Guild Wars 2

My warrior’s current outfit has garnered many more comment than usual so I’ll share that.

Dyes are enameled jungle, molten and rosewood.
Gear is Norn Stag, except for chest, which is Norn Eagle. Hammer is daydreamer

Kross.6428:

…

• Receive Volunteer bonus, as well as Top Player bonuses for Obj. Neutralizer, Obj. Defender, and Revives. Also receive 437 points for winning the match.

This definitely can happen but not sure what drives that. And if your new team loses team you rarely get win-worth of points. If you want the win, volunteering is good. If you want the points, volunteering is bad. If you want to help the underdog, volunteering is good.

Seems like they should let you get your win points and also seems like they ought to give people a bonus in hot join for joining the side with fewer players.

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Mathematically, any system involving randomness generates streaks, good or bad.

Using a stateless RNG will certainly result in streaks and the type of distributions that the OP and others have highlighted. One of the more interesting eye openers for me is that, for a fair ‘coin toss’, if you sum heads as +1 and tails as -1, after a few hundred tosses, the odds of a sum near zero is quite small. It will likely have drifted above or below zero.

The OP proposes a stateful RNG. There is memory to it. This isn’t a bad suggestion in principle but it does raise the issue of the extra state for Anet to track. While a few extra RNG history variables is not significant, it has a subtle effect and, therefore, can be hard to debug. How would you like it if someone made a sign error and your state variable made it less likely that you’d get a nice drop? If the drop is already very unlikely, then it might be hard to tell you are the victim of a bug.

Rather than introduce some sort of per-character memory to the RNG, the standard (not necessarily good) solution in the MMO universe seems to be to make some of the loot RNG and some of the loot token based. The later is simply a function of time earned and puts a floor on when you get the good stuff. The RNG keeps you coming back and hoping, like for the lottery.

Of course, how much is token, and how important the RNG is, is a matter of the settings that the game developers choose. I don’t have any complaints on the GW2 side, from my own experience. I feel I get the nice drops often enough but maybe I’m one of the lucky ones (but if so, this would the first time the luck faerie has ever blessed me in an MMO More likely, Anet has their RNGs tuned in a way that seems fair to me). There are other tune-points out there, like my former MMO, where the forums are filled with folks complaining about RNG.

Nezia.8154:

• Can only bring 10skills at a time. Unlike other mmo’s where the sky is the limit on your skillbar! No thinking required. Just fill that skillbar!

A lot of great points (especially about the dodging and cast & move) but this one really stands out for me. It seemed so odd to me at first but as someone who really loves alts, I have come to appreciate the beauty of the concept: you don’t have to master 20, 30 or 40 abilities to play a toon which means you can switch between them a lot more easily.

Plus there aren’t regular resets that wipe giant skill trees and require you to rebuild a character. That may not seem like much but, for example, in Rift, where I had 4 characters, each with 2-4 builds each with 4-8 macros, it was a huge amount of work to fix all that when they reset soul trees or just to figure out how to use it again if I had been off the character for a while.

Sometimes less is more and this is a case of less being much more. I occasionally wish for a way to save a build, remember my Rift experience and then admit it’s better without it.

I’ve been tempted to try SWTOR again but after playing GW2, it feels so tedious (questing) and glacially slow in combat. GW2 has ruined me on old-school MMOs. There are other dynamic games (Tera comes to mind) but I still prefer GW2 for now.

Mesmer is somewhat similar, as is elemental. (They are ‘spell-y’ and wear cloth, at least.)

Before you give up on your Necro, you could try some WvW or PvP. PvP is also a viable way to level a character, as all toons are leveled to 80 in structured PVP and you get level-up drops along the way, although it might get old if that’s the only way you level. The level-up items can be earned on your necro and used on another character, BTW.

Crafting can help you level to a point but might be expensive if you aren’t sitting on a bunch of mats or money.

All the professions are fairly unique so any would give you a different experience. Ranger is pretty painless to level. Guardian can be a little slow.

It was a fun idea and I’m glad they tried it. but it might have been a better idea to limit it just to cities so that folks could escape it. The sepia tone and hat is okay. The arms out is pretty annoying. The zoom noise is really irritating.

Fortunately, I’m happy in pvp but if pvp also gets ‘infected’ I’m going to try another game until this goes away.

Again, nice idea but duration does matter.

Fixed title to make this clear it is a suggestion. And thanks to all for the follow-up.

Do’h! Thanks. Not sure why I missed that

It’s probably a sign that I have too many characters but it can be frustrating when I find something in my bank that is soulbound and then have to log into 4 or 5 characters to find who it is soulbound to, especially if I just want to salvage it.

Could we have the mouse-over pop-up shown who it is soulbound to?

Thanks!

As a proud owner of many dyes, I do find the current dye navigating system a bit tedious at times. Especially as more dyes are added to the game, it might improve players’ interest in buying more if it is easier to find what they have. How about some or all of:

*More categories to sort by (like tints)
*A search function so that we could search for or highlight things like all electro or shadow dyes?
*A two dimension sort: sort first by color then by material or category, for instance. To keep the GUI simple, the second search criteria need not have a label. I.e., when sorted by color then material, it could be displayed as it does now but within each color, it would also be sorted by material

Thanks!
Marc

Oh and the artwork is outstanding

I returned to GW2 in the early fall after a bit of an absence and I’ve been very pleased.

The wardrobe and dye changes are great. The combat puts WOW-like games to shame (I considered going back to SWTOR instead of GW2 but couldn’t stomach the old-school stand-and-shoot or their mind-numbingly-boring quest system).

The regular content releases are very well done and I’m not really sure how they achieved this, because I am a completionist, but I don’t feel compelled to do all of it. Some world events I do and enjoy, others I skip without any angst (Wintersday comes to mind :P).

I like the pvp changes rolled out over the year and I’ve come to like WvW, which I’ll confess is a big surprise. Hated it last time I played. (It does help to get plugged into a WvW guild’s teamspeak.)

The gemstore is also something I like, lots to choose from from a ‘fun’ perspective, nothing I feel compelled to buy.

The only change that I really don’t care for is having to quest or pay for the traits. I like it in principle but I think they over did it… 78 ‘quests’ is an awful lot to do to get access to all traits and it undermines the otherwise very flexible system. As it happens I had 8 toons that were grandfathered in with their traits (except for the XIII ones) so it hasn’t been a big deal but I did start a new ranger to do racial stories I hadn’t done before and I have to confess the trait system has pretty much sapped all interest in leveling him beyond the 30s. I worry that it might prove a barrier to new players.

But overall, I really enjoy GW2 and think it’s the best game out there for my play style. Oh, and I do like that fact that you hear from the devs and, it’s even positive feedback! (Unlike certain other MMOs where you’ll get: if you don’t like our decisions, play something else )

Overall I really like the new pvp changes. Kudos!

I must confess I don’t care for the death match, although it wouldn’t be so bad if there was a quick spec switch option.

Otherwise, a couple of requests:
1) can you add a way to access your last match’s stats from the pvp lobby?
2) if there is a spike in the number of matches that don’t launch because of an afk player, can you start queuing more than 10 per match, say 11 with the extra person dropped if that don’t kill fast enough?

Thanks,
Marc

NeonSlug.5402:

if you join a team from the start of the game you shouldnt get auto balanced, the most annoying thing is when you are on a team from the start and as soon as its obvious your teams winning 3ppl leave other team and boom. you get auto balanced, it would be ok if everyone just accepted it and played anyway (with a kinda win some loose some mentality) but its just so easy to go, fk it im leaving, which just leaves you screwed for the rest of the game. Worst there is zero penalty for doing that, dosent count as a loss or anything for people leaving.

At present, I always volunteer for auto-balance. Sure, it gets me hammered a lot but it’s fun to turn a losing team into a winning team (admittedly, not so often but it happens) and it means you have a guaranteed win bonus.

So, I don’t mind the current system but I can see the annoyance with it. But that’s why I suggested a few incentives to keep things a little more even so that there is less unbalanced teams and consequently, less auto-balance. If you incentive people to join the underdog and not quit when you are behind, it could help.

Ostricheggs.3742:

As a person who’s suffered skyhammer more than most, I can say with a straight face that I have NEVER seen a SINGLE person actually like skyhammer in the solo queue rotation.

I’d miss it if they removed it. I’ve actually come to enjoy it. And I usually play a mesmer with no knock-back or pull (call me silly, but I don’t usually weapon swap or respec for a SQ fight.)

That said, I did hate it for a good, long while.

One of the persistent complaints about hot join that I see is about uneven teams.

Similar to the bonus for volunteering for the other team when you’re evening up the teams, how about a small bonus for joining (from spectator) the under-strength team if they are behind by, say, 50 points? And either a small penalty for folks who join a team ahead by more than, say, 150 points, or a bonus to the underdogs for every person who joins while they are behind (for sticking it out)?

If you go the penalty route, it could be a delay on when they start accruing points (maybe their first 50 points don’t count).

If the bonuses were in the 25 point range, it wouldn’t be too drastic but it might nudge the teams to be more even.

Just a thought.

One of the persistent complaints about hot join that I see is about uneven teams.

Similar to the bonus for volunteering for the other team when you’re evening up the teams, how about a small bonus for joining (from spectator) the under-strength team if they are behind by, say, 50 points? And either a small penalty for folks who join a team ahead by more than, say, 150 points, or a bonus to the underdogs for every person who joins while they are behind (for sticking it out)?

If you go the penalty route, it could be a delay on when they start accruing points (maybe their first 50 points don’t count).

If the bonuses were in the 25 point range, it wouldn’t be too drastic but it might nudge the teams to be more even.

Just a thought.

sirian.4981:

Ipan, the problem with that sort of play is that people solve the dungeon, post a guide then everyone just follows the optimal guide to completing the dungeon. So devs put in a lot of work to create this complex challenge that just gets cheesed.

And yet if they put the work into randomizing locations and types of critters and bosses, they would have so much more replay for the same effort…

I have to assume devs are scared about how to validate such systems. It is harder than purely scripted fights but it is do-able and whoever gets it right might have the next WoW.

What I look for in end-game is variety. I’d prefer truly randomized content where the fights aren’t scripted and good play is required for success (as opposed to endless repetition to learn arbitrary boss mechanics). Alternately, I’ll accept a wide variety of things to do, some combination of alt-leveling, exploration, farming (like RIFT’s artifacts), and pvp.

What I won’t do is run the same scripted battles over and over again. WoW cured me of that

I don’t care about end-game gear, aside from aesthetics, especially when the next expansion makes all that gear-grind worthless.

I do like GW2 where I can take my max level character and still be (somewhat) at level anywhere in the world. And I find pvp interesting (although not wvwvw- too much zerg v zerg).

I left GW2 about a year ago (got bored) and came back about a month ago. In case it’s any help with Anet, I thought I’d share my experiences to date and why I went with GW2 because it wasn’t the only game I looked at, when I left my last MMO (over some very poor customer management related to some recent changes.)

So far, I’ve been very happy with the return. I can see getting tired of my current activities but I haven’t scratched dungeons and fractals so am looking forward to dabbling with that in time, once I exhaust my current interests.

What brought me to GW2 rather than the other options? Great support for players who like alts. Always thought it was dumb of a publisher to insistent players grind for each toon- what difference does it make to a publisher how I spend my time as long as it is in their game?

The wardrobe changes are fantastic, as are the additional account wide unlocks beyond account-wide achievements and wallet (available when I left).

I like leveling characters and the higher zone pops brought by the megaservers makes a huge difference in making running through zones more fun and less of a grind.

Over the years, I’ve also learned that looks matter to me as a player and I still find GW2 the nicest looking game out there, both characters and world. Some of the world settings really get the daydreamer going in me (like Divinity’s Reach but many other places). The characters and outfits are very nice.

I like GW2’s dynamic combat. It isn’t the most dynamic system out there but it has the right level of mobility and re-activeness for me.

I was previously luke-warm on the small number of actions you can do on a character but it sure lowers the bar on returning to the game and makes it feasible to switch which toon I’m using in pvp. Didn’t think I would but I’m finding I prefer the limited functions to the wall of buttons approach (last MMO, I had 8 action bars up, not all for combat actions but about 30 buttons or so were combat related, plus macros for reactives and sequences. Not all all easy to return to that game or switch between alts.)

GW2 also doesn’t have the most dynamic content but it’s nice, especially with the megaservers seeing to it that there are more events going on and that the group ones can be finished in most places.

I also appreciate the roll-out of news about the upcoming feature pack. Compared to some companies that shall rename nameless, I find your communication excellent: it’s clear as to what is changing, why it is changing, design constraints that prevented some changes, and impact to me as a player.

Not everything is perfect. I’d like a real LFG system and not the ‘glorified LFG chat channel’ we have now. I don’t see how I can make decent in-game money and while I like to support my game companies in the cash shop, I don’t like having to buy gold from them. Long term, I do drift away from games if I can’t raise the gold to enable my alts and other activities through crafting or farming of a type I enjoy. That’s the main thing I could see causing me to leave GW2 at some point.

But overall, I really appreciate the changes made in the last year. They definitely addressed many of the issues I had with GW2 when I left. And I can’t stress how much I appreciate the transparency in your news updates.

Goldberg.4831:

TERA is kiddie porn

No kidding. I think anything but a teenage girl playing one of the Tera races (Elin?) ought to result in a call to local police. The more adult looking toons are sure sexy but it always seemed silly to me to find toons in evening dresses and high heels tromping through the wilderness.

It’s not to say I don’t like the racy gear in GW2 but it is a matter of degree.

Rauderi.8706:

Nay:
It’s a vanity resource, waypoints are superior to mounts in most cases, and it may pull resources away from building content. Some feel it is inappropriate to lore and theme (the “not WoW” argument) as they may be ridiculous or be used to bother players and block NPCs. Also, status quo also runs in this direction, so we might not see them in development.
If mounts come with speed, all the classes would have to be redesigned, and ANet will have to decide how to distribute for balance and power (gems only, WvW yes/no, etc).

It is a vanity item but so were the wardrobe changes. Vanity is a large part of MMO play for a significant number of players (and as you noted, a great platinum sink).

Mounts are one of the things I miss in GW2. That said, nothing is free. Having built the game up without mounts, and realizing developers have fixed resources and therefore what effort is not spent on mounts is spent on other content, I can live without the mounts… even if I do pine for them from time to time.

Cormac.3871:

On the traits system:

If you find levelling to be a grind and you just want to get to endgame then the new trait system adds to the grind.

If you enjoy the idea of levelling your character, and gradually accumulating more skills by doing tasks then the new system is great.

I fall into the latter group of players.

As do I. I much prefer leveling to running things over and over again for end-game gear.

Also mix it up with pvp and like the reward tracks that are there now. When I left, it was partly with the realization that the only gear I wanted was for level 80 pvp rank (I was 30 at the time) and I didn’t really feel like grinding out 50 ranks for no other reason than some level 80 stuff that looked good. Plus, at the time, you could only use your pvp gear in pvp and the mists.

Thanks for the comments.

Thanks for all for the follow-up, much appreciated and very useful.

I don’t think the new trait system is going to bother me although I haven’t spent time on my lower level alts so maybe I’ll find it more of a nuisance. I like the quest for a trait, in principle, at least, although I could see how that could get old. The price to buy outright didn’t seem too horrible, in any case.

I do have a lot of toons (3 80s, 2 in the 60s and another 4 in the 20s and 30s). One thing I’ve come to appreciate when returning: since I don’t have to relearn a ton of abilities (or macros in other games), it’s actually a lot easier to pick up a toon I haven’t played in a long time. That ought to apply to switching between alts, as well.

I do love that almost everything is account-wide now. In other games, it would get to the point that I had so much collected on a primary toon (be it pets, mounts, achievements, pvp rank, artifact sets, etc.) that it wasn’t practical to switch to another toon as a main. That one toon would forever be my main, like it or not. Unless, of course, I was willing to regrind all that on a new toon, which I’m not in general.

I’m not sure if I’ll ever worry about ascended armor. I don’t tend to like working towards that sort of thing, mostly because most MMOs make it very grindy (not sure if GW2 is any different but I assume not.)

Found the phoenix items- they were attached to some bound gear. Just had to get on the right toon.

I promise I’ll continue to read up on things but there’s a few bits and pieces that I’m missing.

Does pvp rank matter anymore (other than the conversion to transmutation charges)?

Also, I know I bought the phoenix light armor but I can’t find it on any of my toons or in my wardrobe. Is this something I need to file a ticket on? Will they be able to track it down or am I out of luck? I purchased it about the time it came out. I suppose it’s possible I accidentally deleted the toon it was on but I don’t think I did.

For gear, I like the new tab in the bank similar to the old pvp lockers that shows me all the gear. When I see something I don’t have that I want, where’s the best place to find where to get it? It’s too bad there isn’t an in-game tooltip that tells you that.

Have to say, the wardrobe changes are a huge plus for me. It took a tedious and expensive to use system that was not at all alt friendly and turned it around with a great interface and account-wide unlocks. Same for the account-wide dyes (I’m embarrassed to say I returned to something like 400-500 unidentified dyes thanks to all the duplicates I had on all my toons.)

I was playing RIFT until recently and I still miss the variety of things to do in RIFT, including artifact collecting and all the cool mounts but it has been getting creaky for some time with every major release causing lots of crashes and infrastructure problems (mail not working, chat not working for days, etc.) Plus while the world graphics are nice the character graphics are quite stale these days. The foolish AH fee changes pushed me over the edge.

I’m currently torn between returning to SWTOR (I like the stories) and GW2, dabbling with both. I love having lots of alts and both are very nice for multiple toons, although from what I’ve seen so far, GW2 seems a bit alt-friendlier now, although the SWTOR legacy system is nice. Great change from RIFT, where alt support was not apparently a concern for devs.

For those who’ve done both SWTOR and GW2, how does living story compare as a story thread? Have to say last time I played, I wasn’t too impressed with living story.

Server pop seems quite healthy on both.

Thanks for any comments.

How about letting us use our pvp gear as town clothes? Just for show, switches to regular gear on combat, just like town clothes. It would be a nice way to show off gear and has no balance effect.

I’m sure this has come up before but I didn’t get any hits in my search.