Guild Wars 2

The only thing the Ultimate Edition offers is a discount on gems. That’s it.

No physical items, and nothing new compared to the Deluxe Edition. Only a fool would buy it over the Deluxe version.

JUN YANG.4328:

an example: you are saying if your wife betray you. you still support her??
HELL NO

Haha, let’s not get carried away with analogies. A company offering a service is nothing like a wife. There is also nothing wrong by supporting and forgiving a wife even if she did “betray” you.

Shalloe.4867:

Koviko.3248:

Just a flesh wound.3589:

https://help.guildwars2.com/entries/27697743-Refunds
“Note: The refund process includes permanent closure of the Guild Wars 2 account. If you wish to continue to play Guild Wars 2, or if you desire to play in the future, you will need to purchase a new serial code and create a completely new account. Characters, names, items, and other features from the refunded account cannot be transferred to a new or different account. Not all serial code purchases will be eligible for a refund. No refunds will be given for any account that has been terminated for a breach of the Guild Wars 2 User Agreement.”

Um… that’s kinda scary. :/

if you look at the link that note is to the answer regarding refunds for your purchase of guild wars 2 obviously refunding the core game will terminate the account. Pretty sure that wont apply to refunding an expansion

Except both are linked now. There isn’t a way to unlink them. So it’s a closure of your core account also. It’s kind of shocking they don’t have a system in place to revert it back to core after a refund.

Getefix.9150:

then dont pay more, dont get the charcater slot and get the same content?

You would be singing a different tune if the Revenant wasn’t included in any of the packages and cost 1200 gems on the Gem Store.

Want to play Revenant? Buy 1200 gems. Don’t complain about it either. You’ll still get the same content.

A corporate shill. I’ll wait for Angry Joe or TotalBiscuit’s views instead, if they even make a video. They are less biased towards GW2.

It’s sad that it has come to this for a lot of players. They will be forced to delete an 80 or not play a Revenant, or pay even more money on top of $50. You have to admit, it’s a crappy way to treat your existing players.

IIvIIozzie.9250:

@nexxe: the base game is completely free. No charge at all for it once you purchase HoT.

No, it’s still $50 or more. It’s just part of a bundled package. It’s not free at all. Just because it’s bundled, doesn’t make it truly free.

Smitten.3076:

Some GW2 players are the most entitled I’ve seen in the industry, not because they want everything given to them … but because they honestly think they are being rational about this.

What’s irrational about wanting the full information of what you are purchasing? The secrecy surrounding HoT is giving players pause before they make their decision. I don’t think you know what entitlement means.

IIvIIozzie.9250:

I think it’s rather gracious that they even give players a choice. They didn’t have to give away a free copy of the game, but they did anyway. Had they not done so the majority of the complaints would not exist. I’ve never seen people upset and getting something for free in my life…. that wasn’t a STD.

HoT is free? That’s news to me.

It’s not free at all, not even for new players. They still have to pay for the initial fee to even access the servers.

Robert Devine.3087:

nexxe.7081:

You couldn’t be more wrong OP. We want something for value. Everyone expected a price tag.

You guys have no clue what is all in the expansion and what is not. They have not showed everything. I do think that is not ok. For all we know the expansion has a ton of stuff they havent showed us and if thats the case great if not i surly do not want gems or another slot to makenup for it i want more content.

You just proved my point. Some of us are waiting for the full reveal to determine if it’s worth the purchase. That’s not expecting “something for nothing”.

The irony is, you support paying for something that is indeterminate.

Fawx.9064:

To everyone on here going on at length about how they will simply not buy the expansion unless the price is dropped, or the package offered is buffed – I call bull-kitten.

A day – maybe two – of you watching/hearing people play/talk about the expansion and you will fold faster than something that folds really fast.

You’re forgetting the competition though. Just look on Steam and all their sales right now. There’s also Heavensward and WoW’s content update, both are coming out on June 23rd, the same day as GW2’s patch.

You couldn’t be more wrong OP. We want something for value. Everyone expected a price tag.

results so far:
1. No 28 votes (56%)
2. Yes 17 votes (34%)
3. Unsure 5 votes (10%)
50 total votes

http://strawpoll.me/4661416
A poll to measure forum posters perspective.

Veterans keep this game alive by using their time on this game, and buying gems. And you have the gall to call them greedy? Some veterans spend hundreds and thousands of dollars on the gem store. You can kindly go you know what.

As much as i like my personal guild, it’s sort of contradictory to even have them. A guild is made up of more than one member. I’m pretty sure personal guilds were never intended.

Behellagh.1468:

The game came with one slot per race, not per profession.

That still doesn’t excuse them.

It still wouldn’t explain why they added an additional slot to the Deluxe and Ultimate versions, unless it was for greed.

grayskull.2367:

god kitten entitled gamers get a dam job, you get the base game for free the xpac is $50 deal with it or i don’t know don’t play it we will not miss you whinnying.

The funny thing is, people that do have jobs are more cautious with their money, because they earned it, unless you’re one of those people who don’t know how to manage a budget.

I really wanted to like ESO, but i didn’t like the combat. The graphics were really amazing though.

funkylovemonkey.3097:

Pimsley.6087:

K. Don’t buy it. If fifty bucks is going to stress people this much, perhaps they need a break from gaming to find better jobs. It’s a steak dinner. Buy it or don’t but stop whining about it. The price is the price.

It’s also the price I paid for Nightfall and Factions, which were full campaigns with huge maps, new professions, extra character slots and a long storyline that offered far more than HOT promises to.

It’s also about the price of a lot of brand new games coming out that offer me a full gaming experience, not just the chance to play Living Story Part 3 in three new areas.

The question is one of relative value. If I’m paying only $10 less than I did on the full game and receiving only tiny fraction of what the full game offered, then it isn’t worth my time. Your quip that if we don’t want to pay extra we should get a better job is childish: it’s not that we can’t afford it, it’s that we’re not careless and stupid with our money.

Also, you pay too much for your steak.

^This. Some people value their money, and apparently some people don’t. I guess he’s content with a thin and dried out steak dinner for $50, when he could get a thick and juicy one a couple blocks down for the same price or lower.

moiraine.2753:

nexxe.7081:

moiraine.2753:

Ofcourse the prize is fine.Lets compare it to one other successfull MMOs.If i wanted to pay WoW i’d have to pay 20$ for the core game + 50$ for expansion which is 70$ in total.For HoT i have to pay only kitten and that is 25$ less than WoW(without even counting the subscription)

Yes, and let’s compare the content shall we? WoW gives you the Core game, plus 5 expansions, 11 character slots per server (100 total slots iirc). GW2 gives Core game plus HoT expansion, with 0 slots for $50 (or $10 more for a slot if you buy with gems), or 1 extra slot for an extra $25, totaling $75.

You can also buy WoW tokens now to pay for your subscription, much like grinding for gold to get gems in GW2.

You know WoW tokens are more expensive than a subscription.And someone always has to buy them with real cash so you can buy it with ingame gold.So it is a win win for Blizzard.

• Token 20$
• Subscription 15$

That’s only if you want to sell the token for gold.
I’m talking about purchasing the token with gold.

It’s similar to GW2’s “gold→ gem” conversion, except in GW2, gems aren’t needed for a subscription.

moiraine.2753:

Ofcourse the prize is fine.Lets compare it to one other successfull MMOs.If i wanted to pay WoW i’d have to pay 20$ for the core game + 50$ for expansion which is 70$ in total.For HoT i have to pay only kitten and that is 25$ less than WoW(without even counting the subscription)

Yes, and let’s compare the content shall we? WoW gives you the Core game, plus 5 expansions, 11 character slots per server (100 total slots iirc). GW2 gives Core game plus HoT expansion, with 0 slots for $50 (or $10 more for a slot if you buy with gems), or 1 extra slot for an extra $25, totaling $75.

You can also buy WoW tokens now to pay for your subscription, much like grinding for gold to get gems in GW2.

It might be fine for you, but not for me. I respect your opinion though and hope you find value out of it.

Why did you preorder then? You should’ve just waited.

This is why i find it funny that people are content with the preorder prices, because not everything has been revealed yet. lol.

$50 for a triple-layered Silverwastes map, and $10 more for the new class… or $25 more for the new class (??).

How is it fair when they haven’t even released all the info for HoT? If anything, it’s unethical to charge people for something that hasn’t been revealed, or have a release date.

Ferever.7014:

I thought WoW was more expensive with expansion and on top of that a monthly sub to?

Not anymore. You purchase it once, then grind for gold to buy a token in game to continue your subscription. It’s really no different than grinding for gold in GW2, then converting it to gems. It’s actually starting to sound a lot cheaper now, where you will get the core game plus 5 expansions worth of content.

Tobias.8632:

Screwing over loyal customers in the hopes of acquiring new customers, GG

They did it with the NPE also. It’s becoming common.

The Rice Hat Samurai.5348:

Yojimaru.4980:

The Rice Hat Samurai.5348:

Guild Wars: Factions, $50, Guild Wars: Nightfall, $50. No. Look at EVERY expansion for World of Warcraft then come back.

Factions: Separate Campaign, added an entire continent, 2 new professions, multiple skills and armor sets, $50. Nightfall: Separate Campaign, added an entire continent, 2 new professions, multiple skills and armor sets, $50 bucks. WoW expansions, generally pretty kitten big.

HoT: Expansion, adds one profession, multiple skills and armor sets. As far as we know, the only areas added in PVE will be just to the west of Silverwastes and south into Magus Falls. I won’t be super pessimistic and say “lol only three maps!”, but such a small area doesn’t seem worth standard expansion price to me. Perhaps if they added the Maguuma Wastes all the way up to the coast of Janthir Bay and east into the Woodland Cascades, the current price would be more palatable.

I can agree with that. My issue is everyone screaming like they didn’t see this coming. Anyone with an iota of common sense saw this coming a mile away.

Wrong. People were waiting to see what will be included, and that means everything. 100% included. It’s actually funny that they released prices without revealing 100% of the content that will be included.

Advent Leader.1083:

Exhibit A.2346:

Advent Leader.1083:

…can’t people wait at least a day or to for the E3 hype to settle, so that additional details about the expansion only bundle come out?

It’s not like they’re going to make older players miss beta events by only giving out preorder bundles that have core+HoT. That would take at the very least a week, and next patch might highly likely not have a beta event within that time frame.

I would agree with you, if they had given any indication whatsoever that such a bundle was coming. The fact that you can buy the $50 version in-game seems to indicate it’s not.

And if you look at the other scope, it’s just one day after E3. Not even HOURS approaching to HALF OF A DAY after the E3 presentation. Have faith and WAIT for any expansion offer changes, instead of RUSHING TO BUYBUYBUY.

Even the in-game option can change with a patch or two. So if I were you, I’d WAIT, since you can give ANet three weeks time to change, revise, or add on their stance with respect to expansion offers.

Nope. Gaile just posted on Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/3a46s4/preorders_for_heart_of_thorns_are_now_live/cs966l5

“Hey all. We’re super happy to be launching pre-purchase of Heart of Thorns! We just want to let you know that $50 is the price of the expansion. We included the core game as a free bonus to make it easier for new players to get into it. There won’t be any other HoT editions, fyi.”

Smoky Diamond.7468:

I agree that $50 dollars for the expansion is ridiculous for those of us who already own the game. $75 if you want any extras at all is just plain stupid. I have a household that all plays Gw2, and it gets expensive very quickly. Looks like I’ll be sticking to other online games. :/

Sounds like a plan. Tera → until WS → until Black Desert, sounds about right.

Disappointing. I never expected Anet to be this greedy. I can’t believe they aren’t including a free character slot for the Revenant.

RoRo.8270:

good random dodge rolls were annoying maybe now people will be more conservative about using dodges

We don’t know how A.I. will compensate for this change though. In some fights, two dodges isn’t enough.

This might make people switch out traits and sigils, for more vigor now. It’s just going to be a pain having to swap out builds for all these changes without any build templates. This might not be needed so we’ll just have to wait and see if it’s good or not.

Just stick with any profession, and learn to be proficient in it. That means knowing how to apply boons, remove conditions, and learning combo fields and finishers.

After that, determine what you want to do with that class. There’s different builds (stats and traits) for pvp and pve.

Once you do this, then choosing a main profession is just based on what weapons and utilities you find most enjoyable.

DiogoSilva.7089:

Bobby.3721:

After all this time has passed, and looking back on the updates, tweaks, buffs, nerfs, and reworking of existing systems from day one of this game being released. I will never understand why they felt the need to rework traits in the game. What was so wrong about it? What was so difficult about buying three different books that unlocked all your traits in different tiers? Why fix something that isn’t broken, or hard to understand? I just don’t know.

Both anet and the playerbase wanted a scavenger hunt system tied to progression, kind of like GW1’s elite skill capturing, so anet added that into their trait system. The idea was good, but it was not well executed, and the game got worse for it. Now, they are changing traits to make them simpler to get again (in fact, simpler than the first system), while also making them easier to understand and that would make sense with the new specialization system.

Players expected new elite skills to be earned, but Anet decided to lock all the traits. One of the worst decisions of this game.

Imagine if they made necro minions static. Necros would be upset too.

Oxidia.8103:

That’s why i only convert gold to gems. No gold=no gems for me, no regrets later on i spent my irl money on in game vanity items that don’t effect my preformance ingame whatsoever.

But do you regret spending all that time grinding for gold? That’s the real issue here. A subscription would let you do multiple tasks to achieve your gear and items, but in GW2, there is only one way to get the gem store items, and that is grinding for gold. to exchange it for gems. People value their time more than their money/gold.

I guess they didn’t learn from the original trait redesign. It was and always will be a disaster for alts. Which dev actually thinks this would be fun?

Seera.5916:

DJRiful.3749:

I find that GW2 is a much more expensive game than a sub base game. That money can get you 2 months sub and game items are not limited to real life money even if it is not pay 2 win items.

I prefer sub base game because I can get all the items I wanted without paying $20 for one piece and $20 for another piece. That is equivalent to 4 mths of sub.

And I prefer buy to play games like GW2. Because I can budget out and justify an initial payment. Depending on sub price I may not be able to budget it. And I can’t justify it for myself. I sometimes take breaks from games and paying a sub would make me feel guilty for taking a break, even if the break would cause me to play the game for longer than if I hadn’t taken the break. And I can’t afford a sub unless it’s like $3 a month.

And I wonder how many GW2 players are in the same boat as me. Playing this game because it doesn’t have a sub and would be forced to stop playing it if they added a sub. Even those players who would be willing to pay a sub if they could afford it.

And would a sub bring in the money that those who leave the game due to it being a sub or reduce their gem purchases drastically?

The sub is irrelevant though. Millions of players are willing to pay for one. Just look at WoW and FFXIV:ARR, then look at B2P & F2P games, and you’ll see that their numbers are struggling. Just look at Wildstar, a game that was subscription but is now going to F2P. It had nothing to do with the sub model, but the quality of the game. Look at GW1 too, a B2P game which never had the success of GW2, and it was always lowly populated compared to other subscription games at that time.

Treating this game too casual takes it’s toll on a healthy playerbase and economy. If there’s too few people playing, events become much harder and dungeon groups take longer to find. WvW gets imbalanced, and so on. When people are paying a subscription, they are going to try to get the most out of their money before their time is up. You might not have enough time, but plenty of others do.

lordkrall.7241:

And how many of those “every other big MMO” does not require a subscription to play?

Make sure to make the character the “right” way from the start if it is such big of an issue to pay a rather small amount of gems to change it later.

They need to get money from somewhere. And I for one prefer if it is for things like these instead of from selling game-effecting stuff.

By that logic, they should charge for dying armor too. People should get their colors the “right” way from the start. All dye previews should be disabled, and the only way to see them is to purchase them first.

The point is, where does it stop? Why does it stop at character customization? Why not restrict people to one armor set, and then charge gems for each new armor piece they acquire? Want to equip it? Too bad, now get charged 100 gems to do it. Why stop there though? They could charge for swapping out sigils and runes, or new utility skills.

Since you seem to assume they are so starved for money, “they need to get money from somewhere”, this should be reasonable right? It’s people like you who blindly accept everything they do, which makes the RMT model so insidious at times.

At the least, they should let us preview the new character customization options. Currently, there’s no option.

Sube Dai.8496:

Totally agree. Even though some of the female models have thinner frames the boobs are still way too big. It makes them look like a porn star from the 80s…

And that’s not a good thing.

They look really bad. The breasts look like they were attached with super glue. They aren’t even smoothed and the shading and skin tone are unevenly matched, and it’s very noticeable and unnatural.

A race change would be complicated, because the personal story is based on race. They would have to rework a lot of code to change it. It’s possible, but i doubt it would be first on their priorities.

As for the Total Makeover Kits, i wish they would introduce a barber shop system in-game. They could let people change the basics for free, and then they could charge gems for the newer changes. This would actually let people preview them without having to buy a kit first. It would also entice more sales. A system like swtor could work.

“Endgame” usually refers to content, for players that reach maximum level.

These are usually dungeons, raids, or pvp, where gear acquisition is the primary motivation to do them.

Anything that requires level 80 in GW2, could be considered “endgame”.

Wuselknusel.4082:

nexxe.7081:

Wuselknusel.4082:

nexxe.7081:

NikeEU.7690:

Morfedel.4165:

maha.7902:

how to get rid of stacking

step 1: make a group specifying no stacking
step 2: complete dungeon without stacking

mission successful

did you happen to notice another post in here where he tried that and couldn’t get a group to join him?

It worked when I did it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jra3jV_ckYg

Glad to see all the responses in this thread from people who are completely clueless about the game’s mechanics or game design in general.

That video didn’t prove a thing. It just shows that you can form a group. It didn’t show any comparison with a “meta” group.

Why compare? Tell me, I’m curious. Do you want to be as effective as a meta group?

Comparisons offer an analysis. Efficiency should be strived for, so you don’t waste your time, or other people’s time, because people value their time. Not only that, but it shows competence in your performance, because you took the time to learn your traits, builds, and acquired specific gear, runes, sigils, etc.

When content becomes trivialized (or too complicated), due to “stacking”, or any form of “meta”, then it needs to offer alternatives to balance variety and challenge.

Just look at sports for an analogy. Anyone can go to the local basketball court and join a PUG, but it will never be as professional as a varsity team, or the NBA. Some of these people eventually move on to a more professional setting, because they want to be more efficient in their skills, while others are content to never hone their skills, which is perfectly fine.

The problem is, players are unwilling to form less efficient groups, because they see that the stacking “zerker meta” is the preferred way to play. Can you blame them? They value their time. This persuades people to stack (exceptions for certain fights), thus limiting their choices in builds and limiting their way of playing. It’s actually less variety than a trinity mmo. At least in trinity mmos, you can have 3 roles. In GW2, it’s more efficient to have one.

When Anet said “play how you want”, when referring to dungeons, i’m pretty sure they meant play whatever classes and builds you want, without being restricted to a specific role, except it didn’t turn out that way. It became one role and one meta, and they have failed to address for almost 3 years.

The funny thing is, they just removed the Practice games in SPvP.

Wait, so you say that you want to play how you want and that should then be the most efficient strategy? I see what you did there…

You’re either failing to comprehend, or i did a poor job at conveying what i meant.

People can play however they want, but when the choices become limited to one style, then it becomes a necessity, instead of a preference. Being efficient in skills shouldn’t be limited to one meta, when there could be a variety of builds, traits, and better A.I.

Take a trinity MMO for instance. 5 healers could eventually finish a dungeon, but the dungeon would take twice as long due to the lack of dps.

The same with GW2. 5 guardians with full nomad gear and dolyak runes could eventually finish a dungeon, but no sane player would want to waste their time, knowing they could just get 4 other zerker players and finish in 1/3 of the time. Now imagine if both groups had the same proficiency that was balanced with each other, and both playstyles were efficient and comparable in dungeons, finishing them in a relative time that was similar. There wouldn’t need to be 5 zerkers for everything anymore. There could be a variety of different stat combos and traits, while still letting people use their preferred builds and gear, etc.

Ayrilana.1396:

Tigaseye.2047:

pdavis.8031:

Morfedel.4165:

Stacking… is effing boring, and to be completely honest, brainless. It requires no real tactics, no thought of any kind. It doesn’t make encounters fun, it makes them lacking in challenge, strategy, and requires no real effort at outplaying the enemy.

Someone else said it earlier in the thread, but I’ll say it again.
Stacking is a legitimate tactic and strategy. Armies all over the world, going back to the days of the Romans, Greeks, Persians, etc. and even today, have used “stacking” at some point or another. The idea was to pack close together for better protection, as well as concentrated fire power. Just because “IT’S SUPER EFFECTIVE!!” doesn’t mean that it’s in anyway broken. Even if in some way, some how, stacking became impossible in GW2, within a week the players would find the next single most effective method, and that would become the norm. Until people started complaining that the “New stacking” was boring and braindead and needs to be removed in favor of a play style the OP enjoys.

No.

Well designed games manage to make each encounter unique enough that one type of method, like stacking (or any other), isn’t always used.

If people don’t realise that, I can only assume they haven’t played many other MMOs (or no good ones).

How many games use the trinity system where you need a tank to hold aggro while everyone else either spams attacks or does support? Many of them have that as the only method to do encounters in their games. I guess those are poorly designed too?

Not necessarily. There’s a lot of mechanics involved in other MMOs. Examples would be Tera and Wildstar, and yes, even in WoW. The days of tanking and spanking has been gone for almost 5+ years now.

Search for the Liadri fight in GW2 on youtube, and you’ll see how possible it is for the A.I. to be similar in dungeons. Not just that fight though, but almost all of the Queen’s Gauntlet fights. In fact, they could make that whole place as a dungeon requiring 5 players, and you’ll see that stacking would be useless in those encounters, and the berserker meta wouldn’t be as useful. They never followed through though, and dungeons could have been tuned more like these fights if they did.

The comparisons are night and day.

Queen’s Gauntlet fights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMoQaOnSqrk
GW2 dungeon stacking: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQ_CVtFRLwk

Wuselknusel.4082:

nexxe.7081:

NikeEU.7690:

Morfedel.4165:

maha.7902:

how to get rid of stacking

step 1: make a group specifying no stacking
step 2: complete dungeon without stacking

mission successful

did you happen to notice another post in here where he tried that and couldn’t get a group to join him?

It worked when I did it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jra3jV_ckYg

Glad to see all the responses in this thread from people who are completely clueless about the game’s mechanics or game design in general.

That video didn’t prove a thing. It just shows that you can form a group. It didn’t show any comparison with a “meta” group.

Why compare? Tell me, I’m curious. Do you want to be as effective as a meta group?

Comparisons offer an analysis. Efficiency should be strived for, so you don’t waste your time, or other people’s time, because people value their time. Not only that, but it shows competence in your performance, because you took the time to learn your traits, builds, and acquired specific gear, runes, sigils, etc.

When content becomes trivialized (or too complicated), due to “stacking”, or any form of “meta”, then it needs to offer alternatives to balance variety and challenge.

Just look at sports for an analogy. Anyone can go to the local basketball court and join a PUG, but it will never be as professional as a varsity team, or the NBA. Some of these people eventually move on to a more professional setting, because they want to be more efficient in their skills, while others are content to never hone their skills, which is perfectly fine.

The problem is, players are unwilling to form less efficient groups, because they see that the stacking “zerker meta” is the preferred way to play. Can you blame them? They value their time. This persuades people to stack (exceptions for certain fights), thus limiting their choices in builds and limiting their way of playing. It’s actually less variety than a trinity mmo. At least in trinity mmos, you can have 3 roles. In GW2, it’s more efficient to have one.

When Anet said “play how you want”, when referring to dungeons, i’m pretty sure they meant play whatever classes and builds you want, without being restricted to a specific role, except it didn’t turn out that way. It became one role and one meta, and they have failed to address for almost 3 years.

The funny thing is, they just removed the Practice games in SPvP.

NikeEU.7690:

Morfedel.4165:

maha.7902:

how to get rid of stacking

step 1: make a group specifying no stacking
step 2: complete dungeon without stacking

mission successful

did you happen to notice another post in here where he tried that and couldn’t get a group to join him?

It worked when I did it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jra3jV_ckYg

Glad to see all the responses in this thread from people who are completely clueless about the game’s mechanics or game design in general.

That video didn’t prove a thing. It just shows that you can form a group. It didn’t show any comparison with a “meta” group.

anabasis.7346:

If you are stacking you are voluntarily nerfing yourself.

Not really. Stacking gives you boons, healing, and protection. Staying at ranged is nerfing yourself. People also stack in WvW because of this.