Guild Wars 2: The One Thread

[Fencers]

Just finished HotW Story and it was also 'easy' (except for Lani), also with a group of all first timers. So, out of 5 dungeon runs (yes, finally got that damned monthly done) the results were: 2 of the highest level dungeons, all noobs, easy/best runs, 3 of the lowest level dungeons, players w/previous experience (except bf & I), difficult/terrible runs.

When the game was first released I remarked that the story modes were often more difficult than the exploration modes. Also that the difficulty was in reverse. With Arah, COE, HOTW, etc being the easiest story/expos and the earlier AC, CM and Twilight whatever being the hardest story/expos.

I haven't run a story mode since the release of the game. I assumed the dungeon rebalancing had taken care of that. Seems like that assumption was incorrect and the dungeons still follow the extremely poor QA and design Anet launched with for dungeons.


Once you run every thing one or two times the dungeons are not really that bad/hard, Lane.

The last time I did AC with friends we had 1 PUG with us and yet we cleared all 3 paths in just a short while. With like 1 person dying. And people hardly die in FTOM too. Like every dungeon in MMOs- it becomes auto pilot mode with practice.

Don't get discouraged.

[Lane]

I saw this on the forums. Looks promising. I never liked the camps farming in Cursed Shore, this looks a lot more varied and is (supposedly) more profitable to boot.

https://forum-en.guildwars2.com/foru...in-orr-no-wait

I don't suppose anyone here already does this?

[Valeron]

I don't do any of that. Yeah I don't get the gold or karma that those farmers do but I feel almost liberated from not doing all of that crap. Heck, some days I don't even log in and I'm perfectly fine with that.

[Scyth]

I saw this on the forums. Looks promising. I never liked the camps farming in Cursed Shore, this looks a lot more varied and is (supposedly) more profitable to boot.

https://forum-en.guildwars2.com/foru...in-orr-no-wait

I don't suppose anyone here already does this?

It's not a bad route if you need the Karma indeed. Other than that it's just useless. I've done the whole event chains and its not bad. If there are enough people doing it and someone to talk to while you are going forwards than its fine

[Lane]

Anyone have a suggestion on how to spend 90 karma? I'm at the point where my bank is full of all the foodstuffs you can buy from the cooking/karma vendors in Lion's Arch. I just wondered if there's anything else I can spend it on where it won't be wasted. (Char is getting deleted so no incentive to gain any more karma.)

[Deleted]

why for care 90 damn karma its nothing 0.o

[Fencers]

Don't think there is anything worth buying with karma other than the temple sets. There was a guy in Fireheart Rise that sold mithril gathering tools for karma. I bought a bunch of those- better than spending gold, which makes gathering a money loss.

[Lane]

It's enough to buy any combination of 2 cooking ingredients in bulk (sans Ginger Root) with some left over, so it has its uses.

I guess I should clarify it's not just 90 karma, it's a recurring 90 karma every time I make a character for key farming. I just wondered if there was anything else cheapish I could start spending it on since, as I mentioned, I'm almost maxed out on cooking materials. Why waste it when it can buy something useful?

[Fencers]

Erm, what is useful though? I mean the recipes are 1 time things. The gear is far off/lofty if all you did was roll a character for the key, etc, etc.

What the hell do you even have access to that sells anything of value?

Just look at a karma vendor list on the wiki or something. /shrug

[Lane]

Ooh, I should have looked at the wiki earlier! I completely forgot about making dyes through cooking. Now I can just continue to spend my 90 recurring karma on things like tomatoes and make dyes.

Edit: I knew there was still a use for 90 karma! :P

Edit #2: This is awesome. I always wondered how people knew when these events were going to happen.

http://guildwarstemple.com/dragontimer/

[Valeron]

March's monthly is way easy, too easy really. You can get 3/4ths of it done today if you wanted to.

[Lane]

March's monthly is amazing. Only thing I don't understand is why are there only 4 options?

[Fencers]

Heh. Decided to watch the new Guildcast because I am slightly ill today/laying in bed.

Someone sent in a question about the difficulty of getting into MMOs for the first time in relation to other games. One of the hosts made the following statement:

"My kids have played Guild Wars 2 and World of Warcraft. In World of Warcraft they need constant supervision. I have to show them where their quests are, where to go, who to talk to, how their skills work- all this stuff. They get lost! And they end up just doing whatever and not getting much done.

However, in Guild Wars 2 they are on auto pilot. They can just do whatever and end up getting a lot done by just playing."

I thought that was super interesting and a lot to think on w/r/t modern MMOs.

By contrast, I was reading this: link, earlier today. Which spoke to how MMOs used to be designed.

/deep thoughts

[Valeron]

by Jack Handy?

[Wonka]

I had thought about the whole socialization aspect as well when GW2 first came out. I heard many complaints that although it was nice to not have to worry about people kill stealing or grabbing a node while you were busy with the mobs near it. It all felt inconsequential, that you could replace the players with bots and nobody would notice. Would it really be better to have some way to force people to socialize or merely incentivize it. Also how would you go about making it seem more appealing (if that's the right word) without making it seem required.

We all saw what happened with the laurels. You don't really need any of those things to access or even complete content in the game but alot of people see them as some kind of requirement to get things like ascended gear without doing fractals. Or am I wrong and I'm just over thinking things.

[Meledelion]

I don't get how your last paragraph ties into the rest of what you said Wonka.

[Valeron]

forced socialization? don't think I've ever seen that in a game

[Wonka]

What I meant with the laurels was that before, dailies didn't really matter you got xp, karma, gold and I believe a mystic coin all of which you could get else where; so they went and made the dailies more varied to get players to go to different zones and try all parts of the game crafting, dungeons, taking on veterans you name it. But to the player it was like what is the point. Why should I go out of my way to complete these tasks. So they needed something to incentivize it something to get players to want to complete the daily everyday. But it also needed to have something that players could work towards so that they got the feeling of accomplishment after doing them for a period of time they could get a bonus.

[Meledelion]

I don't get what that has to do with (forced) socialising.

[Wonka]

I meant to use laurels as an example where the developer tried to make something more appealing without making it a requirement to complete content. How do you get people to socialize more without creating a system or content wherein the player must group up or join a guild to take part in it. Such as the new guild activities, you don't have to be in that guild or in a guild period to participate in the new activities. Although to get the most out of the experience it is better to be in the guild that has activated it.

But now we are seeing some complaints on how it is a staggering objective to even unlock these activities for small guilds thus creating a problem where some players are having to choose between their very close but small guild or be apart of a larger one just for the better rewards and the complete experience. In both cases I can see the developer has tried to put a system in that seems to be fair for everyone but there are still problems where players are feeling forced into one way of playing the game.

I was wondering if it was even possible to create a fair system, or is this a case where you can never please everyone. My apologies if I'm not clear, I really wish I were a bit more eloquent. (If I'm even using that right.)