this hurts the game.

What…..? Um. No. It shows nothing of the sort.

Piejoe.7268:

Do you want to play a game where everyone and his pet runs around in obnoxious wings and leaves behind particle effects everywhere? I can play MapleStory or any random generic F2P mmo if I want to be surrounded by obnoxious stuff. If they made decent stuff for the gemstore, it would be less polarizing, causing less people to leave the game and I might actually even be interested in buying some cosmetics.

There are many people who actually like the things you are complaining about. This is evidenced by all the people buying them. They don’t bother me. So your opinion of them being “not decent” is subjective.

Piejoe.7268:

I know Anet created inconvenience to sell convenience, limiting space and increasing the different types of loot and keys, and I’m heavily against abusing annoyance to make money, so I refuse to spend money on these ‘convenience’ upgrades, especially if they’re overpriced. So this leads to a massive gold grind just to buy storage upgrades and such before I can start fully enjoying the game, leaving me burned out already.

Then don’t spend money on them. And “overpriced” is subjective. If storage is what keeps you from fully enjoying the game… Well, there are no words.

Piejoe.7268:

I did not buy the base game and the expansion just run into soft paywalls.
I want to spend money on something that I WANT to spend money on, not because out of necessity because of artificial paywalls. I actually spend money on skins in LoL because some of them are just so brilliantly done, but here I haven’t seen a single item in the gemstore that I want.

Again, then don’t buy what is there. Many people WANT what they sell and obviously have no problem with what is offered. And they must do pretty well with them because they constantly offer the same types of things and they keep selling.

Piejoe.7268:

At this point I prefer p2p models much more thanks to A-net and I am about to switch to FFXIV. It’s just that A-net’s design flaws and business model that bring me more annoyance than joy.

Well if you are truly as unhappy as you seem to be, maybe that is your best option. Don’t let the door…

Rauderi.8706:

Mosferre.1246:

Discounted Chest Keys wouldn;t be a bad thing 5 for 200gems please

That would still be a ripoff. 5/100gems, and maybe it’d be acceptable for the garbage those bags spit out.

One man’s garbage is another man’s treasure. I have been very fortunate with my RNG from BL Chests.

I don’t have a problem with the price. Even better when they are on sale.

Ayrilana.1396:

jheryn.8390:

morrolan.9608:

jheryn.8390:

morrolan.9608:

jheryn.8390:

Ayrilana.1396:

Revenue from pre-sales generally aren’t recorded as revenue until it is realized. It’s usually booked under an account such as deferred revenue since it’s technically a liability.

I agree, but these days ‘generally’ is a big subjective word.

Many companies will realize revenue when they want it to hit rather than when it should. Ethics in this area is very fluid these days. This is true particularly of larger companies.

And accounting regulations are quite strict to avoid exactly that situation and ensure the financial results are understandable to stakeholders.

And you believe companies adhere to those regulations? You believe they don’t find ways around them or ways to circumvent them? Curious.

I am in no ways saying ANet or NCSoft does that, but many companies do. To think otherwise is naive. Watch the news.

Suggest you read up on public companies and their requirements.

And I suggest you come to grips on how many of those public companies skirt or circumvent those requirements.

I am an accountant and have worked at two of those publicly traded companies. “Reporting Requirements” are many times up for interpretation and manipulated. I left both companies because of their unethical dealings with “requirements.”

So if some people mug other people then we should just assume that everyone will potentially mug each other? Just because some companies allegedly fudge numbers doesn’t mean that everyone else does. Unless you can provide proof that Anet/NCSoft are doing that, I see no point in you bringing up that accusation.

Apparently you didn’t read my quoted earlier post. I stated that I wasn’t saying I believed ANet or NCSoft were like that. I didn’t accuse anyone of anything. Maybe you should read everything involved before making accusations of your own.

Piejoe.7268:

I am getting the impression that A-net is in desperate need of money. Spamming the gemstore with obnoxiously over the top cosmetics and spamming your inventory with fluffed up, but useless loot forcing you to buy all the inventory and bank upgrades.
Why else would A-net resort to this other than pure greed?

Your statement above is wacko. Why is it either desperation or greed for any company to make money?

ANet isn’t an altruistic non-profit organization for the health and well being of computer gamers everywhere.

morrolan.9608:

jheryn.8390:

morrolan.9608:

jheryn.8390:

Ayrilana.1396:

Revenue from pre-sales generally aren’t recorded as revenue until it is realized. It’s usually booked under an account such as deferred revenue since it’s technically a liability.

I agree, but these days ‘generally’ is a big subjective word.

Many companies will realize revenue when they want it to hit rather than when it should. Ethics in this area is very fluid these days. This is true particularly of larger companies.

And accounting regulations are quite strict to avoid exactly that situation and ensure the financial results are understandable to stakeholders.

And you believe companies adhere to those regulations? You believe they don’t find ways around them or ways to circumvent them? Curious.

I am in no ways saying ANet or NCSoft does that, but many companies do. To think otherwise is naive. Watch the news.

Suggest you read up on public companies and their requirements.

And I suggest you come to grips on how many of those public companies skirt or circumvent those requirements.

I am an accountant and have worked at two of those publicly traded companies. “Reporting Requirements” are many times up for interpretation and manipulated. I left both companies because of their unethical dealings with “requirements.”

morrolan.9608:

jheryn.8390:

Ayrilana.1396:

Revenue from pre-sales generally aren’t recorded as revenue until it is realized. It’s usually booked under an account such as deferred revenue since it’s technically a liability.

I agree, but these days ‘generally’ is a big subjective word.

Many companies will realize revenue when they want it to hit rather than when it should. Ethics in this area is very fluid these days. This is true particularly of larger companies.

And accounting regulations are quite strict to avoid exactly that situation and ensure the financial results are understandable to stakeholders.

And you believe companies adhere to those regulations? You believe they don’t find ways around them or ways to circumvent them? Curious.

I am in no ways saying ANet or NCSoft does that, but many companies do. To think otherwise is naive. Watch the news.

Quite a bit with the new maps. I love the new areas in terms of beauty and verticality.

The story on the other hand. Not really since the game came out. I still find the stories, missions, and characters from GW1 much more compelling.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the game, just in the lore and story telling I find it to be lacking.

Ayrilana.1396:

Revenue from pre-sales generally aren’t recorded as revenue until it is realized. It’s usually booked under an account such as deferred revenue since it’s technically a liability.

I agree, but these days ‘generally’ is a big subjective word.

Many companies will realize revenue when they want it to hit rather than when it should. Ethics in this area is very fluid these days. This is true particularly of larger companies.

Again, looking at the reports, nothing indicates horrible performance or any loss of profit as we do not see actual profit figures.

Belenwyn.8674:

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Kattenpootjes.4291:

Lol ofcourse sales went up with that nasty pre-purchase scam going on, not that some fancy graph on a random site should be taken seriously tho.

Q4 sales are Oct, Nov, Dec, so almost entirely regular purchase, not pre-purchase.

• The first beta was in March (Q1).
• Sales boost in Q2, when pre-purchase began in earnest.
• Drop in sales in Q3, after the deadline to get the extra toon slot (register by June).
• Q4 sales (again, representing mostly post-release dates) are over 50% higher than Q2 (representing the peak of pre-purchase sales).

So no, sales didn’t go up because of pre-purchase; they went up in spite of the the 10% boost that pre-purchase provided in Q2 (compared to both Q1 and Q3).

It’s fine to dislike the price and it’s fine to be upset with the changes to the game. Don’t let that close your mind to the fact that in terms of raw sales, the expac has been successful.

Still, as others have mentioned, ‘sales’ is just one metric in measuring success (and of course, it doesn’t tell us how high ANet expected sales to go).

The sales of 4 Q15 contain all sold copies of HoT. Pre-purchase started June 16th. This results in an inflated value for 4Q 15. The values for 2Q and 3Q are artificially reduced. In 3Q 15 the players generated sales of 20 bln Won excluding any sold HoT copy. This shows a very strong base line of sales mostly driven by gems.

None of us truly know when HoT pre sales were booked. It depends on how they define their revenue.

If they are set up to realize revenue only when product is delivered, you are right that all HoT sales would have hit in Q4. If they realize revenue when received as many companies do regardless of when product is delieverd, then and pre sales for HoT would have hit their financials as revenue in the quarter for which payment was received.

Unless you can show proof that all pre sales hit in Q4, then you really do not know.

Regardless of either scenario, nothing in the financials reports or the commentary on them by NCSoft indicates that there is gross weak performance or that profit is sub par. Those that purport those things here amount to baseless doomsayers IMO.

Condi state equipment is used in raids on specific builds needed for certain roles.

The only character I use anything but zerker on outside of raids and WvW is my fractal guardian who is a bit tanky and offers a lot of team support. He uses PVT armor.

Zerker is my primary as well. As you said, I would never use Settler’s stats.

Swagger.1459:

Just being truthful.

Well, no one knows what the truth is as none of it has happened yet. You were speculating on what you think is going to happen just as everyone here has.

Swagger.1459:

Ncsoft is not out of the picture.

Yep. My bad. Just rumor from before. ANet is just taking over publishing. That is the only new thing between the companies.

Swagger.1459:

Even Colin brought up the “expirimenting” comment himself. There are tons of half finished and missing things from this game because of this “expirimenting” and lack of focus.

Professions were and are still poorly designed.

[SNIP]

These professions, the characters we play, are the #1 most important factor to this game but are given 10th place status. It’s a shame because gw2 could be one of the top tier games for professions and combat and pvp, but for some reason they don’t care to reinvest.

I don’t necessarily disagree with any of this other than saying the devs know the professions are poor. None of us KNOW what they think.

I too am disappointed with the professions and balance and creativity. Not having the ability to choose skills as we did in GW1 was a poor choice IMO, but I don’t believe that the directions they are headed in with masteries is gimmicky or a bad thing. It gives us more diversity without having to completely revamp the system.

Again, I guess it is perspective. I see the good things that they are trying to accomplish rather than focusing on what might be bad down the road.

Swagger.1459:

[SNIP]

Wow. That was a lot of pent up negative.

I understand why you say the things you do, but I am hopeful with the changes in the company (NCSoft is out of the picture), that things will improve.

Do I think they will improve with broad sweeps? No. I’m just hoping they will take into account things that people have been wanting and work on them.

LS3 is coming soon and I am sure it will lead to the next expansion which I am sure will be different than the current one we have. I think they will look at what did and did not work from HoT and hopefully make changes accordingly.

The White Mantle are coming back prominently into the picture, so GW1 nostalgia nuts like me find a reason to look forward to some content we will enjoy for the pure fact that they are infusing more GW1 lore into the game.

Also WvW has a big makeover coming. Hopefully that will revitalize that environment.

I am just hoping for positive things rather than focusing on what could/might be negative.

I agree with sirsquishy, they could add some weapons that could be dyed. The old ones could stay the same.

Just as there are some helms & gloves that cannot be dyed, why can’t we have some weapons that can?

EDIT: After reading the post above mine, I can see the logic behind not dying weapons. It makes sense and as she said, I don’t want to give up 20-70% of new skins and features for weapon dying.