Guild Wars 2

Sovta.4719:

marnick.4305:

Chuo.4238:

Kumakichi.2583:

“the grind” is a matter of perspective but mmo’s tend to tap into the OCD of a lot of players. They dump rediculous hours into an mmo to get all the best gear and coolest stuff. Then they are so burned out from grinding they usually hate the game and quit playing. I’ve watched this happen to several friends. Some have quit playing mmo’s altogether.

Ever knew anyone who worked harder at an MMO than at their job? Or worse, lost their job because they prioritized an MMO over their job? I gotta wonder how that happens…but it does.

I’m not blaming MMO’s for this; they didn’t force anyone to do anything. It’s just something that makes me go “hmmmmmm…”

To be honest … I blame the player, just like I blame the heroin addict, not the heroin itself.

I chose GW2 to be my game of choice because I can actually alt+f4 and not lose sleep over it. In <other game>, going out means losing 1 day worth of DKP.

And i loose 1 day worth laurel if i don’t login 1 day.
And in “other game” to be honest…i blame the player, you don’t have to grind there if you don’t like it.

Not like laurels as that big of a deal. 50 laurels are all you need per character, and I don’t care about gearing my alts.

Having a DKP gap could follow you for months, missing a few laurels is nothing in comparison.

Forums never cease to amaze me. A shallow race is expanded upon to give them more depth, people complain this race has no depth so should be used. Really?

I personally think the dredge have some of the best lore of all enemy races, and for one aren’t 100% evil. They just have been treated extremely bad, both by their previous and current overlords.

Sauzo.6821:

Well if you play 1 hour a day 3-4 days a week, then you have no right to cry about not having a legendary or a precursor anytime before 1 year. Cause if they handed em out to people that only play that amount of time, imagine how many precursors and/or legendaries a guy who plays twice that amount or more would have.

You can check my entire post history. Not once did I cry about precursors. Often I’m actually rather positive about them being expensive since it is an extremely long term goal in the range of one year. So ye, I do agree with you. I’m very happy that precursors are counted in gold so it’s actually possible to work incrementally towards them instead of having to be there when killing the Big Bad at the end of a 6 hour raid dungeon. You do realize that the MMO genre is pretty much detested by most non-MMO players, and for good reasons. Most trope mechanics are very unhealthy for both player and game.

Dedicating 2 hours a day really isn’t that much for endgame gear. Anyone who has played other MMOs knows that it takes months of work by a whole guild of people to achieve endgame gear. Seems some people just want something for nothing….

Which is why MMOs are the worst genre of gaming. Which is why I started playing GW2 because it doesn’t follow the traditional pattern of raiding and huge continuous time investments.

Personally i’d just say to solve the problem would be put in a vendor that sells precursors for 500g each and leave the rest of the methods of getting one the way they are. That way people who get lucky at MF or get one as a drop can still sell it for under the vendor and it will keep the cap at 500g for em. Problem solved.

I don’t think communism is the right way to go, IRL, several nations collapsed by trying to force unnatural prices onto a market. Gamewise, GW1 proved how putting a fixed max trade price is bad for a game.
If you really want to destroy the GW2 economy, creating a 500g precursor would be the best way. On the other hand, there really should be a deterministic way.

Non-issue really. Sure it’s nice to have more information, but it won’t help you one bit. At the very least, be happy it’s not a disguised torrent client like <that other game> uses.

Jazhara Knightmage.4389:

and people wonder why people buy gold from gold sellers………

Do people actually do that? There’s a few spammers but I don’t think there’s actually a relevant market amongst core players. Sure there’s people who’ll play until they are banned but they aren’t relevant. People who actually care about their character and the progression it makes, don’t buy gold from spammers.

thisolderhead.5127:

Casual game doesn’t mean that a poor player will be accepted by better players for party play.

I don’t understand this “Casual” at all – transient / occasional / bad… its worse than “hardcore” for failure of definition.

I’ve seen players who identify as “Casual” really they are transient players who are bad at games (strangely good at forum sympathy lol) with no desire to improve their gameplay as they are “just not that into it”… and I’m considered the bad guy for suggesting they log off and uninstall before they waste anyone elses time or resources any further…

[/quote]

Maybe the correct advice for people who want to play a game isn’t to log off but actually to have fun?

Elitism has no place in games played as a relaxing past-time. As such your advice indeed makes you the bad guy. Wasting time is the core reason for playing videogames. That’s what games are for.

Adine.2184:

marnick.4305:

. The gold-to-gem conversion is an optional thing for people who don’t want to support their favourite videogame.

that makes the assumption that one has a budget to buy the gems with real money to begin with,or an income at all for that matter .

Doesn’t change a thing. For people who don’t have the budget, there’s always the gold-to-gems. However … you’re at the whim of the people who want to sell their gems for gold. I personally want to get 2g for every 100 gems so probably the gems are still at the cheaper side.

You can’t have the cake and eat it. Either you work and pay for gems with real money, or you put in an equivalent of farming time. Demanding cheap gems goldwise while refusing to pay with real money is not honest.

Oh and because I actually have money. Instead of playing hardcore, I’m at work earning money.

Behellagh.1468:

Red Falcon.8257:

Behellagh.1468:

Casual games aren’t the ones who would spend money on a game controller, gaming mouse, gaming keyboard, gaming keypad. And equipment isn’t going to improve my jumping skills.

Casual game means catering to people who don’t play a lot of time, period.
It has nothing to do with the skill or hardware required to play the game.

Yes but if I don’t play a lot of games because I don’t have a lot of free time why would I spend money on a bunch of hardware that won’t get much use? See my point.

Because it’s fun to have a killer machine, especially for a hobby you don’t have much time for. It’s like buying an expensive racebike which you use 3 times a year.

I spend more money on hobbies I rarely do, than on active ones actually. Gaming is my most favourite hobby, yet real life is and videogames expect 2 hours dedication at the very least which is rarely feasible for a working, married guy with children.

Sauzo.6821:

SadieDeAtreia.8912:

Sauzo.6821:

Shadow.4871:

Haha you people act like they most people farm, news update they don’t.

One word: Gems

Actually if you buy gems and convert to gold to buy a precursor, you’re crazy. That’s like $400+ real cash to buy just the precursor. You can easily grind 10g a day just playing casual. In 1 month you could 300g and that’s assuming you don’t get any lucky drops. So really in 2 months you can buy a precursor. I don’t see the problem with 2 months work for a precursor. Only problem I see is how they “randomly” jump up in price but if you save up 500g and put in a buy offer, I bet you would get one.

Shortly after launch, I may have agreed with this. But after all the nerfs to Orr etc… I’d really like to know how playing casual will nett you 10g a day.

Well, doing Ori runs with 3 toons will make you 4g+ and that takes about 40 mins or so. Run a couple CoF P1s, HoTW P1, SE P1/3 and assuming you get no rares from any of that, that’s still around 3g or so. So that’s like 7g for about 2 hours. Add in the tokens from COF and HoTW being traded for rare armor to salvage to ecto to sell and bam, you got 8gish. Couple that with some DEs or more CoF P1 and you can pull 10g.

Who told you that dedicating 2 hours per day, 30 days per month, is even close to a casual time investment?

Casual means less that 1h, probably fragmented, 3-4 days a week.

I bought bank slots while they were on sale.

Besides, whether gold is hard to come by or not, the relevant way to get gems is with your visa card and afaik that rate has never been changed. The gold-to-gem conversion is an optional thing for people who don’t want to support their favourite videogame.

Going with the office cake analogy. If someone always takes the entire cake, he’s the kitten and will eventually get fired over it. Yes, kitten will be fired for being kitten since that’s counter-productive at work.

The guild equivalent is kicking him. However, neither did something “illegal” or “against the EULA”. It is up to the guild or company to take proper measures.

I understand but don’t believe. I will try on my rig today, but imho, any site could use that name for a trojan. Doesn’t prove anything.

Also, I don’t see how a mere .htm could be a threat, but that’s mostly because I don’t use Internet Explorer. I scan my PC every week, never found a single virus in over 20 years of PC use. Intelligence is the best firewall.

I consider myself an elite gamer when I push myself, I’ve been quite hardcore back when I was a student. However I just don’t feel like that’s a good past-time anymore. Work, friends and fiancée are far more hardcore than any videogame. Besides, I try to train for a triathlon, so even the most hardcore videogame is pretty dull in comparison.

Sure, I can pwn FotM every day of the week if I wanted, after work, training and chores, I feel more like killing some lvl 5 mobs in Queensdale

I wasn’t there. I couldn’t be there. I am not a fan of one time events. Given it was so bad that chests had to be delivered over mail …. I’m with OP. I wanted to do the event and I’ve seen them on youtube. There’s just no way I’m choosing GW2 over sauna on a sunday … I’m dating my girlfriend, not some one-night-stand monster in a videogame …

It should be accessible for legit players so we can actually taunt!

And it would be cool to see the dungeon grow.

TheDaiBish.9735:

marnick.4305:

I kill dragons because I want to kill dragons

I do dungeons because I like defeating the big bad

I do WvW because I like roaming on a battlefield

When I feel like it, I’ll ride a few event chains because that’s just fun

Jumping puzzles are awesome!

Eventually, all that leads to a legendary, but I won’t break any sweat over it.

This game is very much intrinsic fun, except in the case where people want a legendary yesterday. I understand those people don’t really like the game very much.

Bob kills dragons for the guaranteed rares. He doesn’t like standing there pew-pewing, but he will for the loot. (Although, only doing dragons with around the minimum amount is so much fun!)

He also does dungeons for the loot. He doesn’t want to run that dungeon….yadda yadda, you get my drift.

What may be intrinsic for you may be extrinsic for Bob.

I’d say largely the problem is people have been conditioned that they should be rewarded with loot for their efforts, which leads to developers repeating this, as opposed to creating engaging content and mechanics. Another issue is humans are conditioned to take the path of least resistance. This is shown by Plinx chain, CoF1 ect, which yield more rewards than anything else.

I love and hate FotM at the same time. I love it because it is a cool dungeon with interesting mechanics. I hate it because I feel it is a necessary dungeon to get ascended equipment.

If all gear in FotM had exotic stats except for the infusion, I would be far more happy to run it over and over. As it stands, I don’t like it because of the rewards I’m implied to get there.

I’m the kind of guy who runs away from carrots on a stick. Fun should be worth something in its own right.

Kakeru.2873:

marnick.4305:

I want to be teased and surprised. I like the lack of early patch notes. It also leads to less rushing and more polish (see sig)

The “expansion worth of content” really did happen but not like a traditional expansion. Just print out the full patch notes for january and february and you’ll see they take up several pages in word. That’s a ton of changes. Mostly improvements, which is exactly what an expansion is about… fleshing out the game experience.

If you think a few pages of bug fixes and changes on a patch notes is an “expansion’s worth of content” Then the last 5 patches lol has had were all expansions.

An expansion is about fleshing out the game. While most games tack on a few useless levels, and because of that a few areas, that’s not the core idea of an expansion. Filling in gaps of the game is actually the relevant part of an expansion.

Compare to WoW. Obviously, the 40 man raid system didn’t work, and the gear system was hopelessly convoluted leading to meaningless pvp. Instead of rebalancing the existing game, they threw it all out, tacked on 10 levels and made all existing gear with failed stats irrelevant. Not only that, but they had you pay 40 euros for what was basically a service pack to vanilla. If no one does Molten Core, there’s no need to fix it. That is the easy solution which has become the MMO standard.

As such, guild missions, dungeon overhaul, fleshing out Southsun Cove/Consortium, making WvW relevant … those would be core features of an expansion. However, instead of slapping on a few arbitrary levels and creating all that content from scratch, a.net decided to actually work with the existing content. Imho a far superior yet decidedly more difficult position.

The core philosophy of the jan/feb/march patches clearly resembles what an expansion pack is about, minus the active destruction of existing content. I agree 100% with that position.

I kill dragons because I want to kill dragons

I do dungeons because I like defeating the big bad

I do WvW because I like roaming on a battlefield

When I feel like it, I’ll ride a few event chains because that’s just fun

Jumping puzzles are awesome!

Eventually, all that leads to a legendary, but I won’t break any sweat over it.

This game is very much intrinsic fun, except in the case where people want a legendary yesterday. I understand those people don’t really like the game very much.

Chuo.4238:

Kumakichi.2583:

“the grind” is a matter of perspective but mmo’s tend to tap into the OCD of a lot of players. They dump rediculous hours into an mmo to get all the best gear and coolest stuff. Then they are so burned out from grinding they usually hate the game and quit playing. I’ve watched this happen to several friends. Some have quit playing mmo’s altogether.

Ever knew anyone who worked harder at an MMO than at their job? Or worse, lost their job because they prioritized an MMO over their job? I gotta wonder how that happens…but it does.

I’m not blaming MMO’s for this; they didn’t force anyone to do anything. It’s just something that makes me go “hmmmmmm…”

To be honest … I blame the player, just like I blame the heroin addict, not the heroin itself.

I chose GW2 to be my game of choice because I can actually alt+f4 and not lose sleep over it. In <other game>, going out means losing 1 day worth of DKP.

I want to be teased and surprised. I like the lack of early patch notes. It also leads to less rushing and more polish (see sig)

The “expansion worth of content” really did happen but not like a traditional expansion. Just print out the full patch notes for january and february and you’ll see they take up several pages in word. That’s a ton of changes. Mostly improvements, which is exactly what an expansion is about… fleshing out the game experience.

Obsidian Armor:
105 ectoplasm : wow shows mastery of farming gold
105 obsidian : shows mastery of farming gold
60k : shows mastery of farming gold
Going to the forgemaster : shows master of the 3 easiest quests in the game.

Eventually, all top tier gear will be farming gold, gold, gold in all games. Be happy that this is merely a cosmetic upgrade. In other games, these weapons would be required to do the Arah Story mode.

Really … what did you expect?

Well … before ascended, jeweler was the only useful craft. After ascended all crafts are pointless.

One of the parts of making a legendary is proving you mastered at least 2 crafting professions. As such, it is mandatory to do it yourself.

Warlander.1384:

marnick.4305:

You’re not stuck at 3/4. You can have it in 2 minutes if only you wanted it.

You clearly don’t want the monthly.

Listen … crafting was the easiest part of this monthly. And by easy, I really mean rediculously easy. It costs less than 20s from TP prices, and can be done with barely 50 weaponsmithing. If that’s too much for you, indeed you really don’t want the laurels.

So I really wonder how you come to the conclusion that you’re somehow stuck while clearly you’re not. This blockade is entirely self inflicted but not really there.

Ah hostility, why ? I have no desire to start at 1 and go to 50, i dont have the resources nor the desire to grind, because i dont enjoy it, so why should i ? Im fine accepting I wont complete the monthly acheivement however I figured I would post here and see what others think.
If the best you can come up with is durr just craft cause thats just the way it is…then carry on and flame away.

The hostility you seem to read is the mere impossibility to write down a response to your “problem” in a clean and respectable manner. There is no problem, which is the only thing I can say. The only thing blocking your completion is you refusing to craft for two minutes. That’s a very personal statement, but it is impossible to say that without sounding hostile. I’m sorry for that, but some things are exactly what they are. You have a mental lock on crafting preventing you from getting 10 laurels.

As stated by the devs: _Monthlies are intended as a mid term goal for people who want to put a bit more effort into the game. _
You don’t want to put in the effort. That’s no problem, but the consequence is that you don’t want the 10 laurels you could get in the time it took for you to write your OP.

As i said there is no reason it cant be broken into sections, and despite your OMG CRAFTING IS AWESOME mentality that im sure is swimming around your little brain, a good trade market has a mix of players that craft and dont craft, those that sell there resources those that buy, those that sell there gear and those that buy it.

Whether or not crafting is awesome is irrelevant. I don’t consider it the best part of the game myself. I will let your blatant insult about my “little brain” slide because I’ll try to be the mature guy here. I don’t usually craft myself, but doing 10 or 100 crafts for a laurel is not beyond me. I want the laurels and I am prepared to do what’s required. You’re not, but that merely means you don’t want the laurels.

The march monthly is incredibly easy, and the crafting part is the easiest out of the 4 requirements. Again, whether you like crafting or not, you’re 2 minutes away from 10 laurels. It is up to you to decide whether or not you want to “grind” for two minutes.

I’m all for varying up the monthly, and complaints about WvW and FotM were valid to say the least. Complaints about spending 2 minutes on crafting are not.

You’re not stuck at 3/4. You can have it in 2 minutes if only you wanted it.

You clearly don’t want the monthly.

Listen … crafting was the easiest part of this monthly. And by easy, I really mean rediculously easy. It costs less than 20s from TP prices, and can be done with barely 50 weaponsmithing. If that’s too much for you, indeed you really don’t want the laurels.

So I really wonder how you come to the conclusion that you’re somehow stuck while clearly you’re not. This blockade is entirely self inflicted but not really there.

Mistfire Wolf is underwhelming at best, which, for a collector edition feature, is unacceptable. Make it a Hounds of Balthazar clone so at least it has a minimum of use. As it stands, this skill might as well not exist.

I am very happy with everything else in the CE box, it’s just this one skill that is almost invisible due to short duration.

April fools will be the Annihilator 250 quest.

There’s just too many skills giving too many boons.

Increase power of boons, have skills reward no more than 2 different boons. Stuff like Guardian shouts, engineer elixir B, Mesmer signet and the like are just bad skills.
A single boon has to mean something, make you significantly stronger.

I would very strongly recommend buying a new monitor. That will save you the trouble of asking difficult questions to which I don’t have an answer.

I work with remote desktop on a daily basis. Your problem can’t be solved due to inherent lag, even on the fastest connection. Some things just aren’t meant to be.

As weird as it sounds, with the advent of the i3-i5-i7 CPUs which have built in HD 3000 or HD 4000 intel graphics card, I would very strongly recommend using the built-in intel GPU for sporadic gaming.
Current generation Intel CPU/GPU hybrids are very temperature efficient, and the HD4000 series is not bad. It’s not good either. As I said, for sporadic gaming, like on business trips, on holiday or while visiting family.

If you want top graphics on your laptop … you’re doing something wrong. “Gaming laptop” is an oxymoron. It is a pure marketing term, such devices do not exist.

Sounds reasonable. Armor toggle is already possible as per the town clothes. A second armor unlock should be possible. Remove town clothes and make them GW1 costumes instead.

Prices are too low. I’d suggest:

• Stack of regular for 1 pristine
• 1-3-5 pristines for vial-glob-shard

But ye … these things desperately need to be on sale, not just for the hardcore grinders but also for the casuals who can’t farm a million vials for all the infusions.

Nein nein nein nein nein nein nein nein nein.

Would have done this with my GW1 necro. GW2 characters … not so much.

Considering the history of real-world royal houses, I would presume the extended family is pretty large. A king ain’t a real king without a few out-of-wedlock children.

I would presume physics are valid unless tampered with.

Furthermore, an “anti-moon” would be visible at daytime, which it is not. Ergo, this so-called hypothesis is not valid.

Unless the anti-moon is covered with stealth magic. Also, I have an invisible pink unicorn in my backyard.

Stealth should still give a starcraft-like shimmer. The current implementation has been broken for 8 years, ever since WoW was released.

Just make it increase linearily like that guy with the 25k suggested himself:
First tier: 100
Second tier: 200
Third tier: 300
Fourth tier: 400

The guy with the 25k would be down to less than 10k with a simple measure like that.

If I have permission to empty a guild bank right after joining, I will do so. It’s not like I’m breaking any rules.

If you don’t want people to empty your bank, you shouldn’t give them bank rights…

Don’t question mighty Zommoros

The lack of classic education in this thread hurts.

Everyone should know that -um is pronounced “oom”. It’s not even debatable.

Would pay gems for the Ranger Druid’s 15k armor on my engi. No good leather armors available currently.

On the other hand, title inflation wouldn’t be a good idea either. Let’s hope for a composite achievement track awarding a final title for completing the living story.

Grind is not a matter of perspective, but rather a matter of requirement. In other games, dungeon bosses are virtually always gear checks. In such a dungeon, grinding out that vigil story you wrote (which I did in <that other game>) is almost necessary to tip you over the necessary gearscore to beat a boss with a rage timer.

In GW2 such mechanics don’t exist. While gear makes your life considerably easier in the harder dungeons, easier ones such as post-nerf AC, can be done without any gear.

A laptop will get just as hot as a desktop pc, while having far fewer means of getting rid of the heat. A small fan is usually everything. Furthermore, laptops are typically used in bed, on your lap, all circumstances where the bottom side is covered by cloth. That ramps up internal heat. All of that eats into the life of your laptop.
It is no coincidence that non-gamers usually get 5+ years out of their laptops, while gamers struggle with 2 years.

If you value your laptop, play on lowest settings, even with a “dedicated” graphics card. It’s just to reduce the internal heat. If playing in bed or on the couch, put a wooden or plastic board under your laptop to create breathing room.

• I do my daily. While the 5s isn’t a whole lot, one laurel is equivalent to about 5g given the cost of the triforge amu. Plus chance at free BLC items

• When I have time, a fractal run gives me nice money

• While waiting for group, do the JP in Lion’s Arch. You get at least several medallions which sell for 1s each. It’s just free money while doing nothing really.

• Chill around in Orr for events or Southsun for Karka Shells and Passion Fruit.

• Any dungeon. Doing 3 paths gives you a piece of exotic armor which is equivalent to 3g. If you don’t need the armor anymore, salvage for ecto.

You want the hat with the feather. Don’t know what it’s called since I kept transmuting it, but it is a rather common one.

Rieselle.5079:

bleusnuages.7523:

The problem is due to wealthy players who buy all rage’s weapons of a same kind before selling them 30% more expensive.

People who say this aren’t really thinking this through.

Let’s say I am a wealthy player. I buy a precursor and relist for 30% higher.

• Noone buys the item: I either let the item sit there, tying up my cash, or I relist for lower again and lose my listing fee. I don’t want either of these things to happen.

• Someone buys my item: Who bought my item? And why?

- Is it a richer player who is going to relist again at an even higher price?
I guess this is a market bubble – people buying stuff back and forth only to list at a higher price. As with all bubbles, sooner or later someone is left holding the hot potato, and the whole thing comes crashing down.
—> Save your money for that moment, and suddenly precursors will become cheap.

- Is it a player who actually needs the item?
Then why are you blaming the wealthy player who relists? If the original seller knew that people are willing to buy at that price, then why wouldn’t he just list at the higher price and cut out the middle man?
—> If I can relist and sell to a legitimate buyer at the higher price, then I am closer to the true price of the item (ie. what people are willing and able to pay) than the original seller.

---

So yeah, if the prices for precursors is constantly rising beyond your ability to generate income, then either:

- It’s because it’s rare and people richer than you can afford to buy and use them, in which case you are too poor to afford the item, sorry. (Try grinding for it directly? Try figuring out how to make money faster? Or watch the TP like a hawk and try to pick up a bargain before a relister spots it?)

- It’s a market bubble and speculators are chasing their own tails relisting at ever higher prices. Wait for the crash and buy it cheap.

---

In summary, it makes no sense to blame the relisters, because if someone could afford the relisted price then the original seller could have just listed at the higher price anyways.

This is exactly my thought on the matter. In time, the market will hit equilibrium and we’ll know the true value of dusk. I wouldn’t be surprised though if it were closer to 1000g than 300g given the RNG nature of the Mystic Forge.