I loved the complexity of builds with GW2, It was the best coorpg and had its roots fimly in npc party based RGP – a step up from Baldurs gate et al.
GW2 was a very different beast, it aimed at the mmorpg market butoffered a very different take on the genre, a nod to the horizontal progression in GW1 in an open world without the foul gear race that was well covered with other games. Talented artists and devs to boot.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
Now I find out that the “higher challenge” info tended to be in places that only very dedicated MMO players will look, so no, we should not have known before we bought HoT.
To be more realistic, they said the game was going to be more challenging in the details about the expansion.
From the emails they sent out, or buy.guildwars2.com > learn more >
The jungle represents a challenge for you to overcome. Creatures within it use our new advanced AI, making the fights you encounter harder, giving you the opportunity to work with your friends and put your abilities to the test in battling Mordremoth’s forces and the deadly inhabitants of the jungle. As you progress your Masteries, you’ll find new ways to move through the map and unlock areas you couldn’t reach previously, as well as new ways to overcome your foes.
For those simply playing the game, ArenaNet has increased the difficulty with every major content update. The difficulty has always been complained about, right from the first beta, or Orr at launch. Only those that started after the new player experience and stopped playing at the end of the personal story would have never known.
Well, at least you found one sentence indicating higher difficulty in a place where many people would reasonably find it. Of course that’s a very long page with only that one sentence…
As for regular increased difficulty, I and many others on the forums agree that HoT was a different order of increase than any other update. And the difficulty is not only encounters but even finding them lol.
It is also different because you are expected to spend a significant portion of your time there in order to get HP for your Specialization. I can run down to Orr, do a couple of things and then go do something else. If I’m working on my Elite Specialization, there really is no other place to reasonably work on HP.
yup it was an expansion, and the expansion content was primarily distributed amongst the new expansion zones, no real surprises there. You weren’t expected to do anything though, you do what you want. That’s why you never hear the vast majority complaining in game, those that enjoy the hot content do it, those that don’t don’t.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
Old fashioned learning through discovery – there was a time that people understood and relished this over dull predictability and dot to dot instructions.
Unfortunately, some gamers seem more interested in convenience than anything else. Having to think and perhaps struggle a bit is inconvenient. I believe that the ubiquity of TV is at least partially the cause. TV only requires that you pay your cable bill and turn on the TV to be entertained. The only struggle might be finding something worth watching.
Some gamers seem to want a similar experience in their games. Buy the game, turn it on, be entertained without any struggle, with no significant effort or investment. Just look at the massive popularity of the mindless Facebook games. While there is nothing inherently wrong with that attitude, those who want that kind of experience in a given game cannot be catered to with the same content that is aimed at players who want something more than minimally active amusement.
Games are for entertainment – you know, fun? I’m not sure why you are trying to say that how anyone PLAYS a game is “wrong”. If I play GW2 by doing nothing but craft and never go out of a city, that would still be a completely reasonable way to play.
he is saying that some people don’t have fun and blame the game when actually the root cause is elsewhere.
That’s not how I interpret what he said, but whatever.
In the case of GW2, people have been playing core quite happily and suddenly they give us HoT. In that case, players who are upset by this change are not looking in the wrong place for their gaming amusement. They had it all through GW2 as it was initially presented.
However core did not dissappear, 90%+ of the GW2 zones are still trivial and perfectly playable, and in fact easier with new elites, gliding and more accessable gear. The older hard zones also became trivialised, e.g orr so expanding content for those that do not want challenge.
The question should be asked, how much of the open world should be non challenging if 90% is somehow not enough? Consider this is already leaving less than 10% of the open world for people who want challenging content and those less skilled players will eventually find that 10% easy as well.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
best strategy, play a couple games and stop when and if it annoys and return later. If you drop below your true skill level you can look forward to easier games where you get to rampage
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
“Armor is a value that is listed on the hero panel. It is equal to Defense plus Toughness attribute, and will determine how much incoming damage will be reduced. Armor does not mitigate Condition Damage or falling damage.”
…Curently there is not a stat to mitigate condi damage… you understand?
power hits instantly for 5k say, and is mitigated to 2.5k say through toughess etc.
condition is 5k over 5 seconds, so it takes 5 seconds to ramp up to 5k a hit, at anytime in that 5 second window you can cleanse the remainder instantly. this is all the mitigation you need.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
Old fashioned learning through discovery – there was a time that people understood and relished this over dull predictability and dot to dot instructions.
Unfortunately, some gamers seem more interested in convenience than anything else. Having to think and perhaps struggle a bit is inconvenient. I believe that the ubiquity of TV is at least partially the cause. TV only requires that you pay your cable bill and turn on the TV to be entertained. The only struggle might be finding something worth watching.
Some gamers seem to want a similar experience in their games. Buy the game, turn it on, be entertained without any struggle, with no significant effort or investment. Just look at the massive popularity of the mindless Facebook games. While there is nothing inherently wrong with that attitude, those who want that kind of experience in a given game cannot be catered to with the same content that is aimed at players who want something more than minimally active amusement.
Games are for entertainment – you know, fun? I’m not sure why you are trying to say that how anyone PLAYS a game is “wrong”. If I play GW2 by doing nothing but craft and never go out of a city, that would still be a completely reasonable way to play.
he is saying that some people don’t have fun and blame the game when actually the root cause is elsewhere.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
To be able to cherry pick exactly what i want from an expansion retrospectively and to pay exactly what i think is fair. Alternatively expansions should always contain the content i want exactly which means I will reward Anet by paying the full asking price.
I do not want anything to appear in the Gem shop that i really really want as that is money grabbing. I do want to play sub free. see point above.
I want all zones to be perfectly balanced for all people at all times playing together, including new players in new zones. The game should e able to rate my skill level dynamically on a minute to minute basis while taking into account my build history and knowledge.
I want long chained meta that involves grouping with people but i want to be able to start this chain whenever i want and should have people conveniently at hand.
I want spvp to be perfectly balanced and when i reach my average level i want to always have a win/lose rate over 50%.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
When you go to HOT as a new player, it should tell you straight out that this zone is difficult and the game should recommend content to do before you actually do HOT. It’s not unreasonable.
This game lacks a breadcrumb trail. As someone who has been here from the beginning, I didn’t find the jump from Living Story Season 2 to HOT to be that big. But not everyone has Living Story Season 2 and that’s a major problem. Even if people did, not everyone cares enough to play it.
HoT is meant to be end game content for max level characters. It’s supposed to challenge you. I think it might have been better to let people know in game, so they go in braced.
the game doesn’t know the skill level of a player or need to, the player themselves can simply go to the zone and will quickly see for themselves if they want to play (and port out again in 2 seconds flat if they so desire).
Old fashioned learning through discovery – there was a time that people understood and relished this over dull predictability and dot to dot instructions.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
its 4 days, its there for a good reason to help us all and it doesnt impact you beyond a little inconvenience that you can easily get around. Not everything in life needs to be a complain fest online when a thing is done for the right reasons..
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
Stronghold is for anyone that enjoys it, and is pvp just as Fort Aspenwood was in GW. Some people just want to battle arena style and hate variety, which is ok as long as they don’t try to downplay a thing just because they don’t enjoy it or have an elitist attitude.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
The restriction itself is perfectly valid. It does however, need to be clearer that it exists in some form, rather than players finding out via the forum or wiki, which is not where this information should be presented to first time players.
It’s not in any way a major issue ofc being such an insignificant period of time, but clarity should always be the rule, not the exception.
There is no reason to tbh, it is not likely someone will like a game enough to buy it, but would not buy it if they were notified about the restriction . They will find out in game though a bit of discovery learning at worst. If you documented everything you would simply overload the user and they would skim anyway.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
Noone is really. There has been this focus on there not being a majority or being a minority in pretty much every argument. But it doesn’t really mean anything.
All that really matters is If it is a significant amount of people disliked HoT.
After 4 years, you don’t want to lose/disenfranchise a significant amount of your loyal players.[/quote]
youv’e just done the exact same thing by using the word ‘significant’ except that’s subjective, where majority is objective. the game prioritizes the majority while supporting the minority (which ofc is the way to maximize popularity). And I would argue that 32 or so zones that are trivial and a couple in HOT that are more challenging means actually its the minority that is getting the best service. Whats the alternative – should those last 3 zones be trivial too?
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
The game has a 4 day account lock where you will not be able to buy gear or anything from the Trader, not even sell the loot you earned… no matter what you do.
Support will not remove it… and its not lifted if you buy the game, expansion or anything.
So if you plan on buying, wait 4 days then consider it or not, but playing before that time ends if pointless especially if you boost to 80 and then expect to be able to buy gear and so on.
Posting it because i did not know before buying or i would not have, so maybe others do not know and check the forums first so lets bump it and make sure they are informed since its the only MMO i ever played that does this to paying customers so i`m betting many will not expect it.
1 gimmicky skill does not make a weapon set viable for all builds. Outside of fresh air S/F it is a confused weapon set (i play s/f exclusively), ranged, but slow range attacks, heavy dependency on condition, but no covering conditions + you need to either go auromancer or invest heavily in toughness/healing. Also water is has weak healing skills so you main source of heals is aura.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
the hot zones are designed for players who have already played through 30 zones that are now utterly trivialized by the upgrades we got in HOT – elites, gliding, more exotics. You cant balance a zone at this stage for both players who skip content and gear and the general populace. As for gear, exotic is plenty for HOT. Hot is designed to offer content for those that want more of a challenge than in the other 30 zones. Those who want an easier challenge already have 90 % of the world space to play in.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
ye staff is only really good for party work, i prefer sceptre/focus. can keep a bit of range and good burst. dagger is good if you like to be highly mobile.
The probem is that for aoe to work you need to mobs to stand in your aoe – that means you need to use yourself as a lure.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
Solo’d all of HoT Story, and everything from Living World Season 3.. so far.. what’s the problem?
Obviously, not a problem for you. Some people in the thread are pointing out it’s a problem for them and they fear it’s a problem for too many coming into the game new today.
as other have said, the issue is not that people have said they find HOT more difficult, its that people are trying to say its unplayable for all casuals, or simply unplayable based on thread title, which is absolutely incorrect. Theres 35 zones in GW2, 3 Hot zones are slightly more difficult, so 90% + of the world zones is trivial already..
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
you have to agree that a reward for a couple years of effort that equates to the same as an hour or 2 of grinding is not really an exciting reward. I think a unique pet every 5k would be a good way to go.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
ofc the issue with WOW is that it is entirely gear/stat increase orientated, thats the root cause of 99% of its problems. GW2 is not so a raid that offers normal and hard modes with perhaps specific achievements t reward those with the dedication to do hard would be entirely successful with no real drawbacks.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
^^ its all down to averages, and on average the GW2 player(which are casual players) can and do solo most content and like some challenge. a game with 35 or so zones where 95% of them are facerollable where you can literally 1 skill spam aoe with impunity is not a game with great difficulty.
On top of which a game needs to offer challenge for all players, so some zones are obviously going to be more challenging for some, this isn’t a single player game with a difficulty dial – world instances are shared.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
you could say that about absolutely any good content in a mmorpg. in GW2 however it would be likely that everyone would have access to the paths so exclusivity is not an issue.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
‘When one of your conditions that you have applied is cleansed you gain 3 seconds of protection’
this helps condition based bruiser play but does not benefit condition play where the player is throwing conditions and already avoiding dmg. Would help my soft s/f condition ele for example so I could engage in a fight with some resilience.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
wildstar introduced a couple good quality features to the mmo genre – great housing and i agree the paths, it was lost in a riot of crass noisy poorly paced content but they were good all the same imo.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
After struggled for weeks, for me HOT is unplayable by casual players for majority of classes. Only one that can be soloed to some degree and to play personal story are revenant and guardian. I loved original Gw2, now I’m sorry I have spent money on HOT. They have ruined completely idea of original game. If you wish you play solo, if not, you group. Now is group only. And has nothing to do with LTP.
For now I’m done for long time again with Gw2, “playing” is actually not what should be, now it is just pure frustration.
no, HOT is unplayable for yourself not all casual players, your unwillingness to learn an encounter (which you have every right to do) has nothing to do with casual players as a demographic. Indeed most GW2 players are probably casual and the majority of players in all professions have completed the storylines i would guess going by how little noise there is about it in game. On top of all this, the extra HOT skills and gliding and masteries have made GW2 significantly easier.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
assuming you played 7 hours a week and bought an expansion once every 2 years then that works out at about 24 pence a month. I don’t think a returning players really needs a discount on 24 pence a month
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
in saying that clearly GW2 is not ‘dying’. GW2 will last for many years until GWX because it has a core fan base and appeals to casual players while also offering a product that is one of the best in the market, and allows player to play for free! On top of all this statistically top end AAA mmorpg just do not die. Unhappy people will however continue to declare they will.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
Put it this way, imagine all players were blocked from gaining XP inTyria because they hadn’t achieved Legendary in sPVP. Equally preposterous position.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
um no, GW2 is not the same as those other games – deliberately so. This means continuing rewards for playing world content – and that includes XP.
Player 1 : has a high level of achievements and completion in all areas of the game, spvp, wvw, open world play, dungeons, fractals, but doesn’t enjoy or want to do Raids. He has maxed mysteries and has a pool of unspent mastery points. He is blocked from getting rewarded with spirit shards (worth gold) for playing HOT. The UI awards him xp but it ‘disappears’
Player 2 Raids as well – he gets awarded xp and therefore spirit shards for playing in the exact same HOT areas doing the exact same content as player 1.
That’s an oversight in design clearly.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
i’ve just recently got a full celestial set and it has a nice balance to it, I like the set. Viper is nice if you want to get heavy condition. Outside raiding and spvp any build goes as there was a fair bit of power creep in HOT such that everything is pretty trivial to beat so you have the luxury of using the set you enjoy most.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
Historically good mmo last over 10 years, and take about 5 years to develop. Assuming an expansion is in the pipeline and another 2 after that at least then its going to be at least 10 years before we get GW3. A lot can change in 10 years so no point guessing how that would look.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
^^ Its a valid point, ESO and GW2 are pretty close, for me GW2 has the better performing wvw and better balancing , but this is swinging and if Zenimax every fix server performance then it comes down to just balancing. If Anet keep making the mistake of prioritizing raid balance over the GW world in general then they are going to lose players over time.
This raises the question, assuming the majority of players do not raid, why the hell is raid balancing taking priority over other game types?
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
Not needed, for elementalist, you switch elements to move between defensive and attack and cc, and for style of play you switch between dagger>sceptre>staff (only dagger is competitive in spvp but others fine elsewhere) that gives you 20 -24 spells and 5 utilities.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
oh ok based on your recent comments you seemned like another one of those players that PVP’d without actually enjoying the actual gameplay and just done it for the rewards.
This is part of the problem with pvp, theres a large player base that thinks pleasure = rewards.
‘badly designed’
‘everything telegraphed’
you want more rewards faster
you want surrender votes
‘failed experiment of balancing around invulnerability ’
’Pvp is unplayable, everything is telegraphed but also 00% hp to 0% in under 2 seconds.’ ‘This is unplayable.’
‘Pvp does not require skill, its a mess of a invulnerability CDs’
What part do you actually like?
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
confused, you want faster award tracks, complain that people die too fast, then its everything is telegraphed, then you only play for the rewards. In short you don’t pvp because you enjoy pvp. Never do a thing you don’t enjoy if you can avoid it, – especially in a game lol.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
hm? mostly they buffed it. Arc lightning got up, lots of cooldowns went down. The overload air nerf was the only thing. And I can see why they did it. It was kind of overpowered.
arc lightening is useless, you stack condy to make sceptre dps viable not power. glad they killed off fresh air – horrible gimmicky build that forced you to constantly swap back in to air.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
But why the Air-Overload?
D/W ele was at one level with thief and condi ranger. (and maybe engi if he is really good)
Now there are better classes in the only thing eles can do in raids.
Ok, you can heal. But then we would need an uniqe group buff or something like this. Otherwise Druids are better.
Make Eles great again!
Overall Ele’s are and have been a bit out of bounds power wise, We’ve been trying to bring them in line. The profession has a huge variance in skill level and applications and they bring a lot to the table in any situation which makes them really hard to make changes to. Overload created an insane amount of damage and a 7% reduction isn’t going to stop that from being played but bring it more in line. As for Meteor Shower when it came to big targets the number of times this would hit was insane so this change helps normalize it so other profession with skills that don’t scale as insanely against large monsters can better compete.
Im not sure this is true, sure when you are doing rotations on a boss in a raid, but that’s only a small part of the game. in spvp pretty much only 1 build that is competitive, a build that can neither bunker or burst people down – auromancer and a second specific build that is focused on the fresh air skill that is all about constantly pushing you back into 1 attunement (not good gameplay) There is no build for sceptre/focus/warhorn and now staff that is viable against equally skilled players. Then there is the lack of toughness and healing. it goes on.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
I’m getting a feeling that the Elementalist nerf will never be addressed in this thread
I’m getting the feeling its the elephant in the room that is going to be summarily ignored.
would really like to know what SF role is supposed to be in spvp and wvw. Making changes that impacts the whole game to make classes viable in the minority Raiding activity is a danger that was always recognized – we can see the carnage it has caused in other games.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
I would like to know where you see s/f eles?, it is poor in pvp and wvw because you have to sacrifice stats for toughness and/or heal, so you have low sustained dmg on top of which the headline spells dragon tooth and phoenix are both low dmg because of the above and easily avoided. I love s/f because i like the ranged style of elementalist play but it aint in a good place and has not been for a very very long time.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
Things will constantly evolve and changing in a healthy mmo, this is as it should be, and as long as i see this and understand why changes are made then I can still have fun (faster balance passes should be high priority though).
You were unhappy 2 years ago with pvp, and your still unhapppy 2 years on, sometimes a gamestyle just does not suit people. GW2 spvp is not going to give you what you want by the look of things, its not that style of game, indeed many player revel in the build and role diversity you get annoyed at – especially if you are prepared to compromise on optimization for builds you enjoy as a player. Look at GW1, the PVP was so good because of the constant build and role setups you could play with and many hope GW2 will make strides in this area.
Interesting that you make the comparison with GW1. In that game we have to make decisions. We cannot choose to be a heal tank AND a heavy damage dealer.
That, in my opinion, is the biggest current issue with the game.
Being able to downskill the solo story elements I think is reasonable for the reasons you give (i totally disagree with story being locked behind raids for the same reasons)
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
2000 power dmg, up front dmg mitigated with armor etc.
400 power dmg and 1600 over time, the former is mitigated, the latter can be removed with condy removal at any time.
Whats the problem?
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
issue with tempest for me is range, staff and scepter should be about range as per the classic mage ranged dps low defense model, and yet tempest and other skills force you into close range. This for me is a good starting point, the devs should look at the intended range of a class/weapon and base the skills around that first and foremost.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
Things will constantly evolve and changing in a healthy mmo, this is as it should be, and as long as i see this and understand why changes are made then I can still have fun (faster balance passes should be high priority though).
You were unhappy 2 years ago with pvp, and your still unhapppy 2 years on, sometimes a gamestyle just does not suit people. GW2 spvp is not going to give you what you want by the look of things, its not that style of game, indeed many player revel in the build and role diversity you get annoyed at – especially if you are prepared to compromise on optimization for builds you enjoy as a player. Look at GW1, the PVP was so good because of the constant build and role setups you could play with and many hope GW2 will make strides in this area.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
The issue is people trying to force zerker, aoe builds and ‘rotations’ down the gullets of players left right and center in PVE so they don’t feel free to experiment and learn properly.
edit.
“Trying to please everyone would not only be challenging
but would also result in a product that might not satisfy anyone”- Roman Pichler, Strategize
