Guild Wars 2

The lack of work towards build diversity is striking. How are we supposed to stick around playing one build for months?

Necros can’t swap weapons in DS, but JP wasn’t eager to mention that small fact in his patch notes.

And how do you like the love we received today?

As reported by Khalifahaze, weapon swapping is no longer available in DS.

Do you people realise how huge nerf this is? This one thing probably outweights all changes we got today.

Discuss.

I knew it would be about that!

Yeah, PvP is thriving thanks to this feature.

I’m not paying ANY money before proper PvP is in place. Not even a penny.

If they introduced a 50 EUR expansion tomorrow with the best PvP on Earth, I wouldn’t even consider buying it.

Ye, it’s been few times on the TP already, one now for 2500g. The guy probably doesn’t get that it isn’t worth anywhere near that much right now after we found out where it drops.

Kardiamond.6952:

Toolkit magnet + 100nade is still usable if you jump while switching to toolkit. But kitten it’s gonna be annoying

I don’t play an engie, but how Anet is harming the engie with every patch is beyond comprehension. This quote just shows how messed their game and design is.

Well, behe was broken like most of the game for most of the time after the release, you know…

But I agree, this was an utter bullkitten, thing was bugged all the time. Final Rest is officially going to be a new Wisteria.

It just was bought from TP for 6g. This thing is going to be super cheap.

Okay, the case is solved. Time to farm behe to death.

Durden.5032:

+1 Bullshizle, how are we, small guilds/casual players guilds, going to get that much points ?

You aren’t! Neither is my <10 player sPvP guild getting any fun.

Time to move on, people. Nothing to see here. Inb4 infraction.

I’m also quite sure Jon dev or Tyler dev said that it would be somehow visible.

I learned to take words from the devs with a grain of salt.

EDIT: Found it, I stuggle to see…
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/pvp/invisible-elo-rating/first#post1394178

Razor.6392:

If OP was in ANet balance team he would probably move RtL to the elite slot and give it a 480 seconds cooldown.

Coming from an elementalist… how predictable…

PvP in GW2 was created without any vision.

A harsh statement, don’t you think? Well, let’s look how it all started and where we are now.

When the game first launched its PvP consisted of hot-join and free tournaments. After some time we received paids with a barrier of entry, nice rewards (gems) and QPs that were promised to qualify teams to tournaments in the future.

We also received a very simplistic progression system based on grindy rank and skins. That was it.

First thing to acknowledge is that the free/paid distinction was probably created with belief that PvP would be very popular with thousands of teams jumping in, buying tickets, competing and fighting for QPs. It wasn’t the case.
It first made some people quit the game when only frees existed, because casual people were joining matches solo or in teams and were being stomped by hardcore people.

I don’t know if devs believed that adding paids would solve that, but it certainly wasn’t the case. With an addition of paid tournies, the already smaller playerbase was split. Even more so with the initial cost of 5 tickets to enter, they caused more teams to leave the game.

What we ended up with at that point were super-casual players playing hot-joins, semi-casual prospective players were losing frees against hardcore people whole day with an exception of evenings when hardcore people were starting to play paids.

People were leaving, hc teams were accumulating QPs and everyone was waiting for announced custom arenas. People at the same time, since premiere, were asking for solo queue and ratings.

Suddenly, the devs decided to step back with Customs to implement matchmaking and ratings. It was most probably caused by a worsening situation back then.

We waited. Lately the devs “had” the idea to change paids into 1v1 instead of 3v3. It proved to be a relatively big success, just as people predicted. Of course they decided to keep one map for a whole week to keep us equally entertained. We were said that the system would be there to stay.

But this month’s update just shows the sad truth – PvP team had no idea how to make an entertaining, competitive and popular PvP system that would keep people playing.

This month they deleted paid tournaments – the barrier of entry proved to be a very bad idea. They deleted the QPs and tickets – this is not the way tournament entry will be decided in the future, at least for now. It is another thing they wanted to have but it proved useless. Just another bad step. The matchmaking is apparently there, but it is NOT solo queue. We can only wonder and wait to see how bad of an idea not making the 1v1 solo-only will prove to be.

I have no idea how experienced game developers/alleged PvPers that run this game’s PvP were unable to pull this off after so much hype and millions of people at start. How could they fail with so many intelligent and dedicated people that were literally beta-testing and even designing (!) game systems for them. For free.

Add a terrible balance, hundreds of bugs and ridiculously over-powered specs since launch with no live and immediate response to the above and we have a story of how PvP that was supposed to be everything turned out to be nothing.

TL;DR:
Anet thought that making a PvP that would be based on hot-joins for non-PvPers, frees for semi-dedicated players and paids for professionals would work out. They wanted everyone to pick their mode and stick to “because it’s fun”. They thought this reason is enough to forget about rating and matchmaking. The idea was to add Customs in the future so that pros can just play them and occasionally go to paids and then use their QPs to play in bigger tournaments. It didn’t work, was bad design, people knew this better than devs and now there’ no one to fix things for.

Less QQ, More pew-pew.

Metatail.1306:

Whaaaaaat. I loved my Predator for these Star Wars like pew pew sounds and they got changed to this… woosh woosh!? Do not want! Bring old sounds back!

This is a sad day and I share the pain, Mister Metatail. We can also share a tissue! Here, take mine!

Guts.4967:

Ultima.8673:

i am fine with the patchnotes. now plx implement private server / observermode / ladder / elo

FIXED !

This is too hilarious to be true. Tears of joy are pouring down my cheeks.

No PvP in GW2 is the official statement.

Necro’s still boring as hell and a total design failure. Time to roll a ranger!

Yay! PvP officially forgotten.

580+ MBs is the total I downloaded.

Axe/focus – GG

I’ve been already rolling newbs with it, time for cry to begin.

You again? Yet another topic without any substance…

Why the hell do you keep comparing these two elites?

This. is. pointless. This thread is really pointless.

The Order has a symbol.

Bye bye QP, you served no purpose and will be forgotten.

Erasmus.1624:

ArenaNet Drone detected.

So accurate and entertaining. I haven’t laugh so hard in my tomb for ages.

I’m already writing two posts for two different occasions – one in case the UI is fixed tomorrow and second, more harsh, in case it’s left as it is for the introduction of matchmaking and ratings.

ColinJohanson.2394:

I’m well aware mesmers can’t dual-wield pistols, we’ve only been working on it for 6 years now If there was double-pistols, my Mesmer would whoop you in PvP with them though, just sayin.

Off to play my double-pistol Warrior!

OP, I think Colin just won.

@Colin: give necros double pistols. And a greatsword or a shield. Thanks!

Golem is nowhere near the Lich Form as long as DPS is concerned. Utility-wise they are probably close, with Lich having more options.

Dante.1508:

From playing Guildwars 2 for 6 months now i have come to the conclusion the this new system is no different to a quest system and in some cases its worse..rather than better..

Same feeling. I could do thousand quests in GW1, but I can’t stand hearts.

Jhulz.3657:

finally it works, I just use Lv5+ white full armor then transmute it and became account bound.

thanks

Please note, that you still need to transmute it with an exotic item, picking the Whispers skin and exotic stats in order to get the max gear with your wanted skin.

Heartbroken because of downgrading yourself in a guild?
Involving Anet as the badboy then?
???
Excuse me, really?

I think he used google translate to post this, hence the weird first sentence.

I would answer, but I have no idea what OP means.

There is no main attribute, there is no main weapon. Just play and try everything!

MeanMug.2630:

As always Rennoko, you are appreciated.

Now if you can tell me an easy way to get my Arah gear to transmute for its’ looks…..you will become legend.

I already have 3 pcs of TA gear and all this PvE is killing me….

As a word of comfort, I will say that I made a whole Arah armour and I hate it, it is okay for one day, but who likes to run around looking like a bag of potatoes?

Why not pick a more fabulous look?!

“You must gather your minions before venturing forth.”

“Even if it bleeds, I can’t kill it!”

pixieish.9627:

He actually makes joining Zhaitan appealing. (The dragon helped recover a long lost island, turned Quaggans from whimpering butterballs to slightly threatening toads, offers a long term retirement plan and is an accomplished, if misunderstood, landscape artist.)

This is the best thing I read in a long time! Please know, that you made my day!

pixieish.9627:

And I’m amused at how you say some. How about next event involves the community choosing whether or not our ridiculous tree general lives or dies and we’ll see how abundant “some” really is.

It’s more like, they most probably are aware that close to 100% of players loathe Trahearne, but they can’t really admit that. if the first part stands true and they’re going to kill his character off (I don’t know, make him rot or something), we should be fine.

Pegi 12 is the answer.

I wish they made a real mature story. With many interesting characters presented in many situations, which we have an opportunity to meet and accompany during their adventures. Baldur’s Gate/Planescape style. No more Trahearne, no more Lords Farens, no more Tybalds (as much as I liked him, he suffered as every other character in this game – was introduced, said something, participated in couple of missions and then disappeared).
The villains need to be presented as well, Zhaitan was a good idea, I like when we don’t really know what we’re fighting against until we meet the opponent. The execution on the other hand, was terrible

Bobby, seeing you watch the thread, I’ll use the opportunity to jump in and give a little feedback.

First of all to fellow posters, there is no reason to jump on the personal story at this point. The game shipped months ago, it isn’t really going to change. The PS was a huge project – 5 races, 2 genders, branching, many options and choices. They tried many innovative things; some of them worked just fine, others – not that well. There also isn’t any reason to criticize the team responsible for it. I believe they had some budget, very likely much smaller than everyone thinks, and I’m sure they made wonders with what they had. No one can question their effort and best intentions. I respect that.
What’s important is the ability to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses moving forward, to make the future narrative best it can be. The personal story with all its pros and cons belongs to the domain of the past now.

As to the feedback itself.

1. Cut-scenes aren’t really helping the narrative. They take the control from players and often slow the pace built by the combat dynamics. Their advantage is the ability to give each participating player an option to skip the narrative if they so desire. The example of a negative impact on the narrative – Battle for Claw Island – you hack your way through the Risen. A while later, just after the fight ends, you are being put into a slow-paced cut-scene with a mediocre voice acting at best. It is counter-effective.
   Suggestion: experiment with the dialogue built into the action (just like during dynamic events or in dungeons) possibly adding more dialogue during battles.
2. Little of great is better than lots of mediocre. I personally prefer a great story on which I have little impact than a good story giving me more options. I think GW2 PS needs less fragmentation, by presenting people with relatively the same story steps moving forward. It allows the team to focus and make the best experience possible.
   Suggestion: with PS being one of the pillars of GW2 I wouldn’t completely scrap it. I’d just focus on making one great uniform story implementing little choices here and there connected to player’s race and the like. For instance, during a mission I may be presented with a choice of going either left or right, in contrast with the current system where I have to decide whether my mission is to go left or to go right. Once again, one unified story with many small choices put inside.
3. The VO needs to be improved. Actors should be encouraged to be more expressive and interpret their characters. There are countless examples in current state where the VO is severely lacking. Examples: wounded soldiers not really expressing pain with their voice, idyllic-sounding Tyrians that are supposedly terrorized by Zhaitan, no shouts present in cut-scenes during battles (it’s a battle, chaos around, people are dying and the actors are just talking).
4. Home instances – I believe the team should help develop those places in the future so that they can contain tokens of all the events the players participated in and personal choices they made. Something that can be developed as new content is being released.

Overall, I think that the first step is to always focus on a unified story, because it allows you to focus on it. I’m not saying that creating a system with different mission choices was bad. I just believe that you can make a story system that doesn’t require tens of options and still make it personal and customizable. I believe the story/writing team sees the pros it has and will come up with something really great!

Cheers!

Jeffrey Vaughn.1793:

10 players running the event every day might expect one staff to drop after about 7 months. (And we haven’t been out that long.)

This may be seen as an indirect confirmation that it really is a rather unpopular event. I like.

I’m a glass cannon power necro, no defensive stats whatsoever and I’m the first one to pull aggro in dungeons. It may be because I’m just much better than pugs I play with…

Not-a-chance for a standard necro to win against an even skilled standard mesmer.

It of course can happen if the mesmer makes a mistake and necro’s a bit lucky, but in general I would say this cannot take place.

In their condi builds, necros have no defensive abilities and their offense is rather teamfight oriented. This makes a shatter or phantasm mesmers, who has good offense/defense coming from weapon sets and even a Time Warp to make the encounter even more biased, rather a hard encounter for the necro.

1. It is either some really unexpected/unpopular boss that drops it … -

2. … or it is one of the popular event chains – notice how they said it is working, but they never said when it started working. If we assumed it was broken for let’s say 3 first months and it started dropping 2 months ago, the biggest sample had already left the game. It still does not explain why it hadn’t dropped so far.

3. … or it’s just bug wars 2, the dev allegedly said he tracked the drop back to the event, but who says their private off-line environment is a good representation of the live server? They often say how hard it is to reproduce a particular bug on their servers.

Anyways, good luck finding the staff. I won’t probably be playing, because the game bores me, but it’s fun watching all the ideas flowing.

150 fractals, no rings, no materials, no significant drop. What’s not to love?

Cazio.2137:

I am starting to wonder what this game actually is about.

Sadly, log in and log out in my case. Hey, I can still haunt the forums!

Naito, thanks for insulting a team of r10’s for not learning anything after being stomped by CN. I think people reading this will be really encouraged to hop into pvp when they read your post.

Tyler Bearce.3427:

Ride the Lightning does not drop the orb. Attempting to stealth or being combo’d into stealth does not drop the orb. The stealth just fails, with IMMUNE text.

Thanks for making yet another map where Eles are OP and Necros suck.

I really appreciate that. Keep up the good work. Oh well, map at least looks nice.

Zodian.6597:

settings > graphics > post processing > set to high. This setting can make the game feel a lot more colorful if you have it disabled.

It in fact makes HotM less colourful. I still use it, because Legacy gets some colour with post-processing.

Mists – depressing
Forest – poor gamma and boring secondary mechanic
Legacy – see previous
Other than that it’s okay, wouldn’t mind TotSS getting more vivid though.

Josh Foreman.8250:

You crazy kids breaking my maps!!!

The breaking will continue! It will until Cantha is added!

Commander is a PvE achievement, i.e. it never guarantees skill no knowledge about the game and WvW more specifically.

On the contrary, most of commanders I met were utterly terrible. That’s why everyone makes fun of them.

Thz.7569:

It’s simple, really. The majority of players are mechanically pathetic and give no kittens about optimizing gear/traits/skills/weps per what’s optimal for their team. A perfect example is me expecting a quick 22 run for my daily but being stuck on cliffside for nearly an hour because of idiots like the ranger in my group who is still using human racial abilities.

In the end, though — This is my fault for not seeking a guild better suited for such things.

So true, terrible players unable to learn basic mechanics the game is built upon with total lack of skill and awareness.

I love running to save a guy, taking his aggro, then getting downed, fighting for rally, while he uses his ‘4’ self rez.
Outcome: I die, he attacks the almost dead enemy and rallies. Always makes me want to kill something.

On a side note, when I see a ranger in my party, I usually quit and look for another one. Chances are, that player is a girl or just a terribad wanting a WoW hunter experience with no basic knowledge of his class. Ranger in your party in PvE? Save your time and leave.

Personally, I would find the kittener and kick the kitten out of him for his behaviour, but there is no option for that.