Guild Wars 2

Well they did say it’s “endless.”

OanSur.4590:

Ok, i get the fact that they screwed everything again, but that does not explain rollback. Edge was fine, everything worked as it should. I got punished for no reason because they are trying to fix something that is not an exploit and is happening on different area. (yes, i feel punished and robbed)

There’s nothing else I can say that won’t get me infracted, so…

Sorry you feel that way.

You might not have noticed if you’re in EOTM, but in real WvW, enemies are appearing as allies on some servers. They’re trying to fix it and that may explain the rollback.

You sure you’re not just in Edge of the Mists? :-D

Lauren Kamieniecki.6245:

timmyf.1490:

Lauren Kamieniecki.6245:

Reinstalling won’t fix it guys, it will just make you more frustrated. There’s a fix in the works but I don’t have the exact time yet. I’ll keep ya updated.

but but but

Lauren Kamieniecki.6245:

I’m glad the reinstall fixed it, restart and reinstall fix just about everything no matter what game/application/problem.

Sort of reminds me of this… https://xkcd.com/1425/

99% isn’t 100% :P

I like that comic, good fit.

That comic and this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKorP55Aqvg are my go-tos when I get tired of explaining to people who have never coded or worked in a corporate environment why it’s so hard to do “this really easy change.”

Lauren Kamieniecki.6245:

Reinstalling won’t fix it guys, it will just make you more frustrated. There’s a fix in the works but I don’t have the exact time yet. I’ll keep ya updated.

but but but

Lauren Kamieniecki.6245:

I’m glad the reinstall fixed it, restart and reinstall fix just about everything no matter what game/application/problem.

Sort of reminds me of this… https://xkcd.com/1425/

kiko.2085:

Is the only way to move servers buying a transfer or deleting all your characters? SoR currently, and I haven’t been able to find a guild at all.

I want to move to NSP but 1800 gems is too much.

Yeah, I’d echo what Xivor said: try to find an NSP guild (there’s a bunch that recruit here or take a look at northernshiverpeaks.org) and you may be able to get some help transferring.

It’s a great time to be coming to NSP, there’s some exciting things happening here. :-D

Hi Sky! I’m just going to chime in and say that my guild has very much enjoyed our time on Northern Shiverpeaks since we moved here from Sanctum of Rall in December. You should definitely talk to Xivor, as your guild sounds very similar to his, but if you want a second opinion, feel free to ping me!

Hi everybody, thanks for the responses here. MEGA isn’t recruiting at the moment and we don’t think we’ll be for a few months at least. Full details are at http://apply.supermegahappyfuntime.com along with some suggestions for other guilds you should consider.

Julie Yann.5379:

This war, spies are to be expected. If it is against the ToS, how do you prove it?

The comparison to spies is foolish.

In real life, spies can be captured or killed. In this game, spies appear as allies and we are without recourse.

You should know better and probably do.

I thought a huge part of the fun of WvW is devising and executing long-term (multi-month) strategies with a group of folks outside your own guild. WvW has the most interesting metagame of any mode… why would you annihilate that one strength?

Terrible idea.

Kanebrake.6192:

Reverence.6915:

Welp, time to ban all of T1 for match manipulation right?

Come on Michael, you’ve got to be more specific than that

By being intentionally aloof it allows Anet to define “match manipulation” on the fly and look at things on a case by case basis instead of having a rigid set of do’s and don’ts but I do agree it’s a little too broad

Yeah, the basic problem of a rigid definition is that you create a nice, accessible list of Things To Not Do Otherwise We’re Fine.

If certain guilds don’t seem to think partying up with enemy commanders in order to avoid combat counts as “match manipulation,” though, it’d sure be nice for Mr. GM ProHeals to chime in. In fact, I’ll make it easy.

Does partying with the enemy to track them for the purposes of finding or avoiding combat in WvW or EOTM count as match manipulation?

And then Mr. GM Proheals can just copy/paste this… You’ll just need to add the first [ and the last [. It’s only two characters to type, so I saved you half of the keystrokes! :-)

quote]Does partying with the enemy to track them for the purposes of finding or avoiding combat in WvW or EOTM count as match manipulation? /quote]

Yes.

A few suggestions for you: register for the NSP community website at northernshiverpeaks.org. We have forums, guild recruiting boards, etc that will allow you to find the best guild for you.

Make sure to check these guys out, they’re good friends:

RISE: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/community/lookingfor/Those-Who-Fell-RISE-is-recruiting-NSP

FIRE: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/community/lookingfor/NSP-Chariot-of-Fire-FIRE-Christian-NA-1

GROMIT.7829:

1- No reason to strip him naked (the act of a child).
2- No reason to make the char jump to it’s death (the act of the same child who thinks he’s cool).
3- No reason to show us the character being deleted.

Public humiliation is one way to prevent people from doing bad things. I think Chris Cleary is a hero. I wish we had videos like this for every hacker who gets banned so we can watch them, celebrate, and wait for them to come back on their new $10 account.

Wow, I feel like Sentinel is a FANTASTIC name, great suggestion.

I want Necro to get Physical skills. This could include a lunge (mobility), blast finisher, etc.

Mostly I just want to see Jory beat the crap out of some dragon minions.

If we got Ferocity main-stat gear, that could open up some interesting options, probably just mixed in with other gear though.

Save condi builds! Nerf one of the main ways condi builds proc condis!

dbill.7483:

Instead of removing the karma or badges, why not add the “player kills” to you servers score? Give the WvW players a reason to fight in EOTM. Right now, it only dilutes your server and doesn’t add any benefit.

It would change the equilibrium. There would be more players who come in to kill, leading to less players karmatraining because of the hassle. That would lead to some WvWers leaving (as there’s less to kill).

Overall, the main effect would be less people in EOTM. I think.

Gern.2978:

In addition to new and entertaining dungeons, the idea that I had, and have kinda failed to articulate well, is that they still allow you to play how you want, but they give bonus loot for completing a boss fight in deferent ways. Such as, you get bonus loot (like obsidian shards or mystic clovers or some such) for no one in your party going below a certain HP level. You could also get that same bonus loot for killing the boss in a very short amount of time. You get the same bonus loot, but you only get it for completing one of these bonus challenges, whichever you complete first.

I think you articulated it just fine and it was a fantastic idea.

Sadly, we can’t have a nice discussion about dungeons without a few people showing up, complaining about the balance of conditions and direct damage, and talking about how much better dungeons (which they don’t run anyway) would be if they just required X, where X is a thing that the interloper wants to run in dungeons.

I hadn’t really been to EOTM since launch, but there was something fun about getting a few guildies together (including a couple on different servers who can’t WvW with us but happen to be the same color) and yoloing into a group of 20-30 uplevels seeing how many we can take out before we go.

We might make it a regular thing. Has anybody ever tried this with Lava Tomb ele?

I think the major problem is that you can do all these things simultaneously:

• See the need for a particular system
• Understand the way it was designed
• Dislike particular design choices
• Express your dislike for those choices
• Still be a reasonable thinking human being

It’s tiring to try to critique a design and provide alternatives only to face death by a thousand picked nits… or rampant hyperbole.

Proton Archer.

Rin.1046:

A token idea is ok, but then you run the risk of upsetting the time constrained players. If the tokens required too many hours to acquire, those who cannot put in enough hours will not be happy, and those players are more likely to be the ones who spend money on gems.

I don’t feel like rehashing it here, but the system I was suggesting took your AP, WvW rank, PvP rank, certain achievements (like completing Living Story, HoM points as a nod to GW1 players, etc) and assigned tokens for it.

You would still be able to farm tokens (higher droprate, more required, so you have a better idea of your progress.)

The idea was that long-term players who put in a lot of time into the game over the past 3 years wouldn’t have to farm, but newer, committed players could still get in.

This was (of course) immediately lambasted as me wanting me to get a portal me me me me me. I gave up because there is no hope here.

TheRandomGuy.7246:

MattyP.6954:

rotten.9753:

MattyP.6954:

In context (that is important, you know), calling someone out for not “removing training wheels” by running a build with Toughness (or Survivability in general) is kind of a crappy thing to do. It comes down to a group of players insisting that every player play like they play and bow to the Zerker dungeon Meta, and the comment that they “need to learn the combat system” is hilarious given that the dungeon strategy du jour involves exploiting level design to stand in a corner and dps race the mobs. That is even less active and requires less skill than a WoW 5-man.

You must be really heavy to carry if that’s what you do.

Carrying would imply a lack of skill where it’s required. No skill is required to stack in the corner and dps race the mobs. It’s just a loot farm and contains no rewarding gameplay.

Have you tried doing not AC?

I lol’d.

Serious offer here: for people who complain dungeons have no mechanics and it’s all stack in the corner cheese, I’d be delighted to let you run with my guild and take you through a few dungeon paths.

• Bring whatever gear and build you like
• You can pick the dungeon and path
• If you’re new to it, you’re welcome to watch the cutscenes
• If you think I’m an elitist jerk, watch me and my friends play Living Story while “voice acting” all the lines. See, we love dungeons, and we love story and lore too. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBGzAXTSCiI

Just ping me in-game or something. My name’s over there. I’m on NA.

I get the feeling the real problem here is that we have two groups that have a lot of opinions about each other but very little in-game interaction. I’d be happy to help change that if you’d be willing.

Blockhead Magee.3092:

timmyf.1490:

Blockhead Magee.3092:

There are a lot of people with entitlement issues.

There are a lot of people who confuse criticism of a design decision with entitlement issues.

You must have missed the threads where people announce how many AP points they have or the number of hours they have played before complaining that they haven’t gotten a portal drop.

“I played 70 hours and didn’t get this drop” is a criticism of a drop rate. “I deserve this item because I spent $100 in the gem store” is an entitlement issue. Don’t know what else to say.

There’s some space to argue, for example… “I should get a beta portal, I have 17k AP and over 3000 hours in game.” That’s a little of both.

Overall, the best bet would be to avoid using tired namecalling like “entitlement issues” and stick to discussing the underlying issue.

Rin.1046:

They need players who are determined to get into the beta, not some random lucky sole who got it from playing normally. They need players who are making at least some effort to get in. They do of course need some random (not so determined) players, but they have the newsletter for that.

If they want players who are determined, they’re going about it entirely the wrong way. As we’ve seen, folks who farmed 60-70 hours didn’t get a drop while I know a guy who got one on his first mob kill after the patch.

Random drop does not equal determined.

Instead of thinking about this from the perspective of “how can I justify this decision,” clear your mind and consider all the possibilities.

You are ArenaNet. You want to run a beta test of an upcoming game. You have a limited number of spots available and can’t invite everybody. How do you narrow your playerbase down?

There are plenty of options beyond “drop from two zones” or “newsletter.” I think an in-game item is INCREDIBLY clever, but they made some serious mistakes.

I’m dealing with this “too many options, must narrow down” thing right now with guild invites. I have a small number of spots available and about 3x as many applications. Sometimes your options are limited and you have to use stupid criteria. “This is stupid, but I need some way, and this will work.”

My guess is that ArenaNet recognized this would benefit some players and upset others, but they felt like it was the best option given the constraints and time available to build a system. (I suggested a token system elsewhere that is cool but probably out of scope for the manhours available.)

Anyway, just some thoughts.

MattyP.6954:

timmyf.1490:

MattyP.6954:

Frankly, Dungeons need a rework to discourage zerker-meta speed running. How about add some incentive for supportive gameplay and high-toughness, lower health enemies to incentivize some build/gear diversity in the party

…so you’re saying the game needs 3 Zerker 2 Sinister meta speed-running?

Selective reading of my comment is selective. O.o

Meta speedrunning is meta speedrunning even if you change the meta.

And anyway, there’s tons of support in the current meta, there’s just not a lot of gear diversity.

MattyP.6954:

Frankly, Dungeons need a rework to discourage zerker-meta speed running. How about add some incentive for supportive gameplay and high-toughness, lower health enemies to incentivize some build/gear diversity in the party

…so you’re saying the game needs 3 Zerker 2 Sinister meta speed-running?

MattyP.6954:

heartless.6803:

Problem isn’t the beta portals, it’s the RNG system. It’s a total mystery and many believe that it’s a broken and cheating system. Magic find is increasingly becoming more and more useless with more things bypassing it entirely. It’s long rumored as well that long running accounts have a lower chance to get item drops then new accounts.

There is something fishy with the loot drop RNG system if you ask me.

Do you have any evidence that the RNG is rigged besides “I didn’t get a portal, and that guy got 2! RAAAAGE QQ!!!!1!1!”?

There’s a lot of foil-hatting going on here, even for a videogame forum.

His post was entirely non-ragey. There was absolutely no QQ. There was a bit of tinfoil-hatting, sure, but you’re really exaggerating what he said.

And given that portal drops were confirmed to not account for Magic Find, there’s a slightly valid complaint: players who built up high levels of Magic Find are losing out on their benefits.

This is part of a long-term move from drops (which MF affects) to bags/chests (which MF does not, except SW loot chests), so it’s not exactly new.

Blockhead Magee.3092:

There are a lot of people with entitlement issues.

There are a lot of people who confuse criticism of a design decision with entitlement issues.

One thing that isn’t often mentioned is that WvW is a neglected game mode and EOTM was supposed to be a HUGE beneficial feature for WvWers.

It’s been taken over by people leveling toons instead.

Now, there’s definitely a part of me that thinks this feature IS good for WvWers… keep the uplevels and ktrainers out of WvW! But it stinks to see the one major content drop for WvWers go unused by them.

While community structures are certainly possible apart from servers, there’s a big difference between coordinating a 5-man sPvP team and coordinating one-third of the playerbase.

As others have said, this basically exists in EOTM. Please don’t ruin WvW too.

Nedus.6952:

timmyf.1490:

Nedus.6952:

5) After a capture, supplies should briefly (like 5 sec) be impossible to take. Why:
So people can start an upgrade if needed before it gets drained.

This seems cool but could lead to some epic trolling. For example: I build a spy account [etc]

It’s inevitable some features can be used as troll. In fact this alredy happens for countless things (order guards upgrade in keep while its under attack, go suicide golems off cliff, drop trebuchet in the middle of a zerg and have some pugs waste supplies, etc etc, you name it).

And they can’t really be fixed. So, we can’t really go paranoia for that and stop proposing suggestions.

I’m not saying we should stop proposing suggestions, I’m saying this particular suggestion needs some further thought.

Hi Dave! If you haven’t already, you should check out the NSP community website at northernshiverpeaks.org. You’ll find there’s a ton of helpful folks and guilds out there who’d be happy to run with you.

I can recommend a few guilds if you want some suggestions, but honestly, I’d just register for the site, poke around, and see if anybody jumps out at you.

Feel free to ping me in-game if I can be of any help.

Nedus.6952:

5) After a capture, supplies should briefly (like 5 sec) be impossible to take. Why:
So people can start an upgrade if needed before it gets drained.

This seems cool but could lead to some epic trolling. For example: I build a spy account, follow the zerg, run Yak Guards every time zerg takes a camp. “Hahaha you wanted that supply? Sorry!”

I’ve often been frustrated by people taking supply when I’m trying to run upgrades, but I’m not sure this is an improvement.

Great suggestions overall though!

Yeah, just to add on to what Curo said, NSP is strongest during NA Prime hours, of which you seem to fall in. If you’re looking for an organized guild to run with, there’s plenty of them out there. If you just want to join a map and find a tag, you’ll find there’s usually a tag on 3 or all 4 maps.

NSP has a few pugmanders who are pretty solid as well as some guild-run groups (like mine!) that tag up and let anybody run with us.

Naevius.3185:

Needs more Buddhism in this thread. “Desire leads to suffering.”

This made me lol. Well done, sir/ma’am.

DaShi.1368:

I really don’t believe that Anet intends to limit their playerbase to just players who enjoy DT and SW.

I would hope not, as 90% of my guild would have no reason to purchase it.

Blanche Neige.7241:

timmyf.1490:

I think the portals should have dropped from a wider variety of game locations/modes.

That could have been made, but then they would have to reduce the drop rate somewhat : more players having a chance to drop it, but not more beta spot available.

And I would never have come here to complain about it. The only reason I’ve given criticism is because of the very restrictive nature of where the item drops, not the number of participants in the beta.

Blanche Neige.7241:

timmyf.1490:

GrandHaven.1052:

I know, lets give everyone beta access!

/sarcasm

Literally nobody is saying this.

Well, everyone who complains here on the forums say they should have a portal because of this or that….

I can only truly speak for myself. I have no problems with the beta access being RNG. I have no problems with me personally not receiving one. I dislike that the access to the item was gated behind one specific type of content.

I think the portals should have dropped from a wider variety of game locations/modes.

I’m confident you can understand the difference between “you should have the chance to get one in WvW” (a critique of the specific method of acquisition) and “qq why didn’t I get a portal” (being sad at not getting a drop).

lordkrall.7241:

But then again, this discussion is rather pointless, seeing as you have already decided that it is completely impossible that ArenaNet actually uses these events as real betas.

First time we agree! This discussion is pointless. That said, I haven’t decided it’s “completely impossible” they’re using the event as a real beta. It’s certainly a combination of things. But overall, they’ll be getting feedback on a MOSTLY FINISHED product.

If the product were still in a state where major changes could be made based on feedback, the event would also be under an NDA. That’s really the sign that it’s designed for hype, not real testing… there’s no NDA.

The real reason this conversation is pointless?

lordkrall.7241:

Marketing usually don’t target people already using a product. Seeing as, well, they are already using it.

You don’t understand marketing.

1) Heart of Thorns isn’t on sale, therefore nobody is using it. We are all potential customers, as are people not currently playing GW2.

2) Absolutely marketing targets people currently using a product. I won’t claim to be a marketing expert, I’m just an engineer, but the appropriate term on Wikipedia seems to be “relationship marketing.” I’d happily let somebody more knowledgeable on the topic correct me.

3) Hype is hype. If we’re talking about HoT, that leaks into the wider gaming press.

lordkrall.7241:

It would be a much better marketing event if they had 1 million players rather than 1000 however. Seeing as that would reach out to way more people with more people streaming and posting screenshots and youtube-videos and such.

Not necessarily. By limiting the event, the perceived value of access is much higher. This generates hype. Then you allow access to the Open Beta by preordering.

Hype + Denial of Access + Time = Money

This is okay! It’s very smart marketing. But we really ought not pretend it’s anything else.

(To answer the follow-up question “if it’s just marketing, why do you care?” the answer is that I am hyped. You can recognize something is marketing while also being influenced by it.)

lordkrall.7241:

^ Why make it so limited if it was a marketing event?

Artificial scarcity. Come on, Krall, you can do better.

GrandHaven.1052:

I know, lets give everyone beta access!

/sarcasm

Literally nobody is saying this.

Kodiak.3281:

timmyf.1490:

Astralporing.1957:

JoshuaRAWR.4653:

No, i’d rather they just stick to emailing them out randomly.

It’s still random, except this time I wouldn’t be encouraged to waste my time grinding stale content.

This.

I didn’t grind the content because I don’t have time to waste. It would have been nice to have a chance to get the portal.

You have a chance to get into it from signing up like everyone does.

Consider also the following. They put in a drop that favors a large time investment cause more time is more RNG chances (sure some will get it right away but most who got one or more have grinded a lot). Aren’t those the kind of people they want in beta? The kind who do have time to waste and will play and test it?

Let me be more clear: I don’t have an open-ended amount of time to throw at a task which could very well end in failure doing content I dislike.

I do have 3-4 hours a day to play GW2 which I would be willing to commit to beta testing HoT.

To your last point, you assume ArenaNet is actually testing content with a beta test and not (as most of the rest of us understand it) simply running a marketing event.

Astralporing.1957:

JoshuaRAWR.4653:

No, i’d rather they just stick to emailing them out randomly.

It’s still random, except this time I wouldn’t be encouraged to waste my time grinding stale content.

This.

I didn’t grind the content because I don’t have time to waste. It would have been nice to have a chance to get the portal.

Amnesiak.8619:

Don’t get kittened if you don’t get one, surely you considered this (not getting one) to be an option, and yet you kept farming.

Hi. You don’t know me and many of your assumptions about me are false. For one, I decided that I’d rather not be in the beta than have to farm SW for dozens of hours just to have a small chance at a portal.

Based on the complaints I’m hearing from my guild members, I made the right decision.

In the end, there are a variety of ways they could have handled the process. I think an in-game method is better than the “newsletter only” method, but those were not the only two options. I’ve suggested alternatives here, but just to lay it out for you…

• Based on some marker of personal achievement
• Random chance based on logging in (tied to log-in rewards)
• Random drop from all zones, including PvE, WvW, and PvP reward tracks
• Portals tradeable on Trading Post
• Some combination of the above

I’m not complaining that I didn’t get a portal because I didn’t attempt to get a portal. I’m complaining that the criteria for getting one, while perhaps slightly improved from the newsletter method, leave a lot of players out and made a lot of other players play content they dislike for a chance.

Evan just mentioned this on another thread – when making teams, they pull the player MMR minus deviation (low end of the rating). That’s really important information and should help prevent the problem I mentioned in my previous post.

Guardian is not flying. We’re not getting air combat.

Edit: was this post intentionally ironic? A guy named “Smooth Penguin” assuming that wings = flying? Did I just miss the flightless bird joke?