Guild Wars 2

silvermember.8941:

l the time. The ones who don’t want to buy it can stick with EB, even if it kills WvW let’s be honest here I doubt it will affect Arenanet bottomline significantly.

Whilst it’ll be a small number of players that don’t buy the expansion and play WvW, it’ll be extremely bad publicity for them if they shut out even a small number of players from a game mode they’d been playing for years.

Just look at the backlash when they removed the ability to convert custom amounts of gems and gold.

BrunoBRS.5178:

Siphaed.9235:

BrunoBRS.5178:

^ having the new borderland as expansion-only would effectively kill WvW for good. imagine if every few weeks, all of tyria except orr was completely locked out from PvE players, for an entire week, maybe even several weeks, unless they had the expansion.

that’s pretty much what would happen in WvW terms if the new borderland was expansion-gated.

Why are you assuming that it’s going to be only available every few weeks? Right now I’m pretty sure that all 5 maps -Borderlands x3, Edge of the Mists, and Eternal Battlegrounds- are accessible right now. The only limitation to them is the # of players that are able to get into the map, which leaves a queuing system. [EotM being the exception with the infinite map numbers generated through population balance for overflow.]

So they add a 6th map that is Expansion Only, how does that kill WvW? Sure there will be like a 90min+ queue to get into it, but that is really nothing new to GW2 players. Remember the 4-6hr queues during the game’s 1st season? How it was nearly impossible for people to get into EB because the popularity due to it being the only map with a giant castle in it? Players will still play the other maps while waiting in queue to get into that other map too.

because they confirmed they’ll replace the current borderlands with the new map, as part of a rotation system. so there would be weeks where the only thing non-expansion players can do is EotM and EB (and if they make a new EB in another expansion, not even that).

This. This is the reason I said that.

Well I’m sure there’ll be some free feature packs eventually and the living story should continue, too.

WvW will only change in that you’ll have a new map to play on some weeks (they can’t expansion lock this new map, I refuse to believe they’d break WvW like that) and you’ll have a new class and people with new builds to fight.

Moldur.6275:

Stop demanding Anets response for your unconsidered questions.

It is a whole kitten expansion for you to explore, it is a jungle duh. In multiple zones. In different biomes. In different layers.

Dude did you even read yesterdays blogpost? Adventures are kitten solo content.

Maybe you missed that mastery points will be added to the whole world? I am starting to think your ability to read is the reason for your failure here.

And maybe you missed the new legendaries coming?

And nerfing classes in PvE? Yea its not like everyone are facerolling zerker already, we need to get STRONGER! Not…

Really, the amount of childish dissapointment posts are too kitten high.

He seemed content with the answers he got, you could have just let the thread die instead of shouting at the guy.

catsunami.8437:

Or axe, or shield…

That doesn’t leave very much though since eles conjure pretty much everything either way?

Elementalist with a gun of any sort just seems ridiculous. In my head I’m (for w/e reason) imagining Gandalf with a sniper rifle shooting orcs… :P

Woops, I was thinking I missed a few.

A gun that shoots elemental projectiles could be fun, more of a midranged, fast paced weapon.

catsunami.8437:

I hope it is not just a single choice. If it was, then necros get GSs, but why necros? Maybe my ele would like a GS.

I know I sound like an old person, but I necros are OP enough that they don’t need to get GSs. grumble grumble kids on the lawn

I will settle for a hammer on the ele though. I guess.

Well the Necro GS may not necessarily be any good.

There was a theory that the Ele wouldn’t get greatsword, hammer or shortbow since using certain skins on these weapons could be confused with the summoned weapons.

Hylox.9746:

yeah i thought so… really don’t want to spend $100 or more just to fix a HUD on a game i hardly play anymore… maybe anet should fix the text for the smaller interface sizes, couldn’t be that hard to fix the text, could it?

The text issue could be tied to your TV, I plugged my TV into my computer at one point and the text was horrid no matter what I changed.

Hylox.9746:

unfortunately no… even if i put everything on low while in 720p or 1080p the best fps i get is 15~18 while i can get up to 40 fps on my current settings and most things are on medium setting while a few are on high at my current res

Darn, then I’m afraid your best option is looking into upgrading your computer and monitor setup since your hud issues are stemming from that.

butch.8136:

Guild halls, progression, endgame, precursor crafting, etc.

You could say this for everything. All these things have been requested for a long time. Did they ever say that precursor crafting would be ‘free’?

Nope. But to be fair, at the time this was all discussed they were prepping for a feature pack and announced they would work it into a new rewards system later and this was during the time they kept stating they had no plans for expansions so it was generally assumed to be free.

Hylox.9746:

if i increase my res i get massive hit to fps… could be due to 1 to 2 things maybe both.
1) i have a geforce 430 gt
2) i’m using a Vizio 32" led TV cuz i also have a xbox 360 and nintendo wii hooked up… my pc is hooked up via hdmi

Any chance you could lower your in game graphics to compensate for the fps drop when increasing the resolution?

sorudo.9054:

you also need time every day….and my memory has bigger holes in it then cheese with mouse holes…..

Set an alarm on your phone when you usually have downtime to at least log into the game, the log in rewards are worth it, takes 30 seconds

tigirius.9014:

I agree. I think the game needs to have at least two to begin with especially if they are releasing this somewhere around November, that’s plenty of time to increase the size of your crew to get it done. Even the Asurans know that.

A few people in the forums seem to agree that November is a bit late for a release.

Sounds more like they’ll release between late April and sometime in May if the beta goes well.

Hylox.9746:

current 1360×766 or whatever the second number is
[IMG]http://i57.tinypic.com/1764h3.jpg[/IMG]

to something like this maybe smaller
[IMG]http://i60.tinypic.com/2ebzdwi.png[/IMG]

i would switch the HUD size to small but the text is bugged

Ouch, that’s pretty bad, can your monitor go up in resolution?

Mine currently looks like this (first image) and can be changed to (second image)

lordkrall.7241:

I think you overestimate how many that care about the Precursor hunt or who even knew it was a requested thing.

Don’t really see much of an issue with it either. Unless they remove to ability for them to drop and be sold nothing will really change for people that don’t buy the expansion (except possibly making it easier to get a hold of one due to lower prices on the TP).

Doesn’t really matter how many people knew it was requested, the fact that they seem to be using something long sought after and long promised to boost sales is in poor taste.

It’s well within their right, and it won’t stop me buying the pack but I just disagree that it’s the right call.

Hylox.9746:

what the heck happened to exploration?

Is Soloing going to be forever screwed?

why not give all existing maps explosive content?

why not give a good reason to revisit all the areas in the game and not just the new areas?

why can’t solo content be just as good as zerg content?

why not make weapon and armor skins look awesome for a change?

why oh why do the classes get nerfs while in PvE [in pvp the nerfs make sense] while the enemies get buffed?

is there ever going to be a way to switch to a basic HUD that takes up much less of the game screen? [this game looks epic and having this feature would reduce clutter all over the screen so you can enjoy the scenery much more. i like to hit ctrl+shift+h to get rid of my HUD cuz this game looks so good, but then i can’t see my health and dmg]

I’ve not had much of an issue soloing content on PvE maps like the Silverwastes, you’ll have to group up for some content, but you can definitely solo a bunch of it.

The mastery system may bring new content to the old maps.

I like the look of a lot of the armour and weapon skins.

Content is getting harder because with the current zerker meta, people are stacking and rushing through content that is supposed to be slightly challenging.

Can you take a screenshot of your hud? I’m playing on a 1920×1080 screen and don’t find my screen cluttered. You can also turn the party window to a “raid” mode that only shows healths and names, remove the “story” window from the top right and make the chat transparent and make the minimap smaller to make you more room if you desire.

Instant 80. After 13 or so level 80s of different builds and playstyles, I don’t imagine it would take me more than an hour or two to get the hang of this new class and have a playable build ready.

The problem with leveling the slow way, in my opinion, is that playing prelevel 80 is vastly different than playing a fully specced level 80 character and I’d like to avoid any nasty habits I might pick up by going slowly.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Legendary-Weapons-an-appeal-to-ArenaNet/page/2#post4767102

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Legendary-Weapons-in-Heart-of-Thorns/first#post4763798

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Preview-of-new-legendary-weapons/first#post4765737

I know the search feature doesn’t work great, but there was already 3 topics on the front page/page 2.

Bryzy.2719:

Or we could have an elite AoE skill with a 5000 radius, insta-full health heals for errybaddy, immunity to conditions, immunity to damage, quickness, fury, insta-25-stacks-of-might, and it calls down Zhaitan’s wrath too. Cooldown may have to be a little longer though…maybe 120 seconds for that one?

Sounds awfully similar to this http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Tome_of_Courage :P

Bryzy.2719:

LOL yeah I knew someone would pick that up :P

This would be like a suped-up mega version… I would like more supporty-healy fields though : 3

A small water field with just regen and protection might not be too bad, but I don’t think they’ll make healing spring obsolete with a weapon skill. (though they might remove healing spring for Druid, we don’t know yet)

Um… http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Healing_Spring with added protection? I doubt that’ll be it!

Mike Flavaz.2635:

We’ll have to see how it plays out, but curious to see if everyone just plays there specialization which may really limit the diversity of play from all the classes, when even compared to now.

I’d imagine everyone will at least try the specialisations but with the Druid, I’d imagine it’s more of a support/defensive spec so it wouldn’t really work too well with the Bearbow build which 90% of Rangers run right now.

PopeUrban.2578:

They alter your base mechanics, the don’t remove them.

http://www.pcgamer.com/guild-wars-2-heart-of-thorns-interview/#page-2

“That’s true with all the specialisations. You actually play the profession differently, not just in skills and traits, but in the core mechanics of those professions. Some of them will change an existing profession, some of them might give them entirely new profession abilities and remove other ones.”

To me, it sounds like they’re leaving open the possibility of removing and changing the class mechanics completely.

For example, one of the most asked for Ranger changes is to permanently stow the pet, with this, they’re leaving the possibility of removing the pet mechanic and replacing it with something else in a specialisation.

pdemo.8312:

The game was a $60 preorder and went down l ike $10 a year. As long as you don’t go over $60 on an expansion or game you’ll make more prophet. The wow expansion $50 The guild wars 1 expansions $50. It’s just how you price games

You’re thinking of Nightfall and Factions, they were FULL games, not expansions, so that justifies their $50 price.

Eye of the North seems to be in line with the content we’ll be getting here, and it was priced at around $25 at release.

WoW is a game with a highly addicted player base that pays for their subscriptions and pays a lot for expansions, that game is in a league of it’s own when it comes to that sort of thing, it’s more of an obsession than a game. Comparing it to this game which is more casual friendly is a little silly.

Assuming the Mordrem weapon skins go up in ticket pricing soon, I’d imagine they’ll be rather sought after during the expansion since they fit the jungle environment so well.

Brother Dulfite.5793:

The gamers that have been with gw2 since the beginning (including me) are going to buy the expansion happily so anet gets paid to keep making the game better. If anyone feels so self entitled that they are bitter about this game not giving you EVERYTHING for free (even though it gives out way more free updates than any other game) then that is simply sad. Developers should get paid for their work. Guildhalls, the WvW map, and everything else new even after the expansion should require the expansion. I bought this game before it launched and I haven’t spent a dime on the gem store but it’s about time I pay more for anets employees

I buy gems a lot and will 100% buy the expansion but for those who won’t or can’t, locking them out of WvW is a bit extreme, no? They paid for the base game with WvW included in it. It’s not like PvP where they can just avoid that gametype, this map will replace the borderland every few weeks, and having it locked will alienate players that don’t purchase.

You say people are “self entitled” for asking for something like that for free, but I think that the WvW map is a valid thing to ask for and lashing out at people who may not be able to purchase the expansion pack for any reason is rude and disgraceful. They want to at least be able to keep playing the things they have been thus far, they’re not asking for everything to be handed to them. We’re a good community, don’t ruin it by trying to alienate people.

BrotherBelial.3094:

They can lock out the wvw borderland if they want to. It’s not like the other 4 wvw maps will be empty. I would thing the guild halls would work like the LS. If you don’t own the expansion you must be in a party to enter the guild hall. Look at Eye of the North. People who didn’t buy it didn’t get access to any of the skills from there. Would that leave people behind?

Actually, the WvW map is said to be entering a rotation with the existing WvW borderland map. So one week it’ll be the old borderlands, the next it’ll be the new map. So one week players without the expansion wouldn’t be able to enter their WvWs borderland unless the map was free for all users. That was the point of these questions.

sorudo.9054:

Siobhan.3582:

Lazaar.9123:

You know some people actually enjoy leveling characters, right?

All while missing out on the new expansion that is for level 80’s. They will all insta level

yes, because every single player has enough tomes to even reach lvl 80……
i sure don’t, would like to but for now it’s a no go anyway because my speed on lvling is on snail pace speed…..

I didn’t have any left before they changed the dailies and now I have 45 or so just from logging in every day and taking a WvW keep whenever that daily was active. (I never did the fractal daily to get a tome, nor did I choose the tomes in the end of the “month” box)

Plus, I have 2 Instant level 20 scrolls so they’ll help.

My point is, if you log in every day and do the WvW keep dailies and Fractal dailies then you’ll have more than enough for when the expansion releases.

DevilLordLaser.8619:

Pardon me for being cynical, but ‘most likely in a couple of weeks’ doesn’t really sound like confirmation to me, and didn’t sound like such when I read that eight days ago. Heh…maybe it’s the MWO player in me, I dunno. What I do know is the longer they don’t talk about the game at all save for rehashing the PAX South presentation with interviewers, the more revved up the Hype Train gets as people get more and more desperate for something, anything, to confirm or deny increasingly wild mass speculation.

It’s good marketing. And never mind that ‘good marketing’ and ‘pure evil’ are synonymous in most every way that counts, I suppose.

I think you are being overly cynical indeed.

For now we have to go along with “it’ll likely be a couple of weeks” unless they state otherwise, we can’t start second-guessing what little information we actually get.

The reason I’d imagine the deep dives will definitely be this month is that the PAX East playable demo will be at the start of March and they’ll likely want to give people a good idea of what to expect before asking them to play it (they’ll want people to look for specific things at the demo instead of trying to break down their playtime for any and every piece of information due to lack of information on the website).

Plus, they’re going to start the beta for the expansion pack “shortly” after PAX East so it wouldn’t make sense to start the dives near the same time they’ll be organising that.

DevilLordLaser.8619:

You think we’re getting deep dives before PAX East in March?

Man, you be crazy. ArenaNet’s not gonna give us squat except the occasional slip-up driplet of information in an interview until they get it out there, and when they do anything that’s not in the demo’s still going to be “we’ll talk about that later.”

Um.. They’ve already said the deep dives start at the start of February. Don’t call me crazy unless I’ve actually warranted it!

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Questions-about-Guild-Wars-2-Heart-of-Thorns/first#post4733790

She also reconfirmed that in one of the non-stickied threads but I don’t want to have to manually look for it.

PorceleinEve.2973:

To offer us a spec during that time would mean they’ve been working on ‘em for some time now. I thought that my idea that they’ve been working on this for a long time was wrong and that the consensus here was that they only “recently” decided to go the expansion path.

Last time they gave us skills for free were like one heal skill for all and some other proff related. That’s like giving us the equivalent worth of one spec without the ulti, the trait line, the new or changed mechanic. You got to admit that if it took ’em that long for a few skills, the odds are against us here.

I think the only free content we’ll see after the expansion would be a return of the living story with one or two seasons before the next expansion.

So yes, it does sound like a totally crazy idea to me.

But let me be the first to say, I 100% wish i’m wrong on this one.

Assuming they’ve been working certain aspects of these features for at least a year and around when all of the CDIs they started, they may have some specialisations started but not yet balanced or fully built yet,. So at least the second lot of specialisations shouldn’t take as long, assuming they’re not doing them from scratch after the expansion.

Yeah, they took a while to release new traits and skills and very few of them, but they as I said above, they could have stockpiled some skills and traits that didn’t fit in the base classes without being out of place or were properly balanced. With specialisations, they can remove traits and skills to better balance new ones they place in.

I hope I’m crazy enough for both of us. I’m sure we’ll receive at least a hint of their plans when they start their deep dive on the specialisations in a week or two.

Morsus.5106:

IMO if the point of an expansion is to expand the game, most of the actual content will be in the expansion. I don’t know why it is a divisive issue over what’s fair to lock behind the expansion.

I don’t get it, either. In my mind, as long as it doesn’t lock people out of the base game, WvW and perhaps PvP being the main modes at risk here then by all rights, it should be locked.

Though guild halls being locked out for non-payers despite the guild leader having the expansion could risk the integrity of the guild system.

If the forum posts translate even slightly to the game population as a whole, it sounds like the majority of players will level their Revenant manually.

Brother Grimm.5176:

With all the free content we have gotten over the past 2.5 years, I’m just amazed that some people are still trying to make this an, “Anet is nickle and diming me!!!!”, issue.

If you don’t think the new content (when we really know what it is) does not meet your standards for cost, don’t buy it. It’s very simple.

That’s not what this thread is about, it’s about whether or not things like the WvW map and guild halls will be expansion exclusive considering they could stop people from being able to play WvW and split guild populations respectively.

PorceleinEve.2973:

You actually think that? You honestly 100% truthfully are thinking that we’ll get one (never mind 2) extra specialization for each for the 9 classes within 6 months of the expansion’s release date? Seriously? You, my friend, are having an overdose of optimism.

What you saw is what you’ll get untill the next expansion. Why would they ever, in their right minds, give you for free another 9 specs when they can package it with a few zones and sell it to you?

Nah you must be trolling us. There’s no way anyone would believe that, it’s not a realistic expectation. Check their track record.

Yes, I do think that.

Honestly, I’d say you were being more of a pessimist, and I, an optimist.

They’re billing the specialisation system as their new way of progressing the characters horizontally, it would be insane to imagine they would neglect the system within the first year.

Last time they gave us new skills etc was in the feature pack and that was free, just because they are bringing out a paid expansion doesn’t mean they’ll stop providing free content.

Is 1 specialisation within 6 months really that crazy of an idea to you?

Syione.3046:

psizone.8437:

myself.2143:

Huh, I already thought it was established that some Sylvari are strong of body mind and spirit and cannot be influenced by Mordremoth, hence PCs and certain important NPCs.

Where was this stated? (if I missed that part, I would genuinely like to read up)

The trailer shows (insert name here) saying "We are NOT all monsters. Sorry his name escapes me at the moment.

Yeah I saw that part, but it didn’t state why he wasn’t affected. Will be interesting to find out when it’s released.

lordkrall.7241:

A Massive Headache.1879:

Guild halls and wvw are kind of basic things. Also. you can’t deny that anet has done a lot of questionable things in the past 2 years. You have to understand a lot peoples skepticism

To be fair one can claim that [insert any announced feature here] is kind of basic things. So basically everything should be made available for free? What point would people have in buying the expansion in that case?

To be fair, it’s only the WvW map and the guild hall should be available for non-paying players due to the fact that the WvW map could prevent players from playing the base game entirely for a week or so during matches where that map is active and not being able to access guild halls could cause a divide in guilds in general.

draxynnic.3719:

The GW1 reps came after reps in other games… and it was horribly, horribly grindy to get to the higher tiers.

The impression from the announcement, though, is that gaining mastery points is achievement-based. Complete a particular task once – kill a boss, reach a location, complete exploration on a map – and be rewarded with mastery points. Once you’ve done that thing once, you do not get additional mastery points from repeating the same thing again.

It’s true that it wasn’t first, but considering this is a sequel, I’d have thought more people would suggest the feature from the games predecessor.

And yeah, this is sounding a lot less grindy than the old rep tracks.

PookieDaWombat.6209:

I was thinking this might be the case as well, and although I don’t necessarily like the idea of number one personally, I can see that being a thing and can totally understand it from a business standpoint. I really do hope they also give more specifics along these lines with their deep dives, but historically they have been fairly bad about it, hence my post in the first place.

BTW, thank you for actually discussing the topic.

It was a sound topic and relevant considering the deep dives will start in a week or two.

Well if they’re feeling generous they could well make it free for everyone, but like you said, they do need to keep some features to increase sales.

Lazaar.9123:

The particular specializations from the expansion will probably be locked, the system itself will not be though (for future specialization).

If the specialitions are all jungle themed similar to the Druid, then that could well be the case, especially if you think about the fact that (I think I recall anyway) they said you’d unlock the Druid abilities from within the jungle itself.

Machiavell.7396:

They listened to you, gave you expansion, NOW you cry that you gonna be gated.

Prepare to buy xpac or prepare to pay me and other heavy golds for items we gonna bring from there to you, You asked for it, you got it, cry us a river now you greedy never happy people.

You need to calm down. This is a valid worry, if the expansion releases too much content that completely alienates the people that don’t purchase it, then it could blow up in their faces.

Specifically the guild halls, considering that could split up guilds. Everything else could be locked and no-one would have the right to complain, but the halls would need to at least be open to players if their leader has the pack.

Even still, it’s highly unlikely that every single piece of content will be locked, as I stated in my post above.

Strange how people went to other MMOs first, we had reputations in Guild Wars 1 that had abilities and bonuses tied with them.

The higher the rank in the title you were, the stronger the abilities affected by that faction were.

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Ebon_Vanguard_rank

So in a way, it does sound very similar, just expanded.

myself.2143:

Huh, I already thought it was established that some Sylvari are strong of body mind and spirit and cannot be influenced by Mordremoth, hence PCs and certain important NPCs.

Where was this stated? (if I missed that part, I would genuinely like to read up)

I do recall them stating that the Sylvari were incorruptible by Elder Dragons in general, but this was theorised to be because of them being minions of another dragon already (Mordy).

1. Guild halls will probably be locked and only upgradable etc if the guild leader has the expansion (those without the pack can go in if they leader has it).
2. Revenant will be locked, it seems like this is one of the definite ones.
3. Specialisations might not be locked considering their stance of having this system to balance the game more and add more customisation in general.
4. Masteries probably won’t be locked except the ones that directly involve the jungle, those would be locked.
5. The new area will definitely be locked, as will the events and stories tied in with it.

DevilLordLaser.8619:

Again: ArenaNet has folded the promises they once made about semi-regular updates to existing professions in the form of new skills and weapons into this Specializations notion, after failing to deliver on their original promise for three years. Telling people “shut your blasted meatholes, you’ll get yours eventually you whiny jaggoff!” is both unhelpful and also not actually true. ArenaNet has told us that we will get additional specializations in the future. How quickly those specializations turn up has very, very conspicuously not been announced.

Many folks are assuming that the opening nine are simply a trial run and that once the base concept has been proven out we’ll get new specs all over the place. I think it’s far more likely that we won’t see any new specializations until the next expansion pack, or until whichever point in the Living Story where we move on to the next major area beyond the jungle. And that means that a lot of players are going to be getting nothing for quite some time to come.

I’d just like to point out that I’ve been trying to point out to people how the specialisations were going to work, why 1 specialisation as a trial run isn’t a terrible idea and that we should all be patient before crucifying Anet before they even start their deep dives with info and not once have I called someone a “whiny jaggoff” (except that one guy that started verbally abusing staff members because of the whole “paid expansion” thing).

That said, http://www.pcgamer.com/guild-wars-2-heart-of-thorns-interview/#page-2 in this interview they state that the expansion is to set the framework for the specialisations, I seriously doubt we’ll see another expansion for some time, however it’s much more likely that they’ll roll out one or two more specialisations before the years end, especially with the way they’re talking about the system being a great way to give classes different playstyles and perhaps balance the classes in areas where they were lacking.

I’m not saying we’ll get flooded with specialisations, but I’d like to think 1 or 2 within 6 months of the expansion releasing is well within reason. We’ll just need to wait a few weeks to find out either way, but try not to use the whole “but you’ll disagree with me and call me names because you’re all high and mighty” when some of us are genuinely trying to help.

DevilLordLaser.8619:

The issue, I suppose, is that some players are looking at what the specializations have to offer and realizing that their favorite class/playstyle is receiving nothing. There may be a player out there whose favorite character is his Ranger, which he deeply enjoys playing as a wily, woods-wise archer. To him, the natural magic aspects of the character are a distraction – what he enjoys is the notion of a toughened survivalist with eagle eyes and a full quiver. He doesn’t even particularly like the pet, but keeps a couple of dogs on hand because that’s innocuous enough for him to work with what he really wants to do.

This player is receiving nothing in Heart of Thorns. Those who enjoy the natural magic aspect of the Ranger and its spiritual connection with the wild get an entire new sub-profession to play with, including a new weapon, new heals, new utilities, new traits, all the saucy goodness. The hardened survivalist gets nothing. He does not get new skills. He does not get new traits. He does not get a redefined or reinvigorated profession mechanic. He may choose to do the same thing he’s been doing for three years when Heart of Thorns releases, or he may choose to take advantage of the new thing and sacrifice what he wants to do.

I know what your response is – that player is already content with his class, why should he feel any need to change it if he’s already enjoying what he is doing? This is true, and a valid point – but does it really strike you as fair that half of the Ranger’s archetypal players (the marksmen, the archers, the survivalists and rugged wilderness men) get absolutely nothing while the natural magic players, the elven protectors of the glade, and the beast-souled magicians of the woods get an entirely new advanced profession to play with?

That doesn’t strike me as fair, and I’m actually quite interested in how the Druid will work.

Whilst it might not seem “fair” to the player that isn’t interested in playing a Druid because he’d rather play as an archer, he needs to bear in mind that even though the first lot of specialisations may not cater to him, that this specialisation system will give Anet a way to add more specialisations in a “faster” and more balanced manner and one may cater to him eventually.

I’d imagine the second or third specialisation for the Ranger will completely remove the pet mechanic since it’s one of the most asked for changes, and that will definitely cater to the player you described above.

So I’d say that player isn’t receiving ‘nothing’ from this expansion, he’s getting a much more plausible chance that his style of playing will get a specialisation that caters to him.

6 month wait? Are you referring to the release date for HoT? If so, as far as I’m aware, no release date has been released.

Also, I’ll be one of those instant level 80s, mainly because after 13+ level 80s of all different builds, I’m fairly confident that I’ll be able to pick up all the skills and tricks to playing the Revenant without taking the slow path.

Egg Shennn.6240:

Quells.2498:

I still think the answer is simple. You DO have two specializations, example being a Ranger OR a Druid.

No, that’s incorrect.

Ranger is the base class, not a specialization.

Druid is a specialization, and if what they said is true;
1 specialization per class in HoT.
“you’ll be able to swap from one specialization to another outside of combat”

How do you swap from one specialization to another when there is only one?

Please stop saying the base class is a specialization, because it isn’t.

They should have worded it better so people didn’t get confused, they meant to say “swap back and forth from specialisations to base class” or something, it’ll make more sense once they release more specialisations.

Ayakaru.6583:

They said they will feed us some info later on. But the problem is.. they didn’t say how far they’re done. So we could get info next week.. or the first piece of info might not be until summer.. thats the sad part.. we don’t know how far they are and how quickly they can start releasing information
..
kind of like world war 3.. we all know it’s gonna happen.. but.. this year.. next year.. in 50 years????

Gaile posted in one of the threads that the “deep dives” with information will start in early February so this week or next week.

Also, she said something similar in the stickied thread.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Questions-about-Guild-Wars-2-Heart-of-Thorns/first#post4733790

DevilLordLaser.8619:

What bothers me about this is that many people are being quite terribly rude to folks disappointed that we’re only getting one specialization, much of it founded on the assumption of “well they said we’ll get more later so quit being such a whiny little snot and man up, you Grinch!”

Yes, ArenaNet said we’d get more specializations, eventually. They also said, at the game’s launch, that we’d get more skills eventually, as well as new weapons for our professions. The former has happened precisely twice, with one universal heal nobody uses anymore and a single new profession-specific healing skill, and it’s clear at this point that we’re not getting new weapons because the idea of new weapons has been folded into specializations.

Yeah, there’s been rudeness on both sides in the forums lately, the worst of it has been filtered out by the mods thankfully.

The thing with these specialisations though, is that they’ll be able to keep that promise (rather late, I’ll agree) with more ease and regularity since they’ll be able to swap certain skills and traits about to balance new ones they place in and keep the classes and builds as balanced as possible.

PorceleinEve.2973:

We don’t know if druids will come with their own traits either. People hypothesized that they’ll come with ONE new trait line which could possibly replace the mechanic related traitline of the base profession, based on the comments made about how the specializations would alter the mechanics of the class. We have no more evidence for the existence of new traits other than that. Personally I hope we do get a new trait, but i wouldn’t be surprised if we didn’t.

The skills of the druid will be ONE new heal, ONE new ulti and -number unknown- other skills. It will most certainly not have the -full- range of skills of a new class (which again, if it did people wouldn’t complain about the spec issue, but the fact that they’ll have to grind 80 lvls of ranger for druid class)

So no spreading of misleading info based on wishful thinking.

http://www.pcgamer.com/guild-wars-2-heart-of-thorns-interview/#page-2

“When a ranger becomes a druid, they have an entire new set of skills and traits that come available to them”

We’ve got more information than you’d think, they’ve done a fair few interviews since PAX.

You should really word that as “Could we please be able to save keybinds per profession”

Clickbait titles are frowned upon usually.

I personally don’t have an issue playing all classes with my same keybinds, swapping them between classes would confuse me greatly, but I can see how this option would be beneficial to other players so sure, the option to have this would be good.

PorceleinEve.2973:

A choice not worth making to me is no choice at all. I think we’ve already established that. It’s not contradicting myself, it’s using the language to convey what i have in mind.

Personal views do discount this choice for me. Yes? I do have that right do I not? And since here are the official forums, the place where I have the opportunity to express my opinion, I do. We’re not in a university or scholarly debate discussing the subject “objectively” against a fixed set of criteria. We’re just stating our views. I don’t get why all this nervousness that’s floating around

Seriously though, let the people who don’t like something to not like it. And be glad that you do. You’ve already won. What are you afraid of? that anet will listen and add another specialization and omg the sky will fall?

Have a nice one guys

I was saying you had the right not to like the choice but you shouldn’t discredit the option as being a choice because you wouldn’t make it.

I’m not saying 1 specialisation is enough, I’m saying that if they’re only set to release 1, then I’d hate for them to rush more out that could end up being unbalanced or flat out broken just to satiate the people that might not like the specialisation they plan to release first or feel like 1 isn’t enough.

So yes, I’m slightly worried that if enough people complain then Arenanet may feel pressured into releasing potentially broken specialisations and break the game.