Guild Wars 2

Kaiyanwan.8521:

What many people don’t get is that actual quests (even though heart quests are a mediocre example) create a personal atmosphere…

This and also they are good at bringing players together.
If I were to make a heart quest today the “quest giver” would have several hearts to complete based on what’s going on around them. Sandstorm? Devourers. Champ up? Bring it down. Nearby Events? Go help. No Sandstorm? Prepare for sandstorm.

The idea is that these guys don’t have to be one quest wonders. They don’t even have to stay in one place. For casual players like me hearts are a way for me to make sure that I experience the full zone. Also give me something new to spend karma on.

FrostSpectre.4198:

…
Vulnerability would also increase condition dmg inflicted.

Critical conditions, that use Crit dmg to boost condition dmg.

“Stacking power up”, inflicting powerful special condition on set amount of specific condition stacks.
…

This is a really good summary of the proposals from the players. I just want to add one.

Conditions get consumed by certain attacks allowing more conditions to be applied.

This can work two ways:
1. Certain attacks do extra damage if there are say five or more stacks of a condition consuming the conditions in the process. So basically a new way to spike.

2. Certain attacks convert stacks of regular conditions to special conditions. For example five stacks of bleeding can be converted to a condition called gash that mathematically is just five stacks of bleeding sped up a little bit. Vulnerability could be converted to a condition that causes all attacks to crit. And so on…

Though I suspect that Anet is not short on ideas. There must be some other reason for them not addressing this “problem.” Maybe they think it’s fine the way it is.

Pray For Kosmos.5849:

Hearts give you a chance to slow down and take the story line in and help common folk with their issues…

I whole heartily agree with this. I never played GW1 so the only way I know what’s going on in the game is through hearts. And while I like the southsun zone I have no idea why anything that happens there happens. I really hope that Anet hasn’t abandoned hearts all together. I’m sure if they think about it a little bit they can integrate them into the dynamic event system somehow… Also we need more karma vendors; I’m loaded.

MakubeC.3026:

… where traps can be used twice.

Traps are bad now. What your suggesting shouldn’t be a trait. Traps should work that way untraited.

Does anyone still run 2/6/0/0/6?

Trade Secrets –
Caltrops are now ground targeted
Scorpion Wire teleports it’s target to you
Haste will chill your target
Roll for initiative grants 1 sec of stability

Master Trapper –
All traps create fields when triggered
Tripwire -> smoke
Shadow -> dark
Needle -> poison
Ambush -> lighting

Am I the only one that want LA to be a dungeon? You know since there is a dragon under it?

Star Jewel.5048:

Lishtenbird.2814:

if we have a single boss at a time, we’ll always have to fight with the full zerg, and I think I don’t have to tell developers that killing Frozen Maw or Inquest Golem with 5 people is a lot faster and more fun than a 10-minute auto-attack on a gigantic HP bag upscaled by a large zerg who had no other bosses to do anyway. This is a design decision which will make the game less comfortable with the new system.

Holy crickets, yes. I’ve stumbled onto the world event reset train once or twice. It was uncomfortable and not fun. I bailed after one event. Whereas the times that I’ve 2- or 3-manned Fire Shaman have been very fun, challenging, memorable experiences. (Can’t say Golem is challenging to even solo, but it’s a lot faster and more fun.)

This is more of a problem with event scaling than with scheduling. Scheduling events is a good thing but I agree it will make the issues with scaling much more apparent than it already is.

This is such a simple idea bit I can see something like this moving players around the map. I for one would log on look for the zone’s in the dark phase and go there. Hopefully other like minded players would do the same so we could all play together.

Zaoda.1653:

OMG please no. I played Runescape for 10 years, and the randoms drove me nuts. They didn’t even get rid of the bots properly as they should have done in the first place – in the end it was just a nuisance for all players :-/

What if they made the loot worth it like a huge load of the resources that you were trying to gather and special gathering tools that give bonuses to getting rare items?

For example if you are gathering from a ancient sapling an ancient treent (elite) spawned and tried to stop you (my experience is that elites are solaoble if you are careful). If you win you get like 50 ancient logs a few hidden treasures and an axe that has +25 to fining rare material. If you loose it protects the node it came from but creates an event so other people know its there.

The Lions Arch event got me thinking that there should be events in cities. The events in Ebon Hawke are fun why not the other cities? I can see players stopping bank robberies / hunting down the bank’s gold, preventing kidnappings or finding victims, corralling lost orphans, organizing the city watch, rerouting magical matrixes, repairing city infrastructure after failed experiment s, stopping fights, growing building, etc.

I think the trick would be to make them more scavenger hunt/ puzzle oriented vs combat oriented. For example if the bank is closes because it got robbed players would have to search for clues to find the hideout and then work out how to open the door before taking on the big bad bandit. Maybe they can build some randomness into the event so people who’ve done it once wont automatically know where all of the pieces are.

I know some people will complain about city services not being available but honestly there are six (five?) cities so if a bank in closed in divinity you can always go to hoelbrak or rata sum or somewhere else.

It would be awesome to go to Rata Sum and find a device that you could watch dungeon runs on. I would watch people run places that I’ve never been to so I wouldn’t be such a noob on my first real run though. Also would be pretty cool knowing that you are being watched so you can show off your best moves.

Rainbow Sprint.3215:

… What are we gonna have a monster made out of string for tailors? How would it even spawn? What about for leatherworkers?…

I just want to add my support to string and leather monsters. Animated dolls perhaps?

Yeah … if clear the area around them they should no longer be contested. Instead we have to wait for the events to run.

Also capturing WP in wvw would be very interesting as well.

I like this idea. Just change champ to elite and give a rich vein load of loot and we are in business.

I ran full carrion with my thief for a while with deadly arts/trickery. It worked.

I hope they do raise it but I hope they do it in a sneaky way. Don’t call it a level call it a rank.
That way they don’t have to add more armor and everyone can keep their ascended but earning ranks can give you access to things like talents and abilities. I would also tie ranks to upgrades like runes and sigils.

Using skill points would be a perfect way to increase rank.

If you are willing to give on the tanky part. Air ele might work. I gravitated to it because of the instant cast (septer/dagger) and blinds. It’s not to far from home if you are comfortable with a thief.

Truth is that there is no reason for Karma jugs or any size to exist in the game anymore. They were only good for transferring karma from one character to another. With currencies being account wide we should just be awarded with the karma as the “physical” object serves no purpose other than filling up your bags and making you click.

I still think that getting a guard’s permission to duel is the best solution.

Two players walk up to a guard and tell it they want to duel. The guard says ok and counts down from three and the fight starts. If the guard is near a bank or trading post they can just say no. If the guard gets involved in any kind of dynamic event the duel ends. It also address the concern about duel request spam because there wont be any; a NPC starts the fight.

Also having a guard ref makes it feel less like a random fight and more like a contest (for those with rp inclinations). The guard could comment on the fight and other nearby npcs could come a watch.

Other benefits would be possibility of time limits, possibly making wagers, dueling not being allowed everywhere on the map, purchasable refs at the black lion, making the world feel more alive.

nopoet.2960:

There should be one on one dueling refereed by a guard. Both players walk up to a guard and tell it they want to duel and the guard will allow it and monitor the fight (no duel request directly with other players).

Another thing is that the guard could take bets. That way you can duel for gold!

One of these days I going to write a long post about how all the major cities should specialize in different aspects of the game. What relevant here is that the Black Citadel would make a perfect pvp capital. Anyway…
1. The floor of the Bane should just be tagged as a FFA area plain and simple. 2. There should be a drink at every bar that marks you for pvp. This would only work in the Black Citadel and is completely consensual. If you want to pvp buy a brew and get busy. 3. There should be one on one dueling refereed by a guard. Both players walk up to a guard and tell it they want to duel and the guard will allow it and monitor the fight (no duel request directly with other players).

I was sure this would be about making weapons shiny…

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Sociopolitical Diversification: Player housing (Customizable from rewards gained in the open world), Guild Halls (Customizable from mass play rewards) and Zone Dominance through Faction Alliances (Leading to both individual and group rewards such as titles and skins)

Does this mean WvW gameplay for pvers?

Frostpyro.5942:

The solution to this has already been discussed in many topics. ArenaNet needs to have mobs attack more frequently rather than in huge chunks. The reason we run berserkers gear is because there is NO need for survivability if we can dodge 99% of the abilities and attacks. Anything we cant dodge we can blind, reflect, or block. For us to stack toughness and vitality atm would just be kind of pointless in PvE to be honest.

What if every 100 points in toughness over 1216 increased your maximum endurance pool?
What if every 100 points in vitality over 1216 increased endurance regeneration?
Would that be enough to entice people out of zerker gear? The theory being that defense stats don’t really improve your survivability once you know when/how to dodge. So lets give defensive stats real survivability though dodging.

FrenchyIsDrunk.4703:

…I was thinking of making a thief as my first character because i find it cool enough and was wondering if anyone had tips …

FrenchyIsDrunk

Learn early how to use your blinding skills. Leveling would have been so much easier for me if I didn’t ignore those until I was 80.

Hopefully it’s to late post more about subclasses.

Seems like the right thing to do is to tie them in with the orders like someone said earlier. Maybe they give you two options. For example my thief is in the priory and maybe they have subclasses called scholar and explorer. I would talk to a quest giver maybe duel the the classes to see what they are about and decide what path I want to take. A quest giver would give me a thing/have me build a thing/tell me to find a thing and take it to a spot in the open world (maybe your character is the thing and you have to do something at the right place). Anyway when the right thing gets fitted to the right place a dynamic event starts and if you are successful you earn you your subclass (if you fail you have to get another thing or repair it perhaps).

The subclass would come with utility skills that can be purchased with skill points but it also comes with a new trait bar. To unlock those tiers you need to continue to work for your order using the questing method described above.

Another thing I would like to see is access to new weapon skills. A subclass will either give you more skills for a weapon that you already know or access to a completely new weapon. It really gets tricky here since subclasses aren’t based on your primary class (in this concept). I would recommend that subclasses only deal with melee weapons or horns because a caster can use a melee weapon but there are no instances so far where marshall characters use magic things. Anyway in the case of access to a new weapon it works just like learning standard weapon you equip and learn. In the case of new skills for a known weapon you would have to select the new skill (like selecting utility skills) and learn.

It’s a problem with channeled skills. I notice on my ele that if I’m channeling my 1 air skill and the target dies I keep attacking until the cycle is over. Someone just need to add code saying if you loose your target your channel is interrupted. I don’t know all the ways to loose a target but death and stealth should definitely be on the list.

Got to this thread late and I tried and failed to read everything so forgive me if these aren’t new ideas.
1. Art progression – please give us new animations for skills that we have traited. For example if a thief picks up the Mug trait his steal shadow step should be red instead of black. Simple things like that..

2. Skill progression – Tie some skills to stats. For example if a warrior gets to 1800 non buffed power they get access to a new cool utility skill that is a blast finisher. Or if he gets an equally high toughness stat she might get a skill that ignores all non critical damage for a while. I don’t know the number but I do know there are sweet spots where trades offs start to happen. That’s the target stat area. Hopefully this is clear enough to understand what I’m proposing.

3. Character progression – A. please do more with the priory/whispers/ etc. It felt like a big decision when you made it but it seems like there should be more content related to it. B. we need more irrevocable choices. Currently we have race/gender/class/faction everything else in this game can be taken back. I submit that for a decision to matter it has to be permanent. If you do subclasses or specialties make them matter.

Also would love to see skill points get a challenge mode again on a month cool down.

I like hearts because they gave me an excuse to get out in the open world and explore. Even though I’ve done every heart in the game I would love an excuse to revisit some of the zones again. I know there is nothing stopping me from doing that now but it would be nice to have a focal point.

So anyway here are my suggestions:
1. CHALLENGE MODE HEARTS: When you complete a heart it unlocks a challenge mode – the challenge mode could be anything… Do it again with in a time limit, don’t use any utilities skills, use this (temporary) weapon, spray this stuff that will turn enemies into vets, don’t dodge, complete the task transformed into a bunny…whatever. The devs are creative. The thing with challenge mode is that its repeatable on a very long cool down like a month. That way it encourages players to move around an not just farm the same heart.

2. LEVEL LOCKED HEARTS: Basically hard task in low level zones. Don’t ask me how to do that (maybe these are group hearts?). The big idea is that these open up new level 80 karma vendors all over the world. Again once these are complete it unlocks a related challenge mode.

3. DYNAMIC HEARTS: The heart moves based on the condition of surrounding events. You are encouraged to complete dynamic events and are rewarded based with a temporary karma vendor.

Lian Olsam.9541:

In dungeons dps is better then anything, so glasscannon is a must for hardcore and elitists, mob and bosses hit hard but it seems full glassy party have a faster way for compete it…

Couldn’t this be resolved if they increased the armor on certain enemies?

Elbegast.6970:

…

For a Living Story, we need:…
Shorter story arcs, more zone-by-zone storytelling …

Just thought this was a very interesting idea. There is no reason that the the Living Story has to focus on big huge events. It might be interesting to see how the regular everyday people cope with the changing world. In fact it would be easier to feel like a hero in a smaller story.

ColinJohanson.2394:

So how would you try and solve this? And a second question is how far would you like to see the impact of say a tower in Kessex be felt content wise? The balance here is of course total volume of work for those involved, to literally have the entire world react to what’s going on would take us 6+ months to build, which at that point isn’t actually meeting our goals of a regularly changing and evolving world.

I would like to see the spores stick around and act like a virus. Every once in a while a spore will touch down and start an event where the players have to purge the area. If the players fail the spores spawn one of those mini towers that we’ve been cutting down and depending on how the story plays out the toxic alliance or corrupted versions of local inhabitants will protect it. If the players fight and win the mini tower goes away. If the players fail to down the tower it spits out another spore and starts the process again in another part of the zone. Perhaps the mini tower eventually dies but the corrupted natives or toxic alliance stick around.

On a completely different note Bobby said something earlier in the thread that’s been really bugging me. Essentially he said the the personal story is getting in the way of the living world; static story vs living world. Have you guys ever thought about moving the personal story entrances to the personal instance? It already reads like a background story anyway just emphasize that point and put a “travel point” in the personal instance so you guys can free yourselves from requirement to keep parts of the world static?

BobbyStein.2315:

nopoet.2960:

As a complete aside, I would love to see some experiments in dynamic events where failure doesn’t stall the event but progresses it in a different direction.

Interesting idea. Can you provide an example of how you would imagine it working?

Sure I’ll give it a shot. Broadly our missions are attack, defend, retreat. If the players fail an attack, usually the thing that the npcs are holding just stays held. What I’m suggesting is that npcs show a little more initiative. They have the same three basic options counter attack, dig in, or retreat. A counter attack may mean expanding until the entire map is taken over. In this situation it might be interesting for players to build a small command post to coordinate attacks; maybe Jerry rig a temporary way point maybe the waypoint is moble. NPCs can dig in by sending out patrols. In this case players can work on eliminating patrols and start working on attack plan b (someone mentioned this earlier). The NPCs can choose to retreat but for that to make sense you would need larger objectives and this is generally the condition for victory so let’s leave that off the table for now.

That’s the general framework I would use. Both sides actively choosing to attack, defend and retreat. How they do that depends on the who the npc are.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

A number of you mentioned consequences for failure. This is something we discuss a lot and is quite complex. I would ask that we continue to discuss this topic in the thread.

I think it is important to write failure into the living story itself. It’s kind of there now but in a half kitten way. We didn’t get Scarlet but we didn’t really lose anything either. Let’s say she was successful in her assassination attempt of the queen. Immediately you have a power vacuum needing to be filed. We already have powerful human actors on the edges that would love to either cease control or toss it off. Second, the player would want revenge. Third how would the char react… some would definitely see it as an opportunity. Fourth, with the human nation distracted centaurs and bandits will have greater freedom to take land so they have to be fought back… and so on and so forth.

But I understand it is a balance: Take to much and we have nothing left to fight for… take to little and we have nothing to fight about.

As a complete aside, I would love to see some experiments in dynamic events where failure doesn’t stall the event but progresses it in a different direction.

Finally, I just want you guys to know that I think you all are rockstars and there is no way I would want my work to be open to so much “constructive criticism” 24 hours a day every day.

What if Anet gave us epic escort missions that zig zag though the whole zone setting off pumped up versions of dynamic quest and spawning champs? Do you think anyone would do it?

Galen Grey.4709:

nopoet.2960:

Galen Grey.4709:

Change doesnt mean new dungeons, change means well things are different then what they used to be before that change. I understand what you’re saying and so does arenanet thats why they promised to get MF back as a fractal after all. That however doesnt change the point that change does happen as the living story plays its course. Those NPCs are just used and thrown away. Both Braham and Rox+frostbite played central part in other LS releases like Scarlet’s funhouse and the refugees where the central theme for the secrets of southsun.

These changes had no impact on gameplay. We have a new area where nothing happens and new npcs that don’t do anything. MMO’s have been doing this forever. I expect more from this game. How hard would it have been to add a heart related to the new town or a new dynamic event to the area surrounding it.

I seriously doubt a new heart will make a difference though yeah I would like that too. That being said its important to point out plenty of living story releases did do that. The Secrets of southsun left quite a few new dynamic events behind as well as crap toss. Dragon bash left the moa race and southsun survival, The Sky pirates left not so secret JP, Bazaar left Blecher’s bluff and Sanctum sprint , The jubilee left the invasions, Twilight assault left the “new” path. Pretty good change the new LS release will leave some new dynamic events behind to at least until we solve this issue if the nightmare tower.

Yet despite all these changes (never mind the story / geography and character changes) a lot of people claim the LS doesnt change anything. You honestly think a new heart / dynamic event here and there will tip the scale?

You’ll get no argument from me about Southsun. It was well done.

However, a few mini games and changes to an instanced areas doesn’t really make the world feel alive. What would make the world feel alive is seeing how npc react to new opportunities/challenges after the players solve whatever conflict we resolve. For example if I were leading the sons of svanir you better believe that I would be trying to get my hands on molten alliance gear after the players took them down a notch. And the flame legion and dredge just ignore each other now? I find that hard to swallow.

Anet has to think past the initial conflict. It’s not the conflict that makes the world feel alive it’s the worlds reaction to the conflict.

So to answer your question yes, I do think that a few hearts and dynamic events chains will tip the scale. Hopefully we will see something left over from the toxic alliance.

This small suggestion is inspired by the champ trains in Queensdale and Frostgorge and I like to call it the Champ Walk.

There should be an escort missions in every zone that zig zags though the map. To start the event you need 10 players (think WvW break out). This escort will trigger every event that it passes but not just the normal event, a pumped up version that spawns champions. The rest of the escort rules still apply, keep the group alive if they fall rez to continue. People could add and drop as desired and at the end the mission the npc(s) takes a break then after a cool down is ready to run it again in the opposite direction.

This way we can play the dynamic events that the devs worked so hard to create. The success of the champ trains proves that this is something that people want (casual group content with good rewards). Why not just give it to us.

There are a million way to justify the escort in game; I’m looking for my brother, patrol duty, we be pirates looking for loot, I just want to see it all cooooo, I want to make a name for myself and so on and so forth.

Does anyone else think this could work? I, for one, bore of pig>troll>oak>spider>(wasp)>repeat.

Galen Grey.4709:

Think what would happen? you got no guarantee you’re going to kill the dragon and you’ll end up with a lot of losses. Meanwhile scarlet’s forces would have an easy time conquering the zone seeing as the warriors are out attacking the dragon. Once scarlet forces take over a zone easily its almost certain they’ll move on the adjestant areas and take advantage from the reduced resistance.

But Scarlett doesn’t take over the zone. She just leaves even if she wins…

Galen Grey.4709:

Change doesnt mean new dungeons, change means well things are different then what they used to be before that change. I understand what you’re saying and so does arenanet thats why they promised to get MF back as a fractal after all. That however doesnt change the point that change does happen as the living story plays its course. Those NPCs are just used and thrown away. Both Braham and Rox+frostbite played central part in other LS releases like Scarlet’s funhouse and the refugees where the central theme for the secrets of southsun.

These changes had no impact on gameplay. We have a new area where nothing happens and new npcs that don’t do anything. MMO’s have been doing this forever. I expect more from this game. How hard would it have been to add a heart related to the new town or a new dynamic event to the area surrounding it.

ColinJohanson.2394:

So a fun question to ask to help direct the conversation a bit: What aspects of your favorite television shows would you think would be cool to see reflected in a game medium?

When I think about the living world I’m really thinking about two different things; 1. the world itself and 2. the actual story. You can have a really good story that changes nothing in the world. Star Trek Voyager for instance. It was a good show but at the end of most episodes nothing really changed. On the other hand you have a show like Babylon 5. The plot moved right along. There was a direction.

For me, personally, I place more value in the malleability in the world then I do on the story. I can accept a crappy story if I can see that it had an impact because ultimately the story that I’m really interested in is my own characters.

I guess what I’m saying is don’t turn the game into the Simpsons. It has longevity but it’s been the same for over a decade. Be Battlestar Galactica and have an end game and when that is done find us another perspective explore.

The way that Southsun evolved was beautiful. We found it, fought back some of its most pressing dangers, settled it, and are now dealing with ongoing threats. So I have confidence that Anet can execute on the living story concept and I think when you start opening new areas to play in it will go well.

The challenge comes where we have zone already full of dynamic events. For example, the molten alliance is just gone? There is no trace of them; no artifacts, no hold outs, no left over technology, no salvage, no norn/dredge babies, nothing? Something happened in those zones we should be left with at the very minimum a new dynamic event or two.

My only suggestion is to use the systems that you already have because they are good. Dynamic events are awesome and the game needs more of them (which means implement them in a way that allows you to leave them in once the episode is over). I would even like to see new hearts related to the living story. What about vistas that retell the story? These are the things that made me love the game in the first place. Please make more.

Oct – 29:
Since thieves like pistol whip, all pistol attacks are now melee range. Additionally, pistol whip no longer stuns.

I like the downed state but I agree that it could use some tweaks
Perhaps:
1. One kill means one rally
2. Limit the number of people that can rez a person while in combat to two or diminishing returns
3. Give certain pve enemies a finisher

Also like the idea of enemies having a downstate in pve ie Scarlett invasion.

Basilisk venom should really be a 1.5 second daze and immobilize. The devs shouldn’t have created a unique condition just for one skill. I think that is the heart of the issue with this skill. If they went that route they could have also created a condition that knocks out defiant then other classes could have used it in their elites but that’s getting way off topic.

With all of the changes that basilisk venom has undergone it is now a 1.5 stun with a 1.5 second cast time. It does still overcome defiant in pve but it doesn’t seem to warrant elite status.

My suggestion is to simply drop the casting time and change it to a 1.5 second daze and immobilize. Immobilize can be cured and daze can be improved. It seems like a fair trade off. Of course I would still like to see it overcome defiant so if it has to be split pvp and pve so be it.

I’ve run the build in the in OP. It is a lot of fun. You can unload almost non stop if you want because you are regenerating int so quickly from your crits (opportunist).

The only thing I would suggest is a sigil of endurance for extra dodges (this is your only defense). Since you hit so many targets you will have almost infinite endurance. People should try it out before it’s “fixed.”

I keep seeing these threads. Be careful what you ask for because part of the solution, as I see it, is to give bosses access to condition removal.

TheTaffer.8761:

i do like the idea behind the auto attack but i can see it being abused in WvW with thieves being about to shoot you from places you can not shoot back (back edge of the wall or even behind the wall)

I know I’m pushing the envelope but what if you still have a to be able to see the target on your screen. That would mean your target has to be on your screen and you have to be facing it but if there is some object between your target and your weapon it’s not a problem.