Guild Wars 2

It is a method available to turn your IRL time/wealth into in game wealth – essentially the off switch for grind mode.

Apparently the correct term for a player who doesn’t pay is “user generated content”, my term for someone who isn’t paying to use a service is “Cyclist”… oh wait… no that was on the way to work…

You provided a hypothetical set of conditions, you’ve not evidence that they’ve been met (and have stated you don’t meet them).

OK this one:
“No, time gating refers to the notion that a player is only rewarded X times per day for their decision to repeat an activity they enjoy.

I see no point in punishing a farmer if they enjoy farming. I find it boring, but more power to ’em if they can find enjoyment in something so menial.”

See the way you twist reward there is beautiful, like twisting laurels from earnable currency to an entitlement that you miss out on if you can’t log in and play – completely back to front logic and BRILLIANTLY presented. You’ve managed to take a short list of crap you’d do anyway (more or less) and turn it into the biggest chore list the internet has ever seen, shown the petulance to complain about having to do the chores to get desert, and then moved that it should be repeatable ad naseum.

The scary thing is how common this whole “I don’t have to earn, its a game” attitude is folks – its an MMO and you’ve entered into a social contract of sorts, do y’all know what that means?

Degeneration of your “mature converstations” may indicate communications issues with a common variable, dismissing me as a troll would be a nice completion to this one with a nice touch of faux symmetry…

kKagari.6804:

critickitten.1498:

thisolderhead.5127:

Agony mechanic is pretty dopey, keep it locked in the fractals and let tier 1 of the verticle gear ladder be a lesson in how not to implement it.

No disagreement here.

I just don’t know if the devs will end up thinking the same way. They went through the trouble of creating a brand new special dynamically scaling condition just for this dungeon….so it would strike me as odd if they only intended to use it in the Fractals and never anywhere else. Doesn’t seem like a good use of resources.

They could’ve just done fractals with randomized enemies, even that would be more fun than agony.

RNG enemies would have made for the best forum threads!

I did see a comment out there somewhere stating it was going to be, but basically they were backing out…You might recall the one I’m referring to.

The scaling aside from Agony/Resist is a lot more interesting and would allow any encounters lower than verticle-top to scale up… it makes sense in my head and fills the encounters gaps/issues with the gear pathways I’ve been mumbling about.

They way I’ve been reading that one is much like the WoW purples (plus iLevel) type approach (for sake of quick explaination/comparison).

Once the torches burn out from that one they’ll announce a level cap increase, perhaps major expac/content pack ($$$$).

critickitten.1498:

I am curious if there would be quite so many people defending the present state of Ascended gear if the Agony mechanic was implemented across the game world, instead of only in the Fractals.

That’s not to say the OP is rationalized. He’s not. He’s nuts. But I am legitimately curious if people would be quite so defensive of the poor implementation of Ascended gear at present if it were needed everywhere, instead of just the Fractals. I suspect there would be much more disagreement in this thread if that were true.

And I do actually expect to see Agony elsewhere eventually. I have a feeling they won’t keep it confined to the Fractals. It just seems wasteful for that to be the only place it’s used in.

Agony mechanic is pretty dopey, keep it locked in the fractals and let tier 1 of the verticle gear ladder be a lesson in how not to implement it.

penatbater.4710:

Revolution.6301:

thisolderhead.5127:

Keep it civil mate, you repeating yourself doesn’t provide additonal support for what you are calling a “logical fallacy” – if it is truly a logical fallacy provide me the equation proof mate, all pretty easy stuff when you know your stuff.

Also – what single weak argument do you refer to?

The argument that its a choice. That one, the one that everyone one you is enjoying the grind is using.

so… its not really a choice?

I discovered today a strange verse in a dead sea scroll that both confirms pre-destination and predicts the coming of GW2.

Revolution.6301:

thisolderhead.5127:

Keep it civil mate, you repeating yourself doesn’t provide additonal support for what you are calling a “logical fallacy” – if it is truly a logical fallacy provide me the equation proof mate, all pretty easy stuff when you know your stuff.

Also – what single weak argument do you refer to?

The argument that its a choice. That one, the one that everyone one you is enjoying the grind is using.

Mate – I’m not a fan of deeply grindy games, your “logical fallacy” just hasn’t been proven or evidenced well… and you actually might be able to if you backed up and tried.

You seem to be trying to say that by entering into the game you lose the capacity to undertake activities under your own free will, and instead get stuck repeating the same instance/whatever until logout. That failing to make goals that push one towards grinds is failing to play the game (correctly).

Start a thread mate – its got little to do with which weapon is cooler.

Excellent – we’re getting somewhere.

So you aren’t here to save the game, not to save a player, you are really just “sensitive” to the fact there is a niche imbalance in the game mechanics that could potentially screw someone over, that doesn’t affect you and that you’ve failed to evidence actually affects anyone.

Time gating is your reversed wording for what is actually rewarding regularity, but since that doesn’t affect you really and you have all the time in the world to play, I can only assume you’re angling towards an abusable grindable system….

Which onto the final part – you have touted that effective grinding is possible but hindered by DR, time gating and concurrently noted you want more loot for your time in game.

Looks like a duck and quacks mate – 9/10.

So the suggestion is to create content to resolve the issue of needing more content, nice – elegant!

I like to view it this way – my wife has plenty of content to enjoy, most of the players we encounter have stuff they do and enjoy, I run fractals in my sleep while forum warrioring.

I don’t think I’m the normal/average/mean customer – the wife probably is.

RNG impact is being decreased.

Even if it is 13% every time, gear pathways should bring you into the current tier from any point if Anet get it right, its quite reasonable to get into full exotic and then hop to current tier, so the treadmill only applies if you spend all your time actively watching your feet while you run on it.

You know how often a lot of people worry about improving their gear? In between having fun.

critickitten.1498:

thisolderhead.5127:

So just a Noble White Knight – out to fend off the developers and stick one to the makers of this product you love for the little guy who doesn’t even understand how he’s screwed, gotcha.

Not at all. Don’t twist what I said, I don’t find it amusing.

I’m simply speaking out about an issue that I feel negatively affects other players who have expressed these very same complaints in this forum before. The problem didn’t even occur to me until someone else complained about it. But once they explained their point of view, I couldn’t help but agree that what they were saying was, in fact, a pretty legitimate issue.

But it doesn not impact on you so…

“White knighting” has nothing to do with it. If someone makes a convincing case for why something is a problem, one that I can’t honestly refute, then yeah, I’m probably gonna end up agreeing and back them up on that stance. Because that’s what a sensible, rational human being does.

You are carrying the cause of others – being the White Knight bro.

No the other context.

One noisy kid without much clue can take up such a large chunk of your time and energy (should you let them) proportionate to how much that one person actually matters, it could affect better souls – I mean really its just one unemployed mouth to feed (in the future of course).

Except that in this particular case, the noisy kid is only being noisy because he honestly feels slighted and that he’s not being treated fairly, not because he’s a genuinely bad person who wants to hurt the rest of the class.

Still comes a point in every venture where the return for the investment (of time or other) just isn’t worth it, and attempting to push beyond that point impacts on the rest of the venture, in this case it is you minority of binge-only-casual-end-gamers.

Post don’t exist in a vacuum from one thread to the next and within them your points are quite mutable and there is little that hasn’t been said, but will concede that I should have said “effectively grindable” game.

Still not seeing a quote of where I said that….so….got one available?

I can’t respond if you’re simply going to say that I said “X” and I can’t even view the quote so I can recall the context in which I was speaking.

You’ve discussed “grinding” and DR greatly, always negatively – so you’re saying this is NOT able to be summarised as “not effective”?

critickitten.1498:

thisolderhead.5127:

They are not punishing Binge players by catering towards anyone, that is just a victimised way of saying that some people get left out – well you cannot cater towards everyone, and of course you (as one of the vast minority who’s life doesn’t mesh with the game mechanics) are upset mate.

Actually I have time to play every day. So this doesn’t affect me. Doesn’t mean I’m not sensitive to the issue, however.

So just a Noble White Knight – out to fend off the developers and stick one to the makers of this product you love for the little guy who doesn’t even understand how he’s screwed, gotcha.

Teaching and training are different (just sayin’), but in either regard you would have experience with diminishing returns – you can spend a lifetime of resources on one lost cause student and gain basically nothing… put that into context.

Yes, but I’m not limited to only getting one chance per day to teach content to my students.
[/quote]
No the other context.

One noisy kid without much clue can take up such a large chunk of your time and energy (should you let them) proportionate to how much that one person actually matters, it could affect better souls – I mean really its just one unemployed mouth to feed (in the future of course).

I can’t see how you can remain straight-faced (so to speak) while saying Anet failed to create a casual friendly game, Anet failed to make a grindable game, Anet failed to make a game without excessive grind, and that Anet has failed to reward adequately for grinding all in parallel.

If you can reconcile that for us it would be great,

I’m curious as to where I claimed all of those things, because it wasn’t here.

They did create a game that isn’t casual-friendly and has an excessive amount of grind, that much I have said many times in the past. They have indeed failed to adequately reward players for their efforts, choosing instead to time-gate so as to artificially lock the content for hardcore players and make it more difficult to access for casuals. But I don’t recall when I claimed that they failed to make a grindable game.[/quote]

Post don’t exist in a vacuum from one thread to the next and within them your points are quite mutable and there is little that hasn’t been said, but will concede that I should have said “effectively grindable” game.

kKagari.6804:

Heijincks.9267:

kKagari.6804:

Heijincks.9267:

kKagari.6804:

This whole counter argument of ‘you don’t need to do it’ is ridiculous. I don’t need to do anything in this game, should I completely stop playing it then? It doesn’t make the content designed any less grindy. OP wants ascended gear, and the path towards getting ascended gear is grindy, there is no argument about that.

For example, if you can get an ascended ring by beating a boss without pressing 1, it’d be a challenging way to get an ascended ring, that wouldn’t be grinding. It might even be fun. And OP wouldn’t be making this topic.

Ascended gear is a grind.

If you stopped playing the game, it would defeat the entire purpose of the counterargument to that original counterargument.

Which is why the counterargument to the “You don’t need to…” argument doesn’t work. You don’t need to use /dance to play the game. Does the counterargument work here too?

What are you on about? Clearly quitting the game is not supposed to be a solution. The thing is, relative to what O kitten aying; if he finds gearing up fun, why does it need to be a grind? The only way he is going to get ascended gear is by grinding, whether its fractals or dailies.

Exactly. Which is why the counterargument to “optional” is wrong.

If I found anything else to be fun, then why does it have to be a grind as well? “Grind” is such a relative term that I can find anything grindy, including something as simple as doing map completion.

Lets say, you really want to play tennis. But to play tennis, you need $1000 dollars. You don’t have $1000 dollars. That’s you can play table tennis, that’s free. Does that solve the issue of that tennis costing $1000 sucks? NO.

OP wants BiS gear. BiS gear requires grinding. You tell him not to get BiS gear, does that change the fact that BiS gear requires grinding? NO.

But I’d like to play a certain type of tennis that requires me attend tournaments, join teams, training sessions, strat meetings, pay for insurance, attend mandatory safety training, and…

Screw it – this is hard – I should realign my goals to something which suits MY personal level of commitment (and skill).

Afternoon – I can see your axe needs GRINDING! Hahahahahahahah.

After the manifesto-clinging-raging-crying (which goes on today) do you think we will be ever told anything about the future direction of the game again?

Thanks for that folks.

Heijincks.9267:

kKagari.6804:

Heijincks.9267:

kKagari.6804:

This whole counter argument of ‘you don’t need to do it’ is ridiculous. I don’t need to do anything in this game, should I completely stop playing it then? It doesn’t make the content designed any less grindy. OP wants ascended gear, and the path towards getting ascended gear is grindy, there is no argument about that.

For example, if you can get an ascended ring by beating a boss without pressing 1, it’d be a challenging way to get an ascended ring, that wouldn’t be grinding. It might even be fun. And OP wouldn’t be making this topic.

Ascended gear is a grind.

If you stopped playing the game, it would defeat the entire purpose of the counterargument to that original counterargument.

Which is why the counterargument to the “You don’t need to…” argument doesn’t work. You don’t need to use /dance to play the game. Does the counterargument work here too?

What are you on about? Clearly quitting the game is not supposed to be a solution. The thing is, relative to what O kitten aying; if he finds gearing up fun, why does it need to be a grind? The only way he is going to get ascended gear is by grinding, whether its fractals or dailies.

Exactly. Which is why the counterargument to “optional” is wrong.

If I found anything else to be fun, then why does it have to be a grind as well? “Grind” is such a relative term that I can find anything grindy, including something as simple as doing map completion.

Actually quitting the game is a solution.

Really people – if everything is agony and you don’t enjoy it anymore put down the crack pipe, erm mouse and keyboard… have a break.

I stopped watching my sport for a time back in the day because I was made angry by it and all joy was gone – they ruined it with profiteering and changed the contest from what I’d loved about it. Now I enjoy it again because I realised that salary rules and scandals were distracting me from just enjoying it but I was too deep in… the game.

Darque Intent.1674:

thisolderhead.5127:

It is the road, not the destination…
;-)

Well when I joined the road it said I was going somewhere else entierly, 6 months down that road and I find out that I’m actually going in the opposite direction than what I wanted. And they keep sticking up toll booths…

Nevermind the people who try and turn that road into a battlefield.

Don’t be ashamed in deleting your alts. Who knows, they might sack whoever can’t make a decent decision and it might be worth creating new ones… YOLO BRO...

Sounds like you need a truck stop….

OrianZeta.1537:

thisolderhead.5127:

I’m stilll a firm believer in the fact I am pro enough that I can evaluate the performance of my party in real time – but I can see most are not. I apologise for suggesting that a tool to look at the gear of a player was not required in this task.

You want to “straighten them out and give them advice” and to this end allow others “see what high-level players use to help them along”… riiiiiiiiiiigggghhhht.

Most don’t sit and evaluate the performance of others unless there’s a lot of death or faffing about. I personally focus on what I’m doing and react to things. If I know ahead of time I may need to react and/or protect a certain player, it makes my job easier.

That is fine mate, some of us are quick enough on the uptake to do it as second nature “always on”, but players who can do this are not the norm (I forgot).

But apparently some people think this is a soft spot to exploit discrimination, or that others with control issues are thirsting to impose onto others. I’ve taken a lot of traditional sides with GW2 but this about tops the list of most ridiculous protests over a game feature.

While we are all blind in the manner we are it is harder for elitist tools, levels the playing field for MF/Gearing characters and forces the actions to rule, would you prefer replace that with a slippery slope to Gearscore?

I, for one, would greatly appreciate bad seeds showing their elitism so I will be left to group with people that aren’t shallow, arrogant control freaks with cases of superiority complex.

And the best way to pick them out of a crowd is see who wants to be able to inspect/link builds and gear – EVERY reason to have this will be below kitten and discrimination.

I am a better player than a big chunk of the player base, geared out well, and an abrasive bloke who can hold his own online – I am suggesting the downsides outweigh the benefits entirely from a neutral view, but hey – some of you like being kicked out of parties immediately after getting to the group.

Aristio.2784:

gimmethegepgun.1284:

Except that whenever you’re dealing damage, you’re dealing on average 13% more. There is no skill or situational variable to include, as it is done regardless.
You ARE doing that much more damage during whatever time you’re spending dealing damage.
Which means it IS a 13% increase.

My point is that while it may increase your instantaneous damage or burst damage, its real effectiveness is near impossible to measure. Especially on anything that is worth bringing to extra stats to. (Fractal bosses and such)

And the discussion has been sucessfully diverted away from the fact that we are still on the first tier and “out of date” whining is completely unfounded…. for now.

They are not punishing Binge players by catering towards anyone, that is just a victimised way of saying that some people get left out – well you cannot cater towards everyone, and of course you (as one of the vast minority who’s life doesn’t mesh with the game mechanics) are upset mate.

Teaching and training are different (just sayin’), but in either regard you would have experience with diminishing returns – you can spend a lifetime of resources on one lost cause student and gain basically nothing… put that into context.

I can’t see how you can remain straight-faced (so to speak) while saying Anet failed to create a casual friendly game, Anet failed to make a grindable game, Anet failed to make a game without excessive grind, and that Anet has failed to reward adequately for grinding all in parallel.

If you can reconcile that for us it would be great,

Leo Paul.1659:

I’m not a very big fan of games that encourages alt tbh.. I’d much rather play games that rewards you for being loyal to a specific character. You know, like how old mmorpgs used to be. Just 1 character per roleplay.

People still had alts, just took about one more step.

In fact because people assumed that each character was a unique player – SCAMS!

Was great.

Keep it civil mate, you repeating yourself doesn’t provide additonal support for what you are calling a “logical fallacy” – if it is truly a logical fallacy provide me the equation proof mate, all pretty easy stuff when you know your stuff.

Also – what single weak argument do you refer to?

critickitten.1498:

thisolderhead.5127:

Let me dig out some surveys of working gamers from one of my previous lives, most well balanced working people would see binge gaming all weekend as less attactive than a few hours a few times a week. Some very big games you may not play used the results to create (wait for it) structured daily reward programs.

Not everyone works a 9-to-5 job. Some people have restricted internet access hours by virtue of the jobs they work.

And while it’s easy enough to say “well, tough for them”, I’d prefer if there were a way to ensure that they’re still being given a fair shake.

That is right, some people have duty weekends, some people fly in and out – but you have to tailor your passtimes to suit your lifestyle mate – can’t expect Anet to help out there, so they reward those who can only spare an hour or two here and there to play. Those who can only binge play (as you seem to be stuck with) are lower on the representation – so get screwed for the sake of the vast majority.

The few hours a night player cannot engage in activities that require as much sustained involvement as the binger, therefore binger has potential to gain rewards from sustained activities which often also reward better.

Not any more, since much of the game’s best rewarded content is time-gated to once per day.

If not for February’s patch, I might agree with you there to some degree. But now? Nope.
[/quote]
Yeah I’m a little dissapointed too but believe it is being addressed.

I’d be happy to agree with you about the subjectivity of other things I’ve said, but this isn’t one of them.

No really it is a casual friendly game (at least RIGHT NOW) based on the fact there is no gear gating and its pretty easy for the most part, you state those elsewhere, so that makes it VERY appealing to casual players…

Probably broke all the quotes there.

Dante.1508:

thisolderhead.5127:

It is the road, not the destination…
;-)

The road blocks in the road, make the destination unreachable..

That is disappointing from you mate – you’ve always struck me as a more “half-full, but with something rancid” type of player…

Back on topic though – some players have built road blocks in their mind, I can’t convince them otherwise nor am inclined to as they don’t make fun party members.

critickitten.1498

I do wish that people such as yourself would actually stop and think for a moment about why I’m complaining so much. Because if I was complaining simply because I hated the game, I would have just left the game months ago.

This is a good point – we both get into things because we enjoy the game and have thoughts/feeling about where it should go. Also makes it a bit easy to get blunt or worse when conversing…

Just as long as we are in agreement about the dead manifesto the rest will shake itself out! ;-)

critickitten.1498:

thisolderhead.5127:

Because there is more to gaming than pure time investment – skill and guild management for instance, that and you find games that reward casual play while concurrently opening doors for the elite/hardcore/whatever succeed.

I could also suggest it is promoting healthier gameplay by rewarding moderation over binging…

To many people, “binging” is the only option, as they have jobs that prevent them from obtaining regular access to the computer.

I don’t feel that it’s particularly fair to say that they don’t “deserve” the same rewards as someone else who puts in the same amount of time but spreads it out across more days.

It’s certainly not creating a “casual-friendly” game in my opinion.

Let me dig out some surveys of working gamers from one of my previous lives, most well balanced working people would see binge gaming all weekend as less attactive than a few hours a few times a week. Some very big games you may not play used the results to create (wait for it) structured daily reward programs.

The few hours a night player cannot engage in activities that require as much sustained involvement as the binger, therefore binger has potential to gain rewards from sustained activities which often also reward better.

Also fixed something for you…

It seems like some assume that time=reward, we input more into this game than just time (well assuming one is not faceroll grinding watching TV).

Why shouldn’t time = reward?

If a player puts in 10 hours all in one day, and another player puts in 1 hour across ten days, why is the second player getting ten times the reward?[/quote]

Because there is more to gaming than pure time investment – skill and guild management for instance, that and you find games that reward casual play while concurrently opening doors for the elite/hardcore/whatever succeed.

I could also suggest it is promoting healthier gameplay by rewarding moderation over binging…

And yes – I was dismissive of a lot of the noise that is being dragged in, do (specifically) note anything you feel was of import in that noise.

Back to the original point, and assuming forever verticle gear progression…

Given that we really only have one tier of end-game gear anyone saying they can’t catch up must have some undisclosed deficit.

As for those hurt over the fact there is going to be verticle progression – let us see how they implement it before the panic, neckbeards making mountains out of unhatched chicken eggs is not a bandwagon we should all jump on.

gimmethegepgun.1284:

Doesn’t justify continuing to break it with the treadmill when it’s fully preventable.

Yeah sorry – edited in a point about that.

If (like dailies are introducing) you build towards “end game” incidentally while running around playing the game, why is it so evil to have the “end game” evolve?

I’m not seeing balance problems, I may before the end of Ascended and after…

I said above if they don’t do it right it is bad – but right now it isn’t breaking balance much if at all as much as other factors (broken class mechanics are a big one).

To clarify – 13% between a “just 80” and “fully geared” isn’t that rich, when it is 26% and you have to step through Ascended to get there most of the above makes sense.

People play these games to grow characters, I don’t know why you would want to stop developing your characters for their life…

Cosmetic items aren’t needed either…

I get it – OP is a former EvE player, deleting alts actually has a financial impact on the devs over there, freeing up space on the servers for Anet by deleting your rubbish is just polite!

Verticle progression (we’ll assume tiered) is only a problem when it lacks a pathway for catching up characters, which will be relevant and necessary IF a new tier replaces Ascended.

In the meantime it is clear linear progression and anyone left behind their mates needs to do a few runs, problem solved.

SadieDeAtreia.8912:

Vayne.8563:

It’s still easier to get than a legendary.

RNG determines how difficult a legendary is to get. Nothing else.
OP can run fractals for more than a year and not get the skin. Someone else can dump 4 rares into the forge and get a precursor on first attempt. The rest of the mats (with the exception of specific types of lodestones) can be obtained in a matter of weeks.

Which is more ‘difficult’?

Actually one can just dump cash into RMT and circumvent all the pain involved in a Legendary – I’ll use my credit card.

Its a good example of how you can get similar outcomes playing the game different ways, like one might expect of a player who runs with mates for three hours a night compared to a player who solo grinds for eight hours per day – both get a prize!

So to summarise – some people will get things faster than others, and that is difficult for some players to pallet.

Some people will input more and gain a return faster. This seems unfair when looking at two different input streams with the same output, but lets try to bear in mind that as big as the divide between player groups (as per above), is the divide between inputs between those groups.

It seems like some assume that time=reward, we input more into this game than just time (well assuming one is not faceroll grinding watching TV).

So is it the cost or the fact they exist? We are blurring lines here.

Rainbow.3496:

i think they havnt added it cause it will add alot of hysteria to the whole, “THIS CLASS OP, THAT CLASS OP” thing. I agree, it should be implemented ASAP. but…you know anet.

Haha – yes it would be bad to START the fools trying to argue 1vs1 balance is broken in this game… that would be one MORE thing that Anet doesn’t have to deal with at the moment.

So check out the idea of areas within cities I floated – you can completely ignore the existence of duelling if you wish.

Fight Club – these characters are your appartments, burn them.

It isn’t like chasing the Flavour Of The Month builds/profs in GW2 is hard – you only need three characters (warr, theif, ele) to stay ahead of that curve lol.

cargan.5689:

Experience 5 minutes after creating a dwarf and logging into the game that shall not be mentioned
them:wana duel
Me:no
T:wana duel
M:no
T:wana duel
T:duel me chicken
T:scared baby
T:wana duel
M:Kitten off
T:Whaa im reporting you

Duels no thanks

Ignore would have been faster…

Do a quick search and you will see this has been well discussed.

An area of each major city where it is allowed, off the beaten path enough as to be able to be ignored by those who would be (oddly) offended by it seems to be the best way to please almost everyone if I recall (quote my own solution).

You know what I’m calling a logical fallacy on every person who uses this NON-SENSICAL argument.

We know you love your grind but this is to people who have work and life other then this game. If you want to bash this comment you can but don’t use this same argument.

No its not realisitc and thats his point. If you just want to attack the op just for the sake of it there are other forums to do so.

It doesn’t lack sense – though I give you props for the persistent and devout subscription to this rhetoric and the manner which you present it.

The choice to grind, play, or whatever you do after log in is in fact the players’ to make.
The choice of goal within the game is also the players’ to make, Anet just made some suggestions in the game design.

But we digress – perhaps a thread where the point is evaluated for its own merit, rather than trying to stuff it into every thread possible, ought be raised?

Furikake.4052:

Champions need to have much much better AI. It’s the intelligence level of the opponent that makes combat fun.

Orr is not fun for me because the mobs there are still as dumb as anywhere. They only serve to annoy.

Watch this space for updates to AI of both companion/spirit/whatever and mobs – now that most of the loot-wah has been dealt with its back to fixing core mechanics.

It was a half written stub at release, and is being iterated upon slowly – it takes most MMOs a few YEARS to get theirs together.

Incentive to do so, or an acknowledgement of those that do?

Rested XP from a few games was intended as a way to reduce the impact of being more casual with your time, and the TWEWY reward method is just a carrot.

First people will be stressed about getting “behind”, then a pathway from zero to “caught up mostly” will be implemented, assuming of course significant verticle progression comes in…

Can you rework their numbers correctly to illustrate the error mate?
Ta.

It is worth it in a way… the percentage/band improvements on loot for the individual in the gear is more predictable and stable than the impact of group members capabilities on loot.

It is good old fasion kit/basket craft gating, direct bottleneck that can be directly manipulated by the game controllers.

Their rationale for having it set where it is I shant speculate on too much, but given it is a clear example of intentionally limiting supply… oh right these are an input to something that is meant to be very hard to get, or expensive.

Lodestones/precursors in the gem store would be great.

Without an agreed definition of “Grind” this whole discussion is moot…

While one may wish to paint any form of repition as a grind, in this context the term stems from that it was technique used to pad game play time stats back in the day where advertising a game had 200hrs of game play was the norm – back when games were on carts that couldn’t be content patched and noone had interenet at home.

The result was gaps in content and encounter requirements that could only be closed by repitious behaviour that served no other purpose than the above padding. GW2 has gone down this path somewhat in some ways, but no means as much as MOST.

I also see that the concept of infinite verticle progression has been snuck in to the discussion, if that little gem of unchallenged speculation is ignored we are back to a handful of people who want rewards with less input… I can’t be too hard on that – greed is human after all!

The issue with both being in a large and small guild(having cake and eating it to as you put it) is most large guilds now require you to represent 100% of the time, meaning there is no point in even keeping the small guild. Thats not really a great option for the people who prefer the community/freindship of being in a smaller guild.

Most – Guild shop.

The choices are there – you can’t always have the best of all worlds, games are no different.