Guild Wars 2

Rednik.3809:

randomguy.1283:

This isn’t a question for me, this is a question for anet. Do I know why 95% of the devs at anet seem incompetent? no. You and me both wish they would be putting other stuff out, but they just seem to not be for whatever reason.
Your anger is directed at raids but what I am saying is that you are pointing the blame at the wrong place. You should be pointing the blame at the 95% of devs that can’t seem to do anything for the last 6 months.

No, I blaming Anet for focusing on completely wrong direction while ignoring others, and I don’t trust “only 5 devs” at all. 5 devs pumping out full pve-sized map, with new encounters, mobs, SFX, etc.? No way.

Again you’re wrong, RisingDusk already confirmed that the only people helping are the sound team and lore team (both of which clearly would be working on other things as well). Everything else is done by the raid team themselves. My only explanation for this is that the 5 devs working on raids are either extremely competent or the rest of the devs aren’t. Or both.

Torolan.5816:

randomguy.1283:

Torolan.5816:

To be honest I could not care less about your enjoyment, and you should not care for mine, randomguy. Raids are a reality in GW2, I already had to swallow that toad. And with the selling of raids, Ohoni does not need to devalue the rewards, that is something that already the seller does then.

So what are you suggesting to do?
Giving up and admitting that raids took over GW2 for now, stop playing and look for another game when I don´t want to be fed with morsels? Vote with the feet so to say? Or stay a little bit longer and wait for ls?
Please keep in mind if you are so kind to answer me that I am neither interested in learning or buying raids and I already know that old content is old and still there.

“To be honest I could not care less about your enjoyment” Well thanks.

“So what are you suggesting to do? stop playing and look for another game when I don´t want to be fed with morsels?” Yes, go somewhere else, please, you bring nothing but toxicity to this game just based on that first line.
And thanks for proving my point that you are toxic…

If you quote me, have at least the decency to quote me in full as I also stated that you should not think of my enjoyment with what GW2 offers lately.
You can enjoy and keep your raiding, I already said that but this is not the point. It does just not affect me that you enjoy raiding, maybe I said it a little bit harsh and if that is the case, I apologize for it. I don´t enjoy it and was asking for suggestions what you would do when you are not intending to raid and had 16 months of only very meager content else wise.

Get angry at anet because they can’t seem to produce any content in a 6 month timeframe.

Fay.2357:

So while it can be useful to be proficient at multiple classes, it’s definitely not necessary.

Chrono, Druid, warrior, tempest, revenant, and DH are all fine/great on every fight. Thief, engineer, and necromancer will vary in effectiveness and some groups will prefer that you not use one of those classes sometimes.

That being said, if you’re just trying to hop into random groups, it’s best to play as many classes as possible because that increases the chances that you can fill the role that someone wants. I only play chrono and despite chrono being present in every raid, not every raid group is looking for a chrono at any given point in time.

However, your best bet is joining a guild or permanent raiding group, finding a role to play, and mastering that role. Do some research on the fights to become familiar with them, and look around for guilds/groups recruiting for new members. Don’t be afraid of letting them know that you’re inexperienced, as most groups don’t mind bringing a newer player up to speed.

ewww revenant no

Rednik.3809:

randomguy.1283:

All of this is factually incorrect. As stated a billion times before in this thread, the raid team is made of 5 devs, there are over 100 devs. If you aren’t going to argue in good faith I’m just going to waste my time.
“there would be like no complains at all if Anet added raids as side activity” They ARE a side activity…

I don’t care how much devs making anything, and I should not care. All I care is outcome, and current outcome not supporting your claim at all. Where is 95% of new content then, from remained 95 devs? Deleted? Hidden?

This isn’t a question for me, this is a question for anet. Do I know why 95% of the devs at anet seem incompetent? no. You and me both wish they would be putting other stuff out, but they just seem to not be for whatever reason.
Your anger is directed at raids but what I am saying is that you are pointing the blame at the wrong place. You should be pointing the blame at the 95% of devs that can’t seem to do anything for the last 6 months.

ele still deals the most damage to VG even if it moves.

Rednik.3809:

randomguy.1283:

This is exactly what I’m talking about. You are complaining even though anet didn’t take away ANY CONTENT FROM YOU. Yet you’re still complaining about content being added for other people. You have no reason to take away the content for other people, the ONLY reason you have for taking away this content is just so you can be a toxic kitten to people.

Yes, they just starting making content for very specific group of people instead of making it for everyone. There would be like no complains at all if Anet added raids as side activity, along with other content. But guess what? They focused on it instead and even thrown whole exclusive CLASS of items behind it (show me other ways to get legendary armor, I dare you).
inb4: “Why you refusing to raid and enjoy raiding in game what was not made as raiding game”.

All of this is factually incorrect. As stated a billion times before in this thread, the raid team is made of 5 devs, there are over 100 devs. If you aren’t going to argue in good faith I’m just going to waste my time.
“there would be like no complains at all if Anet added raids as side activity” They ARE a side activity…

Torolan.5816:

To be honest I could not care less about your enjoyment, and you should not care for mine, randomguy. Raids are a reality in GW2, I already had to swallow that toad. And with the selling of raids, Ohoni does not need to devalue the rewards, that is something that already the seller does then.

So what are you suggesting to do?
Giving up and admitting that raids took over GW2 for now, stop playing and look for another game when I don´t want to be fed with morsels? Vote with the feet so to say? Or stay a little bit longer and wait for ls?
Please keep in mind if you are so kind to answer me that I am neither interested in learning or buying raids and I already know that old content is old and still there.

“To be honest I could not care less about your enjoyment” Well thanks.

I’m sick of reading this post just filled with nothing but hate for raids and raiders, who seem to want nothing other than to ruin our experience in this game because it is somehow less valid than everyone else’s.
Ohoni only wants to devalue our rewards in order to give those rewards to others, but most people here seem to want to completely remove everything in this game we enjoy for no other reason than we enjoy it.

Rednik.3809:

randomguy.1283:

I’m very saddened by how toxic the gw2 community has come, or maybe its just that the salt seems to move only to the forums. Ironically the toxicity is coming from the people who complain about “elitists” more than its from elitists. I really wish people could just get along but a lot of people here seem to have nothing better to do but whine and be entitle to rewards that they don’t want to actually earn. You are devaluing the experience not just for raiders, but for those that buy them as well.

So what exactly is wrong in complaining about game what turned into entirely different direction instead of one that was promised? They already made wonderful hardcore raiding game, Wildstar, and when it flopped miserably, they decided to bring same thing to GW2, spitting on their own manifesto.
And now you asking why people are not happy with new Anet policy about catering minority of PvE-rs? Maybe you missed how well such thing worked on PvP side of game?

This is exactly what I’m talking about. You are complaining even though anet didn’t take away ANY CONTENT FROM YOU. Yet you’re still complaining about content being added for other people. You have no reason to take away the content for other people, the ONLY reason you have for taking away this content is just so you can be a toxic kitten to people.

This is exactly what I’m talking about when I say you’re toxic, you’re only suggestion is to remove content that other people enjoy just because they like different things than you. Please, for the sake of moral decency, stop.

This is why people call the forums salty, this is why people don’t browse the forums anymore.

This is the reason why a lot of players have left this game, this community used to be one of the best but is now just full of upset people angry about everything (for many legitimate reasons, sure). More people have left the game because of attitudes like this than because of raids, I’m sure.

reikken.4961:

If you’ve already got the utility that the heavies provide (ie you aleady have your banners and facet of nature), you’re better off adding some health to your build than swapping classes. Tempest with marauder’s armor still does more dps than any other class.

Tempest with marauder’s armor still does less dps than a thief or another tempest with berserkers armor.

Replace a warrior with an ele.

I’m very saddened by how toxic the gw2 community has come, or maybe its just that the salt seems to move only to the forums. Ironically the toxicity is coming from the people who complain about “elitists” more than its from elitists. I really wish people could just get along but a lot of people here seem to have nothing better to do but whine and be entitle to rewards that they don’t want to actually earn. You are devaluing the experience not just for raiders, but for those that buy them as well.

Ohoni.6057:

Ok all joking aside, you’re actually arguing to balance the game in favor of raid buyers and AT THE EXPENSE of raid sellers. Do you understand why us raiders don’t like your ideas yet?

Oh, I’ve understood from the start why raiders might be opposed to it, naked self-interest is part of human nature. I’ve just never understood why anyone else should care.

Ok so you admit that this would be obviously unfavorable to people who do raids now? You’re literally trying to argue with people you ADMIT you are trying to screw over. No wonder they all disagree with you.

Ohoni.6057:

So apparently the only way to get through to Ohoni is to explain to him why free market capitalism is beneficial for both parties?

It’s not beneficial to the consumer in this case. Yes, they can pay gold and they can get through the content to the reward that they want, that much is to their benefit. But they only NEED to make that transaction because the deck was stacked against them in the first place, because the conditions were such that they could not reasonably pursue their goal without making that transaction. This is not capitalism, this is highway robbery.

What would be beneficial to the consumer in this case would be for ANet to implement a new route to the end reward, one which the consumer could pursue without having to raid, AND without having to pay someone else to do it for him. Players should not be profiting at the expense of other players.

Ok all joking aside, you’re actually arguing to balance the game in favor of raid buyers and AT THE EXPENSE of raid sellers. Do you understand why us raiders don’t like your ideas yet?

And yet again you use this word “NEED”, no, no one needs to buy raids, none of these people have a gun pointed at them. They can choose to do raids themselves to get the reward they want, as I’ve attempted to point out to you a million times before. If they still want the reward they can farm the gold somewhere else and pay full price.

Let me explain this to you in numbers, legendary armor can be valued by the amount of gold it costs to get it: ie lets say it costs 10k to buy enough raids to get it.

If you suggest that that’s robbery, well then you can make easy mode raids where people can get armor. This way nobody will need to buy raids, making the value of legendary armor at around 2k assuming thats the price of all the materials needed.

QED I have just proven that if everything you say were to be implemented, the value of legendary armor would be now about 1/5 of the value (and therefore prestige) as it was before. As someone who wants to get legendary armor, that upsets me.

Ohoni.6057:

Then farm the gold somewhere else and buy the raids.

Sorry, perhaps I was a bit too brief earlier. “Yes, that’s the problem, people who raid feeling they are entitled to nicer things than those that do not. . . OR to be paid gold by those who do not.”

In either case it’s pretty sickening.

How is this not reasonable ?
If you want something, do the activity that has it.

but in this case, the activity in question is unreasonable to a great many players, so expecting players to do it is unreasonable.

This is very much a themepark MMO, there’s something out there for everyone, but not everything is for everyone. In your case it just so happens to be Legendary Armor that isn’t for you.

But this is the problem, just because the existing raid is not for me, and it’s not, and I’m fine with that, that has ZERO bearing on whether or not the Legendary armor is “for me” or not. that will depend entirely on how it looks when it comes out. Just because it’s locked behind content I don’t like doesn’t mean that I won’t like the armor itself, so you can’t reasonably argue that it’s not “for me”.

You want legendary armor to be obtained via easymode raids where any random group of people can complete them with any phiw builds with a minimum of failures. That’s not earning legendary armor, it’s turning it into a participation reward.

But the current method of earning it is also a participation reward, just with a higher skill floor. It’s no more “earning it” than easy mode, it’s just for players that are more interested in coordinated group gameplay than those that would prefer the easy mode version. Players are not more entitled to the reward just because they happen to enjoy that sort of gameplay and are good at it.

Ohoni.6057:

You can disagree with me without slandering me.

There’s no slander here, just a statement of facts.

That’s not how slander works. When you mis-attribute a statement to someone, that is slander. Well, ok, technically liable since we’re doing it in print, but it’s a weird distinction between journalism and forum discussions. You said that I want the rewards without earning them, that is factually incorrect since I do want to earn them, even if you don’t believe that there is any way to earn them short of participating in raids.

“Sorry, perhaps I was a bit too brief earlier. “Yes, that’s the problem, people who raid feeling they are entitled to nicer things than those that do not. . . OR to be paid gold by those who do not.””

So apparently the only way to get through to Ohoni is to explain to him why free market capitalism is beneficial for both parties?

Ohoni.6057:

This entire topic is you complaining that you’re entitled to rewards that you don’t want to earn

Not true. I’ve stressed time and again that I want to earn them, I just want a method of earning them that does not involve hard mode raiding, because that is an activity that does not appeal to me. Some people enjoy hard mode raiding, and that’s great for them, they can earn Legendary armor and have fun doing it. I can’t have fun doing that, but there are plenty of other parts of the game that I enjoy as much as raiders enjoy raiding, so I’d like to be able to earn the Legendary armor by doing those activities instead.

You can disagree with me without slandering me.

Actually not the case. Not nicer, not better, just different.

But “nicer” and “better” are both subjective. It’s impossible to have “different” without ALSO being “nicer” and “better” in some people’s eyes. But let’s put your point to the test here. Let’s say raiders did get Legendary armor that was merely “different” than other armor, not nicer, not better, just “different.” Let’s say it was all just the most simple geometric solids possible, each piece made of 1-2 rectangular bricks, with a general shape like it was made out of cardboard boxes, and had a neon green color to it that could not be changed. Beauty is subjective, but many would classify it as “ugly.” But it would be “different” than any other armor, and ONLY raiders could acquire it. Do you believe that would be a sufficient reward that raiders would welcome in open arms, or do you believe that they would expect the raid armor to be very fancy and shiny and something that a player might want to wear whether they enjoy raiding or not?

Even if the, “things,” were nicer it is not players who have decided that those playing the raid would be entitled to the nicer things, its Anet.

For the time being, but raiders seem to accept this as a matter of course, and belligerently object to any suggestion of that changing. Defending the status quo over alternatives IS taking a position, it is not being more reasonable than those asking for a change.

Luckily just such a reasonable path exists for those who really want, “it.”

To many players, the existing options are not reasonable, and never will be. There will need to be alternate paths for there to be reasonable options for most players.

I think something everyone is missing is that ALL of these players CAN get the armor still IF they just take the time to actually go and do raids.

Yes, but that is not a reasonable option for many. “You can do it if you do raids” is never going to be a satisfactory response, and we would save a lot of pages of discussion if everyone would just understand that.

Then farm the gold somewhere else and buy the raids.

Ashen.2907:

Ohoni.6057:

Yes, that’s the problem, people who raid feeling they are entitled to nicer things than those that do not.

Actually not the case. Not nicer, not better, just different. Putting a clock in the side of a teapot doesn’t make it nicer and adding an essentially useless stat swap function to ascended doesn’t either.

Even if the, “things,” were nicer it is not players who have decided that those playing the raid would be entitled to the nicer things, its Anet. The player(s) expressing a feeling that they are entitled to something is, well, you (and a few others).

Ohoni.6057:

If players want it then they have as much right to want it as anyone else does, and deserve a reasonable path to earning it.

Luckily just such a reasonable path exists for those who really want, “it.”

I think something everyone is missing is that ALL of these players CAN get the armor still IF they just take the time to actually go and do raids.

Ohoni.6057:

If you’re a “casual” player you’ll have no need for Legendary armor, it’s not statistically better than ascended.

I’ve heard the same arguments made in progression games, that “if you don’t want to raid then you don’t need raid armor because those stats are unnecessary outside of raiding.”

Let’s please just permanently retire the “you don’t need X” argument.

It’s a game, if people want something then whether or not they “need” it is irrelevant, you don’t “need” anything in a game. If players want it then they have as much right to want it as anyone else does, and deserve a reasonable path to earning it.

Im really trying to relate but if this isnt just plain entitlement idk what is.

reikken.4961:

Raizen.7981:

Dante.8965:

Each class can play different roles

Except thief who is the only class that doesn’t have a spot in raids, and warrior who has exactly 1(one) role.

Thief is great for wing 1, and can do two roles on the first boss. Less good for wing 2 due to increased demand for utility over sheer dps, but you should have no trouble finding a spot in a wing 1 raid

Well its great for matthias for the cc, which is the main utility you need for that boss.

Rising Dusk.2408:

Some thoughts:

• It’s fine if there are other sources of legendary armor. What matters is that the particular legendary armor available in the Forsaken Thicket is only available in the Forsaken Thicket. This is just the first place that it has been introduced; I expect it to show up elsewhere and in raids in future expansions.
• The raid team operates almost entirely independently from other groups barring involvement from the lore / narrative team and the sound team. They are very efficient at their work, and have a proven track record thus far of both listening to the community and making very high quality content.
• Raids are very active and are contributing to player retention.
• The current plan is to have a raid in the next expansion. This may change, though given the success of the team I seriously doubt it.

Note: I do not speak for ArenaNet, but I do speak with them, sometimes in-game. I am not bound by an NDA, but I also don’t want to throw any devs under the bus if they talk to me. Suffice it to say that as far as I understand, ANet considers raids a resounding success both in their impact on player retention and in keeping raiders raiding, and at this point they expect the next expansion will have a raid.

“The current plan is to have a raid in the next expansion.”

Wait are you saying they’re going to stop making raids after the third wing all the way until the next expansion? This is NOT what we were told and I’m very disappointed to hear this, but with the whole legendary weapons thing I guess I can’t say I’m completely surprised.

Is that actually what the plan is?

I extremely doubt they’ll cancel raids considering that team has pushed out more content per worker than anyone else at anet by far, and from all the information I’ve gotten raids are going very well in game. The team said they’d be doing more raids after this one at a rate of about 1 wing per 2 months (and if the third wing coming out in may or june is correct they are actually pretty close to meeting that).

Also just the fact that its by far the best quality PvE content they’ve ever made.
(and yes I’m even including gw1 in this).

reikken.4961:

druid is good for sure, but nothing like warrior and chrono

Forst spirit, sun spirit, grace of the land, glyph of empowerment, heals, it’s very important to have one. As much as warrior or chrono? no, but I’d certainly still make it #3

I feel like you’re completely forgetting about druid :P, warrior, chrono, and druid are all required to have a decent raid composition.

Herald is definitely not top 3 classes, it’s pretty worthless if your chrono is spec’d out in boon duration gear (which isn’t on metabattle yet since it’s out of date). Herald is actually the worst class for raids right now imo.

Ohoni.6057:

Yes, exactly like how services which aid people can sell their services because there is a market for it. A mechanic can assist someone with services on their car further reiterating my point.

Yes, but again, if it were possible to build a car that NEVER needed repairs, and auto-mechanics were actively fighting to prevent that from happening, then they would be the bad guys. Service industries are fair when they provide a service that absolutely needs to be provided, not when they perpetuate a broken system so that they can benefit from it.

I disagree. You pay a mechanic to fix your car. He’s doing you a favor. You order a pizza. That delivery driver is doing you a favor.

That’s not how words work! If you ask a mechanic to fix your car and he does so for free, then that’s a favor. If he asks for money, then he’s providing a service, not a favor.

If it is not free, it is not a favor.

Ever.

I’m not saying that providing services is automatically a bad thing, but it is not a favor.

Interesting. Do you have a link? I could not find any official difficulty standard list.

People have argued that raids deserve to have better quality loot because they are more difficult than most of the other content in the game. Are you trying to argue that raids are no more challenging than, say, Claw of Jormag?

The ascended drops do not drop every time, and their value is not fungible. If I get an ascended dagger drop, but I already have one, then the drop is worth 0 gold to me, despite that it would take 80-100 gold to craft a new one.

This is a fair point. Has anyone tried salvaging ascended weapons? If they’re increasing the drop rates in various parts of the world, then they should drop actual Ascended mats, so yeah, you might not get 80-100g back from them, but you could at least get 10-20g back in materials that you can put to your next weapon.

Favor definition:

an act of kindness beyond what is due or usual.
“I’ve come to ask you a favor”
synonyms: service, good turn, good deed, kindness, act of kindness, courtesy
“will you do me a favor?”

Service definition:

the action of helping or doing work for someone.
“millions are involved in voluntary service”
synonyms: favor, kindness, good turn, helping hand; More

SOURCE: THE DICTIONARY

So, nothing else needs to be said on this, unless Ohoni and Linken, you’d like to claim you know more than a dictionary.

You’re using the voluntary definition of service, as in “providing the service out of the goodness of his heart.” But when you use “service” elsewhere, you are using “transactional service” as in “I help you out, you give me money or other goods in return.” They are two separate meanings of the same word.

The fact that you think you shouldn’t thank the person making you coffee, carrying you through a run, working on your house, holding the door for you and taking your coat, waiting the table you are eating at, etc, is literally what is wrong with society today but that discussion has zero relevance to this thread and let’s try not to derail this thread which has had every possible component of discussion taken care of.

/Sigh. Let me give an ingame example. I was in Dragon’s Stand a couple weeks back, and I was at that hard to reach PoI in the Asura lane, and saw two people down below who looked like they were trying to get up there, and never could from where they were. I had my Mesmer though, so I told them to follow me and glided down and dropped a portal so they could get up there. Afterwards, both sent me a little gold. Now this was a favor on my part, because I did not ask for any gold, did not expect it, and if they hadn’t sent it, I would have been fine with having done a nice thing for people. But they sent me gold and I appreciated that. Now, if I had ASKED for gold, if I’d said “I’ll portal you for 2g” or something to that effect, then that would have been a transaction, it would not have been a “favor.”

“Stand here and do NOTHING while we CLEAR this content for you.”
“But, but you’re taking advantage of meeee!”
“How so? You don’t like raiding, you never plan on raiding, you have thousands of gold.” “Some random guy on the forums told me this.”
“Ok, get out, we don’t even want your 90g/9 for the hours of work we put into this multiplied by 9.”

But the problem is that the player wouldn’t NEED people to carry him if there were an easier alternative way that he could get himself through the content, and you guys are actively arguing that such an easier way should never exist.

The player doesn’t NEED people to carry him regardless.

It’s dps is barely at all higher than ps war, and since ps war has a ridiculous amount of utility there is really no reason to run one. Optimal? Never. Viable? I guess.

I really don’t see the problem people have with it in either place.

Linken.6345:

I wonder how many here are selling raid spots and don’t want their lucrative side business crushed by a easier mode that their customers can play to get their items.

I dident see these posts from arah sellers when you could just get it from spvp farming.
Maybe we should do the same 1 reward track for each legendary armor precursor and be done with it.

And what’s wrong with that? Some of these posts might well be by those people, what’s wrong with that.

Shylock.4653:

fishball.7204:

Do you think Raids in GW2 were a bad idea?

The idea isn’t bad, the implementation is bad.

Anet sacrificed other content like dungeons for something a few people do one time a week.

“A few people” Ok people NEED to stop pretending they know the metrics on how many people play the raids, we all know that you pulled that one right out of your kitten .

Astralporing.1957:

Zenith.7301:

Prestige items should be tied to in-game achievements and challenging combat gameplay, not about who farms best or plays the auction house baron.

By this point I’d even prefer they release legendaries tied to gold medals in adventures or upon successful completion of hard jumping puzzles.

But have these legendaries means something that is not FARM GOLD. kitten that.

Since you can buy raid runs and achievements, legendary armor already lost the status you wanted. Why pretend it’s otherwise?

Zenith.7301:

Weapons and armors should be earned by doing meaningful content WELL in the game.

The economy should be restricted to convenience items like food, pots, minis, and other frivolous crap not tied to character progression.

Get this virtual market filth out of my gaming.

You’d really like that empty game you’d get here.

randomguy.1283:

But it’s not an issue when legendary weapons are locked behind HoT then?

There’s already a full set available in core.
But you’re right, it is an additional problem with legendary armor. It’s not only locked behind raids, but behind HoT as well.

Ok, and the core set is locked behind dungeons AND map completion and probably some more stuff as well.

Sometimes it is a pug

Rednik.3809:

Absurdo.8309:

Raiding is not required to get the highest stat gear.

It’s not about stats, its about locking best items behind raids.

But it’s not an issue when legendary weapons are locked behind HoT then?

JVJD.4912:

Oh Snapalope.1378:

Just a definition of what a fake is: Someone who bought raid kills/eternal for a lot of money and is trying to pug raids. As you know since they bought kills, they have absolutely no idea how each fight works and proceed to feed deaths over and over to drag the team down. The reason I think people do this is because after buying 1 full clear, they realize multiple kills are needed to complete the armor collection.

I’m just asking because last week I had to kick 3 people who were fakes, and they were easy to spot too. One person even admitted it and said sorry for dragging down the team. Anyways have you guys encountered this too?

Because raids are horrible and keeping stuff like legendary armor behind it causes this situation
GW2 pve should have only been about open world combat and small 5 man instances
Fractals having levels 1 -100 made it cater to every individual, do raids have this?? NO

Oh boo hoo there’s one thing in PvE that you don’t enjoy? Then act all entitled and whine and see if you get it taken away from the people that do enjoy it!

insanemaniac.2456:

i dont think i would recommend zealot gear for healers. pugging is all about being as safe as possible, and keeping yourself alive and doing as much healing as possible is the safest route. magi, magi/cleric mix, minstrel mix, or other things to cap out healing power and bring survivability are the best options. none of the bosses require pitiful dps from the healer to be finished, so play it safe and keep your group alive more easily.

For VG my group usually just takes two viper’s druids so we have dps and extra healing.

I don’t know about you but I make way more gold per time by doing raids than I ever did with dungeons, the only issue is the weekly gate.

Anet has confirmed that the current stats only available in ascended forms from raids WILL be available from season 3 living story I believe on their giant AMA.

“A GOOD solution takes time and work,” Wrong. Just completely blatantly wrong.

Not saying i agree with ohoni here on it could be that simple, but no, a good solution does not NEED to take time and work.

As I’ve been arguing with others on here for months now, timers are a good solution that took minimal effort.

Kagamiku.9731:

BloodyNine.7504:

I am not sure if it simply the new wing or the fact that people have realized there isn’t much point to it anymore. Once you have defeated the bosses, now what? If you were weekly clearing SV since early on you should have gotten enough Mag shards to get any ascended gear you could want. That is one thing I don’t think Anet got about raids. Raids aren’t just about harder content. They are about LOOT. These boss encounters need to have the liquid gold tripled. They also should be dropping 2 to 3 exotics per person. And the rate of drops for the ascended stuff needs to go up drastically.

I also think a lot less people are doing pug runs. Or at least that is the impression I got. I sat in LFG Monday night around 8pm PST for about an hour and 15 minutes. I got one PM for a sab run that fell apart before it started. And I wasn’t just advertising, I was actively refreshing LFG constantly to try and catch a group looking for members. Nothing.

I have talked to a fair amount of people I know that raid regularly and have all expressed the exact same issues. The people that are running it repeatedly now have set groups. Plus the quality of Pugs seems to have dropped drastically.

You need legendary insights for the legendary armor, so that’s a pretty big inventive I’d say.

But you can’t get more if you already killed the bosses, that’s what he’s saying.

Ohoni.6057:

They’re already making a less challenging version of the raids in fractals now.

Again, Fractals are not raids.

Fractals are not a “less [anything]” versions of raids. Fractals are fractals, raids are raids, they are not similar, they are not substitutions. People REALLY need to stop saying “well you could just do X instead.” We KNOW we could do X instead, if we’re arguing that we want easy mode raids, it’s because X is not what we want to be doing.

Also you CAN control the other 9 people because you can yell at them, tell them what to do, choose who they are (which you can’t do in open world without a huge guild), and kick them.

Aside from being able to kick people, you can do all of those things in open world content. you even have some control over adding people to maps, I remember doing that all the time on TTS-run Queen’s Pavilion maps. It’s not efficient though. I definitely want better map control options to be available, but the point is, open world content is not necessarily that far off from raid content, it’s all in how it’s managed.

No what I mean is the devs have actually said that they are changing fractals to be like raids.

On the giant AMA:

“We want Fractals to be the content that fills this game space. They’re not quite there yet, but we’re working on making them less of an Hit point slog and more mechanically interesting, especially at higher scales.”

“At this time the Raids team doesn’t have any direct involvement with what the Fractals guys are doing (and by direct I mean going to the same meetings, or sitting next to each other talking through our designs). But I can say they have talked to us a little about how we approach our design docs and are adapting something similar for themselves. And if they invite us to come check out their content for feedback we will absolutely be there to help support them!”

It sounds at the very least they are taking advice from raids with how they are updating fractals.

They’re already making a less challenging version of the raids in fractals now. Also you CAN control the other 9 people because you can yell at them, tell them what to do, choose who they are (which you can’t do in open world without a huge guild), and kick them.

katz.8376:

randomguy.1283:

And why can’t we have both? You’re talking as if raids take away from these other parts of the game, and they do not.

please point out the exact post or phrase used to indicate proof of your point of view that STIHL is saying anything about raids taking away from other aspects of the game.

throwing my 2 cents in the pot here. raids should feel epic. amirite? old time EQ player here and it was an everyday occurrence to wrangle 50-100 people (in groups of 6… no fancy raid UI, and no voice coms at first) for a planes raid. that’s epic… on a grand scale. much more recently i played DDO… and while the group size for a raid was much smaller (max group size 12)… for the most part the raids themselves still had an epic feel to them… trouping through a multi-part maze where 2 of the first 4 phases could kill you if you didn’t complete them quickly enough… one of which was a guaranteed fail if you didn’t complete in time… followed by 2 rounds of fighting a balor? that’s still epic even with reduced group size. exploring a gigantic dwarven-made extraplaner bank vault that had an ongoing story woven into it replete with love, betrayals, doublecrosses, and forced teamwork to solve all the puzzles… followed by a fight with an ancient red dragon who liked her adventurers roasty toasty and covered in ketchup. that was epic.

now in GW2… the first time i ran TTT… taxiing in people until the map was full to bursting… sorting people by what job to do.. each head with a different mechanic, and needing teamwork and coordination to kill them all at nearly the same time… THAT was epic… my first time facing a dragon (i think it was Jormag)…so many people on my screen they literally bought my computer to a halt… dealing with all the mechanics… being told to “stand here” and getting the crash landing achievement… when i wasn’t expecting it and had no idea what was going to happen (i have some friends who are practical jokers… they raised me at least XD)…. that… was epic.

my first time running the raid didn’t feel as epic. its like 2 trial runs… like… if you can’t kill these two, don’t even bother to pass GO do not collect 200 dollars, please step your way out of the raid now. then the “boss”… no epic trek to find the boss… no puzzles… no minions to mow through first….its just “oh look… there’s a platform… with the boss… lets do this…” followed by “dodge… green…. dodge…. bounce….green…. dodge… green… bounce… dodge… green…” etc rinse repeat for 5 phases. i’m sorry, but no. no offense to the designers, but that’s not epic

was it a good idea to make a raid? apparently, because for some reason everyone wanted them even tho we already had some pretty epic encounters in game, they just weren’t labeled “raids”…was this a good implementation? IMHO not really. does having a raid that isn’t epic and is really nothing more than a skill-gate take anything away from the mechanics and enjoyment of other encounters of various types and difficulties in game? nope.

Some people just like different things, I find the open world bosses all to be an extreme bore and a grind, they’re easy, you can’t lose them, there’s 100+ people who you have no control over, and you dont actively do anything other than just straight up attack the boss if you’re the majority of players, and even if you aren’t just autoattacking, then the mechanics still aren’t very engaging and you don’t feel like you’re doing much.

Raids are actually fun, nothing else in PvE is.

I don’t know where you get your information from but you do NOT need a commander to enter the raid. Also servers do not effect PvE in any significant way at all since megaservers.

I already said I am fine with easy mode raids IF they take nothing away from current raids, (meaning no unique rewards, rewards are fine, just not magnetite shards or unique skins, or legendary armor).
But I’m pretty sure the time that would go into making them wouldn’t be worth it for anet to do, but I’m no expert on that.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Ropechef.6192:

There are many people that have been posting on this thread and the forums in general. Concerning Raids or difficulty or how its to hard to get mastery points etc.

These are the people that come into my Fine dining Japanese/ Asian Restaurant. Order Chicken tenders with fries, Complain to me about how I don’t have hamburgers, (yes this does happen), Don’t tip the server and go on to write some review on yelp about how the sushi was improperly prepared.

You have reached a point where your opinions mean nothing. Most of us don’t even read them any more. As they contain no information worth noting. And they will remain as such for a very long time.

I’m very much in the corner of raiders as far as things like raid nerfs go. However, a lot of the objections to the raiding community in any game come down to their being opinionated and rude. This post goes a long way to confirming that view. Characterizing people you disagree with as ignorant is not good advertising for your later offer to "help’ these people.

As an entrepreneur, you would know that while certain reviews matter and other reviews don’t, what really matters is sales. That you love your work and aren’t doing it primarily for money is great. However, you do need to be able to keep the doors open. Also, I’d guess you aren’t wholly owned by another company that does care primarily about money. ANet is in the middle (reportedly) of revamping HoT. They would not be doing so if they believed those complaints did not matter. Now, which complaints they’ve listened to is anyone’s guess.

Good luck with your restaurant.

But he’s not wrong, most of them are ignorant, that’s not an insult, not knowing something isn’t a bad thing. He’s not calling them stupid, only ignorant of what raids are, which again, is not an insult.

STIHL.2489:

I am going to stand by what I first said in this topic.

STIHL.2489:

I’ll chime in.

I am going to say that I think raids were a bad idea. It has nothing to do with how hard they are, or any of that, but simply that there really was no need for a 10 person dungeon in this game.

Also lets be honest with ourselves, when you have world meta events like Teq, TTT, Shatter, Jormag, which can take well over 20 people to do effectively, communication team work, people gathering for… a RAID… and then the boss and even the lakys are larger then life, these dragon heralds that rain death and fear upon those around them..minions that can rend you, all kinds of stuff going on, people really rally together for those events. And it’s… Beautiful!

In the face of the Meta Events in GW2, The Raids feel like a 10 man dungeon.

Now this is just me, but, a 10 man dungeon really just amounts to “Double the Pug” Experience.

Sorry, I get that some people love them and I am glad that they love them. but to me, the whole thing (while a complex dance to get it done) felt, small and insignificant for what should be this grandiose event.

I just could not really get into the idea that this was “Raid” when in GW2 there are meta events that fill maps with people, just to get them done.

In the end, I think they were a bad idea, simply because they don’t offer anything that could not have been provided as good, if not better, on a 5 Person scale.

Look at Thermanova Reactor Fractal, a very dynamic, twitch sensitive, and in may ways challenging encounter that required team effort.

The Fractal Underground Facility the content is engaging, requiring team work to open the doors, and get to the Boss fight, most people take part in it, and the boss fight, is, ok, I’ll admit, an annoying mechanic, it’s also a challenging one if you have to play it out fully and it requires thought and team work.

Even to use a “Story Dungeon” as an example, AC Story Mode, the Fight with the lovers. This was a wonderfully done encounter, where the players have to split them apart to be able to kill them. It requires team work and thought to make it happen.

They could have taken any of those mechanics and made them less forgiving, and that would be just as “Challenging” as the Raid is.

Not saying that people shouldn’t enjoy Raids, and I sincerely hope that people are having fun with them. Just between Fractals, World Bosses, Meta Events, and all the other Content, I personally just don’t feel like Raids added anything substantial to the game.

Anyway, with that said. Since I don’t see anything that really inspired me to change my mind since my first post on this subject, I will bow out and wish you all well.

Have a Great day.

And why can’t we have both? You’re talking as if raids take away from these other parts of the game, and they do not.

I understand the point being made by the analogy, its just that its wrong because
HoT changed NOTHING about how the old content worked, NOTHING.

Lord Kuru.3685:

Ropechef.6192:

These are the people that come into my Fine dining Japanese/ Asian Restaurant. Order Chicken tenders with fries, Complain to me about how I don’t have hamburgers, (yes this does happen)

GW2 was a hamburger joint that decided overnight they wanted to become a fine dining establishment. Both restaurant types have their place, but when you make a switch like that your old customers are going to be unhappy. And that’s what we’re seeing.

Now the question is whether (1), there’s enough people interested in fine dining to make up for losing their hamburger eaters, and (2) whether the fine diners are going to look past the “stigma” that this place used to be a hamburger joint not long ago.

Looking at the poor sales of HoT, it doesn’t look good.

Wasn’t there a Kitchen Nightmares where this exact thing happened? Maybe Anet should call Gordon Ramsay.

This is a ridiculous analogy, NONE of the old content went away.

STIHL.2489:

Avarice.2791:

@STIHL

It’s merely the fact that hard != excluded therefore your analogy is a fallacy..

Can we please stop this charade that Hard does not mean Exclusive. We all know it does.

That’s absolutely ridiculous. Hard doesn’t mean exclusive it just means its harder.

godsie.2864:

I assume that eu players can’t team up for this – otherwise I would be very interested

I don’t think I can really do much to help EU players unfortunately

Aktium.9506:

Amineo.8951:

Why would people invest over 1000g for something that only increases 2-3% in the stats? Juste because people don’t have it doesn’t mean they suck and shouldn’t raid, I cleared the 1st wing with ascended trinkets only and there was no timer issue at all, so please stop saying it’s required or anything even for a dumb Vale Guardian, maybe for tank or healer but certainly not for DPS and condis…

Unless you’re soloing the raids, 2-3% x10 more damage is a pretty big difference.

That’s not how math works.