Guild Wars 2

GW2 will never be a “serious” MMO without a client side logfile to parse. At minimum, it requires subsecond-accurate timestamps, logging of every ability, every attack, every action. (it does NOT, now)
Logging of self and other players is done in many many other MMO’s, all of which have been in production vastly longer than GW2. (or even GW1+GW2 put together). They are doing just fine with it.

My personal opinion is that the lack of a client side parse-able logfile is due to the accurate balance complaints it generates. It allows customers to compare, mathematically, over time, their effectiveness in combat. It exposes design flaws and forces designers & developers to justify their decisions.

In other words, you don’t see it in games where the developers are scared of scrutiny, comparison, and critical dissection of their decisions.

I’ve read this before, so here’s a repost: All feedback regarding class envy/balance, with respect to combat damage, will ultimately be untrustworthy without a client side logfile to parse. Until such a feature is added/enabled into the client, truly accurate feedback on this subject will not be possible. Feelings and impressions create a drama swirl the likes of which, oh wait, exactly what we’re seeing now, post-launch in GW2.

atarigenocide.4987:

It’s useful if you’re farming. That’s about it.

Until Diminishing Returns kicks in, which some claim is within 20 kills of the same creature and/or somewhere between 30 and 60 minutes of killing the same creature, whichever comes first.

Translation: It’s only potentially useful for the first hour of play (per day), at best, in my experience.

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

It does not work on the Mystic Forge, magic find only effects the loot generated from killing monsters. (this includes crafting materials, higher tiers of loot like rares & exotics… etc… )
…

Isaiah,
Any chance this will be changed in the future so that crafting materials will be EXEMPT from Magic Find and presumably Diminishing Returns ?

If waypoints in the “open world” worked like the waypoints in cities (free in zone, costs out of zone) then people would use them all the time. People would use them to quickly move to the next event to help and play with other players.

As it is now, that doesn’t happen as much as it should, but I would imagine there is a very real profit associated with players buying gems to convert to gold to spend on waypoints. It seems unlikely ArenaNet would voluntarily part with that profit.

Voqar.2349:

I’m really sick of people dragging a chain of mobs behind them and having those mobs end up on me when I’m otherwise not involved.

Two things:

-those mobs should not peel off of the person who aggroed them without a reason – like another player attacking, healing, doing SOMETHING other than just being near.

- you should NOT be able to gather from nodes while in combat – a large amount of the training is due to people tapping nodes and not bothering to fight. You can’t seriously get me to think that this game was designed so people could avoid fighting mobs that easily…while gathering. You get interrupted if you’re looting a chest and get hit…why is it any different for gathering? It’s expoitive.

Fixed in many other MMO’s, and I completely agree. No reason to have it in GW2 except to permit griefing. It’s like they ignored all the lessons learned from everyone else since 1996 and expected that ignorance would help. It didn’t.

RLD.7439:

Short answer, yes!
It’s not hard to implement a slider to tone down other peoples effects.

Correct. Which is why every other “north american” MMO has had the option to “only show your own effects” both for icons and particles, since 2005.

How ArenaNet missed implementing this feature is hard to imagine. You get more than 5 people attacking any single target and this problem is immediately obvious. The entire open world PvE Dynamic Event “boss thing” is intended to be more than 5 people attacking a single target. Um… ok.

All I want to see is the location of combo fields and my own particle effects. In particular, I cannot stand the strobe light effect that mesmers throw down. How a designer thought that would be good? In what universe is a strobe light a good particle effect? Sheesh.

Dead.7385:

… there is only one place where I can play dungeons similar to these. …

LOTRO, DDO, WAR, EQ2, and RIFT all have instanced dungeons, just like GW2.

SamTheGuardian.2938:

… * ArenaNet’s design philosophy for endgame is heavily rooted in their belief that level scaling works. That is a level 80 can go back to an entry level zone and still be challenged and well rewarded…. Level scaling seems to work ok the problem is it’s not a real replacement for hardmode because it doesn’t challenge a player beyond max level. Also the loot you get is not that great. …

This design philosophy would work if, in addition to scaling loot to your real level (which already happens now), karma and xp rewards also scaled to your real level.
If level 80 characters were getting 17,780 xp, 378 karma, and 1s86c for doing any event in any area, all the content would be PvE “end game”.
Until then, it’s a half-implemented design philosophy.

Note: 17,780 XP, 378 Karma, and 1s86c is the current max PvE Dynamic Event reward (from Cursed shore Penitent area) for a level 80.

That is certainly your prerogative. However, it has been my experience that when your average customer runs into such roadblocks, they simply stop playing. Or at the very least, play less or do not continue consuming that content.

Personally, I cannot logically see any benefit to making the personal story inordinately difficult, frustrating or tedious. As evidenced by this thread, however, what makes something difficult is an opinion debate.

If a design goal of the personal story is to make the player feel heroic, then for me and at least one other customer, it does not meet that goal at this step, with this class/race.

jrdepriest.5182:

I read that other thread. It seemed to be you saying that you were able to do it and other players saying that they weren’t able to do it.
The biggest problem was not being able to lose aggro so the harpy would follow me around and one shot me.
A thief has stealth and an elemental has summons to distract the harpy for a few seconds
My characters don’t have things like that, so I die, repeatedly.
I have done story missions for my human ranger all the way to the end of her story and never had a mission that was as impossible as this level 12 story mission for my stupid asurans.
I don’t think a mid-level story mission should take a super-tweaked build just to survive. This mission is not fun and needing a non-level-appropriate amout of skill just to survive is not productive.
My best course of action at this time is to hope that I have Guild mates online who are willing to come help me.
In the mean time, I am abandoning another Asura and playing my Sylvari thief instead.

Edit: I still need strategy advice for an engineer or a warrior since I am not playing an asuran thief or asuran elemental.

Bolded mine. (and oh so much THIS)

I’ve done the personal story through to “Ships of the Line” both with an Asura Warrior and an Asura Thief.

As a Thief, without the Golem to tank for me, on many missions, I would not have been able to complete them. Warrior? I didn’t even think twice about anything. I just waded into every fight, killed everything, barely lost any health, and had a blast.
With the thief? I was lucky to survive 3 hits. Lyssa help me if I couldn’t stealth, and those mobs that have no leash and spawn on top of the character when you respawn after you die? Had to zerg-death those. Oh yeah, that was a big ball of joy right there.

And yes, I’ve tried it with Knight gear as well as Berserker gear as well as Valkyrie, Carrion, and Rampager sets. I can craft it all myself, and while Knight gear helps, ultimately it’s still frustrating in blue/green gear. And to expect every player to have full tricked out masterwork, rare, or exotic for the personal story, at every level, is ridiculous. The content should be balanced for a set of fine (blue) equipment.

Jeffrey Vaughn: I have played every “north american” MMO since Meridian59. The personal story is EXTREMELY FRUSTRATING as a medium or light armor class. In my opinion, it is balanced for the Warrior, and no Quality Assurance testing appears to have been done for Thieves or any other non-Warrior classes.

The personal power disparity is extraordinarily jarring in this case. It’s night and day. It’s fun vs. frustration. It’s not challenging to die in three hits. It’s not challenging to have to zerg-death by yourself because of bad event scripting. It’s broken. YOU, Jeffrey Vaughn, need to fix it.

Don’t tell us how you used your “l33t strats” to get around broken/inappropriate content. Fix the freaking content!

No innovation.

Innovation would be bosses that are smart. And by smart I mean better scripting rather than the default “1,2,3” most of them have.
They’ve also fallen into the same trap as all other MMO’s made since 2005, namely: One-shot kills, instant mob respawns, and more hit points = more challenge. All horrific mechanics that players despise, and with good reason; they’re not fun.

GW2 PvE tactics come down to this:
-kite (cripple/chill/immobilize)
-dodge twice
-death zerg

And they will be that and only that until ArenaNet shuts down the servers or makes a fundamental and global change to all combat.

Without predictable threat, anything else is impossible. Without roles that can actually stand in front of a mob for more than 8 seconds and not lose >75% of their health, you can’t have variety, depth, or real teamwork. Heck, in the past week I’ve seen three boss fights where the boss slides, stiff-legged, over the landscape. They don’t even have a crippled animation for it. Lame!

Even their current combo system is a gimmick as durations of combo fields are too short to have a meaningful effect on the outcome of a battle, condition durations are too short and/or condition damage and ancillary effects are too weak. Combo fields do not increase damage on their own, they simply apply effects. If they offered a damage multiplier or crit chance/multiplier, they would be tactical instead of gimmicks.

They have painted themselves into a very small corner with their so-called “innovative” combat system, which is nothing more than what EQ1 & DDO have, without the variety and freedom of both.

And to those that have never played against a good MOB AI, the Reaper Bot for Quake1 is open source and available to anyone that would care to try. Personally, at it’s best, one on one, I’ve never seen anyone beat the Reaper Bot on Skill level 3, and that was back in 1996.

Quick Mouse.7635:

The world of Guild Wars 2 is so huge and so beautiful. I am constantly amazed by the artful design and incredible detail the designers have put into every area.

It’s really sad that once you hit level 80, you only visit 2 areas.

That particular problem they could fix with one single change.

As loot is already scaled, scale karma and XP rewards to match your real level, rather than your adjusted level.

Everyone would be playing all the content in the entire game, across all areas and level ranges, rather than stuck in two (or whatever other very small number you’d care to use) areas.

Inexplicably, the developers have neither commented on why this is not the case, nor why they decided originally not to do it, nor why they never plan to do it. A real shame. I know many players that would return to GW2 if this single change was put in the game.

And of course, removing DR wouldn’t hurt.

Nate.8934:

… While the rest of the BLTC was down, quite often the currency converter is the sole thing that is still up. Another thing to note is that during the period when BLTC and currency converter was down for majority of players, it was still up for a random selection of players because they were testing the infrastructure. So in reality, the Currency Converter was almost always up.

I was not referring to these times. The times I was referring to were when it was publicly stated by ArenaNet to be down for everyone.

Also, your assertions indicate information not available publicly, so it would be good to quote your source. (regarding internal ArenaNet systems)

As to the updates from John Smith last evening regarding a Free Market discussion. Artaz summed it up nicely: ‘A real-world “Free Market” discussion applied to GW2 is laughable. It can’t happen. ’ That’s pretty much it.
A free market for any aspect of GW2 should not happen, ever. Just like real countries, they’re full of broken humans who will take any short term gain at the expense of any long term consequence.

In other words, ultimately you have to plan for the worst possible abuse of any system, RL or otherwise. If you don’t, you’re intentionally setting yourself up to fail. ~15 years of MMO’s have demonstrated this quite nicely. For the moment, GW2 is being held hostage by very few people who exploited early, and exploited often. Until they’re removed from the game, any semblance of fun or “fair” in the Economy is a dream.

One more in a long list of items that bots and gold farmers are playing the market with.

Heaven.4385:

To John Smith,

How do you explain gem prices jumping on non peak days at non peak hours, it may be supply and demand but who’s buying all the time, I’ll tell you who…bots. Bots are ruining gem price fast. …

An interesting item of note:

During the first few weeks, when the BLTC/Awesomium interface was down more than it was up, the exchange rate would rise even when no-one could buy or sell gems. It was a perfectly smooth rising slope. No variation. Looked to be a rise of about 1c/hour or similar.

In other words: No-one was using it, and the exchange rate was rising. I’m not going to point out precisely what that means, because it’s pretty clear. If there are historical records of the exchange rate for the first 1-3 weeks after headstart, you can see it for yourself.

You’ll also note: Every in-game change, to date, made by ArenaNet has caused the exchange rate to rise. Given you cannot choose what price to sell at, nor what price to buy at, it seems extremely unlikely the exchange rate is “player driven”.

As far as I can tell, the gem/gold exchange rate is the way ArenaNet makes money.

Why do I say this?

No MMO company posts their subscriber numbers monthly.
No MMO company posts their “free to play” profit numbers, quarterly.
and…
ArenaNet is not transparent regarding how the exchange rate is set.

Customers are ignorant of everything that matters in this context. For most, it doesn’t matter and they will happily pour their wallet into ArenaNets bank account. Without complete transparency, we will never know, and all these clever word games don’t accomplish anything that genuinely benefits the customer.

ArenaNet needs money to pay the bills. Wages, benefits, office space, hosting, space, power/HVAC, and internet transit are not free. They are actually quite expensive, and relying on greed and impatience is not a sustainable business model for years and years. It might create an initial burst of capital, but those monthly opex’s will consume it faster than people will buy new outfits and sunglasses. The gem/gold exchange rate is the "dial-a-profit’ widget for ArenaNet. They can make as much money as they want by changing that number, and there is absolutely nothing players can do about it, nor is there any way to know or call them out when they do it. You just pay. And pay.

Myself, I’ve played MMO’s since there have been MMO’s to play, and loathe, despise, and hate in-game trading, auction houses, and all the conveniences GW2 has promoted.

MMO’s need exactly one player-to-player transaction, and that is crafting items directly into another persons inventory. Everything else, all other rewards should be for you and you alone. No trading, no sharing, no mailing, just no. But alas, MMO devs instead “innovate” with sparkle ponies and glowing footprints, and continue to perpetuate all the ills of all the MMO’s made since 2005, expecting a different outcome. /boggle

I have zero expectations it will change. I suspect, in fact, it will continue to get worse and no-one will care, because MMO’s are now about profit, not about fun, challenge, and social teamwork.

I realize this is an old question, but I was looking for these same mobs today, and found them in Malchor’s Leap, around the Cathedral of Eternal Radiance.

Many elemental types can be found here, including Ice, Air, Fire, Earth.

The attached picture shows the area (highlighted in red) where level 78 Embers (Fire Elementals) are found. There are approximately 8 spawns, and one veteran. Also in the same indicated area are two Risen Catapults, so bringing a friend is recommended.

https://dviw3bl0enbyw.cloudfront.net/uploads/forum_attachment/file/13767/malchors_leap_fire_elementals.jpg

Buy gold from ArenaNet and buy ecto’s directly off the TP. It makes them happy and will save you frustration. Of course, you’re spending real $$$ to get what you want, but don’t worry, GW2 is not P2W.

If you work out the numbers, currently, ecto’s are cheaper than the cheapest level 76+ rare, of any kind. You can’t craft them that cheap, buying the mats from the TP. That’s how completely screwed and illogical the GW2 economy is, and will be, likely forever.

And don’t worry, they have a REAL economist who designed it from the ground up, so it’s super awesome and there will never be any problems. Really. Really really.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/crafting/ATTENTION-36-000-Mithril-Ore-18-000-Elder-Logs-22-500-Large-Fang-1-500-Level-80-RARE-Greatswords-Mystic-Forge-ABSOLUTELY-NOTHING/428025

So I Crafted 1,500 Greatswords for the mystic forge.

Materials required:
36,000 Mithril Ore
18,000 Elder Logs
22,500 Large Fang

this is a quick picture for proof. http://i.minus.com/iTaJexROqeBQo.jpg
here is a whole album for further proof. http://minus.com/mTlGiMA85C3Yy

in the end i was left with nothing.

TLDR: kitten Guild Wars 2

edit: yes these were level 80 rare greatswords

I love how these forums don’t let you quote. So professional/awesome. Worst. Forum. Software. Ever.

Kaeyu: Thank you very much for the time and effort. As a result, neither I nor anyone I know playing will ever attempt to obtain a Legendary as a result of your testing. And I mean that sincerely. I understand the time, effort and sacrifice you put into this, and I for one /bow in appreciation.

Arenanet: You should be ashamed such a system ever made it past design -> QA and into your game. “Luck” is not a valid gameplay mechanic. Skill would be, but getting a Legendary in GW2 is entirely due to random chance. There is no skill. So, way to fail, again.

guide.1487:

Some Orichalcum I need to wait 24hrs for others, like the one i found last night before i went to bed (1am) is up now at (9am).

These patch notes are still confusing to me though. I dont understand why they say what they do

If they were clear, customers could make informed decisions. By leaving things vague and unclear, some customers still have hope. (and hold off making that informed decision)

Calcifire.1864:

This is starting to just get silly, the price of vanilla is the same as ORICHALCUM.

ANet, when a base material for all levels is the same price as the top tier crafting material that is on a 24 hour respawn to prevent farming and keep the price high, YOU’RE DOING SOMETHING WRONG.

Unless ArenaNets business model is based on people buying gold from them. In which case, everything is moving towards “ideal”.

See that exchange rate trending upward? See all the changes that have resulted in that exchange rate trending upward? Two of these things have something in common.

Well it’s good the patch notes are crystal clear and accurate. grr.

As of Friday, October 12, 8:15pm mountain time, I can confirm mithril nodes are visible and can be harvested per character.

Specifically, I logged in with one character, found the location of a mithril node adjacent to Fort Trinity. I then logged out, logged in with a different character on the same account, went to Fort Trinity, and mined the same mithril node.

I’ll try to get orich node confirmation in the next few days.

So if that is true, Wreknar (and I have no doubt it is) then the patch notes are at least half wrong, as Mithril Nodes are not refreshing every 24 hours.

It would be really nice if the patch notes were correct / corrected. :|

To any ArenaNet Developer that knows:

Are these patch notes correct:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/news/Update-Notes-October-1st-2012/357683

"
Ancient wood, Orichalcum Ore, and Mithril Ore nodes respawn rate is now tied directly to characters and set to respawn one day after your character gathered from it.
"

Or is the current T6 node respawn timers being account bound (NOT CHARACTER BOUND) working as intended?

The last few people I know that actually log in each day anymore would like to know this so they can continue playing in the hope this is a bug and will be fixed, or is working as intended, and they can stop hoping and make an informed decision.

Please and thank you for an official answer.

Change waypoint costs so they’re just like cities, in each zone. That is, if you’re in a zone, it’s free to go to any other waypoint in that zone.

If you need to cross zones, you can walk (slower, but free) or pay (faster, but costly). This would allow players to help with zone events (I’m not paying ~4s to join an event in the same zone, sorry) but still have the money sink for real convenience.

It’s because players don’t have the official definition of “farming” from ArenaNet.

For some players, killing the same type of enemy over and over is farming. It may or may not be, according to ArenaNet.

Thus, the flailing / disconnect / anger / etc.

WasAGuest.4973:

… I’m curious about the run as well; but quoted this for the following: It may be time for Anet to address the reason players are staying in these bubbles rather than either joining a zerg or roaming around Orr as they seem to want the players to do.

They’re there because the penitent path gives max karma/xp.

If they scaled karma and xp to the real level the player, and gave the same karma and xp regardless of the event location, everyone would be everywhere.

There are very elegant solutions to this problem, and ArenaNet is not using them, despite already setting the precedent by scaling loot to the real level of the player.

Constant bug, been in the game forever, bug reported at least 10 times by myself over the course of all the BWE’s, since launch, etc. Happens to all professions using ranged attacks of any kind.

Terrible. Terrible. Terrible. Obstructed should only apply to world geometry/terrain and fixed placed objects. It currently applies to particle effects and dynamic attack objects, which of course it never should.

Hard to believe ArenaNet has left this bug in the game so long. Easily 25% of my attacks are obstructed during Dynamic Events with more than 5 people participating. And people wonder why they take so long?

How would I fix it?

Hm, ban every IP address with more than 20 unique bot reports on it, for a week for the first infraction and a month for the second, automatically.

Remove all DR from the entire game, forever.

Remove all loot/money rewards from DE’s. Make them reward XP and Karma only.

Scale all XP and Karma rewards to the real level of the player, so no matter what DE you do, at level 80, you get the same XP & Karma as the penitent path DE’s (or within 90% of those rewards @ 80, that would work too)

and/or

Allow 1, 2 or 3 repeats for all DE’s, every 24 hours, for karma/xp. After that, you get zero karma/xp for that particular DE.

Also, remove all loot from all DE mobs.

Result? Everyone plays all the content in the game, spread out over all the zones.

This is why several other MMO’s have appearance slots instead, so you can change it whenever you want with no consequence. They also have sets of appearance slots, so you can switch to one of 2, 3 or 4 sets anytime, in-combat, pvp, pve, in town, anywhere, with no consequence or cost.

It’s very easy to see why ArenaNet did it this way: Gem Store.

tolunart.2095:

… The option that does nothing constructive, however, is to keep shouting the same arguments. A dialogue is a two-way exchange of information. Arenanet has said they heard you, and are working on it. Continuing to yell as though they said nothing will not make the fixes come any faster. You’re just making more work for the mods who spend their days closing botting and DR rant threads.

Listen. Wait. Do something else if you must. But continuing to rant about this accomplishes nothing.

16 years of experience with previous MMO’s and previous MMO developers disagrees with you, tolunart. Specifically, those that rant the loudest and most often, -always- get their way.

Stratzvyda.3921:

Cerise hit the nail on the head, why are these changes not put into the patch notes? We get that we’re beta testers on all these new features you’re adding, but how are we supposed to tell if something’s a bug or just some radical change you stealth updated in?

All MMO developers put in stealth changes like this. Every patch. Every time. Asking MMO devs to be transparent about this is like asking water not to be wet. Never going to happen.

They hope they won’t get caught, but invariably they do (which is why it’s so ridiculous they keep trying) and then are silent. Every single step in the stealth change process is a mistake.

Tradewind.6913:

… Being “pay2win” having to buy gold with gems just to make money or that the only way to make gold is to spend all day playing or exploit the system. …

Nope, it’s not the only way. Just A way. Just like buying gems. With real money. And then spending them.

Tradewind.6913:

… Except you can only buy a small fraction of what’s available in terms of gear through the TP. So, still no.

Really?

Right now, every blue item, every green item, every yellow item, and every exotic item, both dropped and crafted, available in the game is listed on the Trading Post.

What small fraction are you referring to?

ArenaNet sells gold for real life $$$, via gems.
You can buy approximately/almost/just about/pretty much/all items in the entire game from the Trading Post.
The Trading Post has a listing fee.

The circle of profit is complete.

But don’t worry, GW2 is not pay2win. Nope. Not at all. Not even a little bit.

Personally I’ve observed the same thing. Rares (yellows) no longer drop for me, no matter how little or how much I play in any of the Orr zones. Basically it’s down to bags and bones, now.

SHM.7628:

… I doubt it was ever a bug. I think it was intentional, and they disliked the bad press. and/or lost revenue at the cash shop.

That is all hindsight. Now we have an answer. Are you are asking why people are continuing to "cry’ as you put it.? My answer is this. DR has no place in an MMO. It’s too problematic and does nothing to Bots. There’s a million ways it can mess up = innocent players get punished.

Plus I don’t want to have to monitor their failure of a system. I also don’t want to have to worry about “playing right” That is too much work. You say they are crying, I say they are kitten off and other than full rollback of DR will be unacceptable. …

Yep, you’re dead on, SHM. GW2 is going to be known as “That MMO with DR” until it’s removed. People don’t want to play a game knowing every single moment of play, every keypress, every mouse click and in-game action is lessening their reward. DR has to go, or it will be the doom (to varying degrees) of GW2.

Put another way, here’s a few conversations between two hypothetical gamers:
—
“Hey, you gonna buy GW2 or MoP?”
“I was gonna buy GW2, but it has diminishing returns, so I’m going with MoP”
—
“Hey, I’m looking for a new MMO, what’s new and good?”
“Anything but GW2”
“Why, I heard it’s really good?”
“Yep, it is, but it has DR”
“Oh, well forget that!”
—
“Hey, let’s play some GW2”
“Nah, they only let you play for 30 minutes each day, then they nerf your loot”
“What? Screw that, then, let’s go play <insert game here> then, where they don’t do that”.
—
“Hey, why aren’t you playing GW2, I thought you waited 5 years for that game?”
“I did, but they put in diminishing returns, which presumes guilt before innocence, so I don’t see any point in playing anymore”
“Well that’s too bad, it looked really good!”
“In every other way that matters, it’s a great MMO. It’s a real shame, yep”
—

This will happen. In fact, I would bet a dollar these conversations are already happening. Every second DR is in GW2, this will continue to be the case more often, until it’s another forgotten MMO, just like GW1.

The solution is clear, Arenanet: Take out DR. Remove it entirely. Do it now before MORE irreversible harm is done to your intellectual property, brand, and game.

1. Yes
2. No
3. No
4. No
5. No

Phaedryn.3698:

These forums are some of the BUGGIEST pieces of code I have seen in a long time. What the hell is up with them?

As far as I can tell, there is a very short aging timer that prevents posts older than a few hours from being reported, quoted, or edited.
I’ve never seen anything like it, and share your opinion. In my wildest dreams I cannot imagine a good reason why ArenaNet chose this mechanism.

Derpinator.2894:

… I know about a dozen who are waiting to get back into it, but not with much real hope. From our (opinion) perspective, the game is fundamentally broken and the development team haven’t any idea how to fix it. Blankets and nets are well and good in theory but the former puts everyone in the dark and the latter has just enough holes in it to be a terrible patch to stop a tidal wave.

Yep, unfortunately, I have found this to be true with my friends as well.

The confirmation that a DR system exists at all was enough for ~half of my friends to stop logging in. Most feel betrayed and won’t be back, but some said they would check back weekly for a public message DR has been removed from the game.

I was surprised at the strong response, as I know these people pretty well, and most of them are moderate in their views and opinions. Unfortunately, the justification for them is: It’s not in any other MMO they play.
I had nothing to say in response. It’s true.

Promega.7628:

…
2) It increases the chance of finding higher tier magical items from mob drops only. ie. with 200% MF the chance of an items being blue instead of white has tripled, the chance of green instead of blue has tripled, rares instead of greens tripled, exotic instead of rare tripled.
…

Promega,

What is the source of this information?

Hawken.7932:

@Kietay: Why would they explain it? Why do you feel that you’re entitled to know the exact algorithm that goes into their loot tables?

Because computer games are spreadsheets with GUI’s in front of them, and happy customers refer their friends.

Blacklight.2871:

You should be able to waypoint to your home city for free. That provides at least some small incentive to return there now and again. Unless you need the Mystic Forge, you might as well take the free trip. And it would be faster than detouring through the Mists.

Correct. Yet another fundamental innovation ArenaNet missed out on. Additionally, it should have at most a 1 minute re-use timer.

On the plus side, it could be added at any time. The problem is, because of their horribly shortsighted and limited UI, they would have to add either another button or another tab or another panel in order to have this functionality.

I would love a racial port-to-home-city ability. It would reduce the lag/load in Lions Arch, and provide real value in having those other cities. As it is now, the cities are empty, pointless, and ultimately a complete waste of content. A real shame.

Fayte.1803:

THIS WOULDN"T NEED A PATCH, its only a matter of turning off the DR or reseting back to pre patch..

Correct. And the fact that Jon has NOT chosen that option, despite it being available, is worth serious consideration.

Do you want your entertainment to be changed at any point in the future, not for the better, or for the goal of fun for customers, but negatively affecting all players at the expense of a few?

Every customer should think long and hard about how this was handled, and specifically the decision Jon made given a very large number of better alternatives. All of which have been suggested publicly, both before and after the change. The existing DR system should NEVER have been pushed onto the production servers. Never. Ever. Ever.

exphryl.3857:

I don’t think I’ve found a heart vendor that sells master salvage kits. I may have missed them though.

This was the real value. If there are no more master salvage kits available for karma, that’s a real kick in the shorts. Bad change if true.

Linsey, you’ve been choosing your words carefully. Is there a karma vendor that sells Master Salvage kits in GW2 today, and if not, is it your intention there will be, eventually?

JonPeters.5630:

… While we need a safety net to stop unanticipated economy-breaking exploits and botting, we have no desire to stop farming. Farmers are a part every online economy and when they are doing normal game activity they do not cause any harm. If a player finds a normal game activity fun and would like to keep doing it, that’s fine with us. …

Jon,

Thank you for posting.

Is farming creatures (repeatedly killing them) for fine (blue) crafting materials, necessary for advancing their crafting profession, considered “a normal game activity”?

If so, please seriously consider removing all DR’s from this activity, as currently, it is extraordinarily tedious to obtain the crafting materials necessary to advance all crafting professions that rely on fine (blue) crafting materials that drop from creatures (such as scales, blood, totem, fangs, etc)

Terrant.2903:

… 2) The decision to implement DR came after launch. …

Yep, and it was an extremely bad one, for which the precedents of why it’s bad have been clearly demonstrated in all MMO’s since Meridian 59.

They know better. They already have GW1 as first hand experience. It is inexcusable that they implemented this mechanic, given all the better options available.

You may find, Terrant, after you have played your 18th MMO (yes, GW2 is my 18th MMO) that you no longer give the developers the benefit of the doubt, nor play devil’s advocate. You simply jump to the inevitable conclusion, because you’ve seen it all before.

The reason doesn’t matter. They made an absolutely terrible decision, and now they are reaping the consequences of that decision. Personally, having seen such bad decisions 17 times before, I’m not even slightly surprised. The only thing that will surprise me is if they fix it or change it before they’re pressured to by their quarterly financial statement.

cherrie.8907:

… Well… at level 80 standard reward for an event is ~3k exp, 243 karma, 1.xx silver. …

For me, a Cursed Shore, Penitent Path event nets 378 karma and 17k XP, 1.xx silver. I’ve never seen higher in the game, yet.

marianitten.1247:

… The rules changed two weeks after launch, after all 3 beta weekends, after we paid the game. That is not OK.

Correct. It’s not OK. It’s fraud at worst, or bait and switch at best.