Is this game worth playing now?

[Vorkreist]

You clearly live in alternate bubbles if you didn't notice the player activity is in the grave across all areas. Then again fanboys will be fanboys everywhere.

I play on Desolation EU which is/was one of the most populated realms. You can look at everything:
- WvW deserted most of the time and only a tiny fraction of the old wvw community still barely logging on reset day.
- Almost 8-90% less fractals/pve groups around compared to same time last year for example.
- All maps are dead, you barely encounter another player once in a full moon, even at world boss events you barely get more than 10 people at some "peak" hours
- Hot maps are totally empty besides a handful of people at peak hour

They have jack shit working on the new expansion, their staff got cut too much. Most of their devs are making LS3 episodes right now with a small number probably working on the next expansion due to release between 2020 and 2030.

[PACOX]

You clearly live in alternate bubbles if you didn't notice the player activity is in the grave across all areas. Then again fanboys will be fanboys everywhere.

I play on Desolation EU which is/was one of the most populated realms. You can look at everything:
- WvW deserted most of the time and only a tiny fraction of the old wvw community still barely logging on reset day.
- Almost 8-90% less fractals/pve groups around compared to same time last year for example.
- All maps are dead, you barely encounter another player once in a full moon, even at world boss events you barely get more than 10 people at some "peak" hours
- Hot maps are totally empty besides a handful of people at peak hour

They have jack shit working on the new expansion, their staff got cut too much. Most of their devs are making LS3 episodes right now with a small number probably working on the next expansion due to release between 2020 and 2030.

2/10 - troll harder.

Everything you said can be disproved by simply logging into the game.

[Sorrior]

I can answer some of these.

There was no connection between Abaddon and Scarlet. They never practiced that fractal, it was that one of Thermanova, people voted for Thermanova. Though they vote was exactly fair because it was in the middle of Scarlet's arch, of course people would vote for that one.

Anise is definitely an older lady who keeps up vitality through mesmer magic. They probably have decided how old they want her to be yet.

They 100% dropped the ball with the Rytlock arch. We saw him about to cleanse Ascalon, get sucked into the Mist, and then come out with new powers. No explanation whatsoever. Answers might come sooner than later since story wise he is being interrogated/debriefed by the charr.

Tequatl and Shatterer are ranks within their respective orders. The new Tequatl has a an easy lore explanation (that's been confirmed as well). When a dragon dies its energy spreads to the other dragons, surrounding land, and its minions. So in turn, the current Tequatl absorbed some of the energy and became stronger.

The Shatterer fight has a similar explanation but you can apply the same explanation for Tequatl to it. The Shatterer fight is almost a tech demo of different mechanics they were working on. Someone had the bright idea to apply them the fight (it was terrible before and easy to do according to Anets words). BAM, new Shatterer fight.

I have a question though. Wtf are they going to do if/when all the dragons die. The dragons control the flow of magic so that there isn't too in the world. Otherwise wield stuff happens like hostile anamolies, chaotic rifts, etc. Is the new dragon supposed to take the place of the elder dragons? And if so isn't that extremely dangerous? Maybe worse than having multiple dragons split the load

My best guess is that Magic starts to infuse everything and becomes super easy to use and far more common. If you ever read war of the ancients kinda like what happened when Ronin gained access to the moonwell and became near godlike

[Deleted]

2/10 - troll harder.

Everything you said can be disproved by simply logging into the game.

This weekend I finally took the time to log on and finish the latest episode of the living story (Head of the Snake).
He kind of exaggerated it, but i cannot completely disagree with him.

On the new map (Lake Barric, was it?) i have encountered a total of maybe 10 players over the span of about 4 hours; and it was on saturday noon-time.
Like i said; he is overdoing it... but he isn't completely wrong either.

[Deleted]

This weekend I finally took the time to log on and finish the latest episode of the living story (Head of the Snake).
He kind of exaggerated it, but i cannot completely disagree with him.

On the new map (Lake Barric, was it?) i have encountered a total of maybe 10 players over the span of about 4 hours; and it was on saturday noon-time.
Like i said; he is overdoing it... but he isn't completely wrong either.

i literally just went into lake doric for the first time to check and already found twice the amount of people you did just walking along the edge of the map within 2 minutes

and it's the afternoon on a workday

[Arlee]

2/10 - troll harder.

Everything you said can be disproved by simply logging into the game.

Actually finding people to play PvE things with on EU realms is a complaint I hear a lot from EU friends, a few I know have even made NA accounts just so they could play with other people. Of course, on the PvP side of things everything seems to be going well on the EU side, it's a matter of what you're looking to do and when you play really.

Of course, none of that means the game is dying at all I can understand the frustration though.

[Valeron]

Must be a EU thing. In this US, I see plenty of people, even in the HOT maps I see quite a few folks.

[Svifnymr]

My best guess is that Magic starts to infuse everything and becomes super easy to use and far more common. If you ever read war of the ancients kinda like what happened when Ronin gained access to the moonwell and became near godlike

That was one of the functions of the bloodstones IIRC, concentrating overflow of magic.

[Gray_Matter]

I play on Desolation EU which is/was one of the most populated realms. You can look at everything:
- WvW deserted most of the time and only a tiny fraction of the old wvw community still barely logging on reset day.

WvW could be deserted. I haven't joined for a while. That's only one aspect of the game, though.

- Almost 8-90% less fractals/pve groups around compared to same time last year for example.

Perhaps they have moved onto other things such as raids. Personally I am seeing more groups but that's because I joined a guild that runs them regularly.

- All maps are dead, you barely encounter another player once in a full moon, even at world boss events you barely get more than 10 people at some "peak" hours

I am just not seeing this. Any time, any place, I log in, I see people. I did a world boss last night at 2am and there was over 50 people there.

- Hot maps are totally empty besides a handful of people at peak hour

I am not seeing the same thing as you. AB hourly runs used to net 13 full maps during peak hours. During off people they would get 2-3 maps. Even now with the AB nerf there is at least one successful map during off peak times. There are other maps, they just aren't necessarily successful. So there is at least enough people on 1 map to cause overflows.

They have jack shit working on the new expansion, their staff got cut too much. Most of their devs are making LS3 episodes right now with a small number probably working on the next expansion due to release between 2020 and 2030.

Can you please point out some facts to back this up.

[PACOX]

Actually finding people to play PvE things with on EU realms is a complaint I hear a lot from EU friends, a few I know have even made NA accounts just so they could play with other people. Of course, on the PvP side of things everything seems to be going well on the EU side, it's a matter of what you're looking to do and when you play really.

Of course, none of that means the game is dying at all I can understand the frustration though.

That's odd NA maps are always full of people. I get anxious if I have to wait longer than 3 min for a dungeon/fractal/raid to form.

[Arlee]

That's odd NA maps are always full of people. I get anxious if I have to wait longer than 3 min for a dungeon/fractal/raid to form.

Yea, it's a really weird dichotomy no idea why it's like that.

[Valeron]

That's odd NA maps are always full of people. I get anxious if I have to wait longer than 3 min for a dungeon/fractal/raid to form.

Same here. It seems strange to me to see the statements that it doesn't have people. Out of all of the MMOs out there that I have played in the past year, I easily see the most people in this one (take note: I don't play WoW).

[Sorrior]

Yea, it's a really weird dichotomy no idea why it's like that.

I think the simple answer is most EU players have swapped to us and the game itself may not be as popular over their

[Deleted]

I used to play GW1 a lot and recently decided to finally try GW2. But I am not sure there will be someone to play with on EU servers.
Thanks for clearing some things for me.

[Vorkreist]

2/10 - troll harder.

Everything you said can be disproved by simply logging into the game.

Noticed now you mentioned NA. Which is weird considering the daily threads on official forums saying they can't finish any meta on hot maps anymore because of the low number of players on most NA servers.

Hint: Getting on a full map through LFG once in full moon =/= active playerbase

[Gray_Matter]

Noticed now you mentioned NA. Which is weird considering the daily threads on official forums saying they can't finish any meta on hot maps anymore because of the low number of players on most NA servers.

Hint: Getting on a full map through LFG once in full moon =/= active playerbase

A few things:
1. The size of the population on individual servers only affects WvW. When people go out into the world A/Net make use of a megaserver technology where people from all servers join the same map. When that map gets full they start filling an overflow map. When the overflow gets full they go to another overflow map. etc.
2. For the meta's or any world event you are either going to have to be on a map early or join through LFG. That's not because the map is empty but rather because they get full and overflows are created. It's definitely frustrating, especially if you join late. I am not a fan of the big metas but being on a map where it doesn't finish doesn't mean that there is no one doing the event. Most times HoT maps have lots of individuals running around who aren't doing the meta. They are doing HP trains, exploring, activities or even AFK. Those people make metas much more difficult to complete because the map doesn't get any more people who want to do the meta because it's basically full.
3. GW2 is large. There are many places where you can go to do things. PVP, World bosses, WvW, HoT maps, cities or any of the maps that came with the original game. There isn't 100 million people playing the game but there isn't 50 either. The more area you have in game and more things that people can do, the more spread out you make your population. There are going to be some places which are a bit quiet if you run around at 3am in the morning.

[Azsune]

I really enjoyed GW2 but the problem for me was my friends quitting. I went from doing a lot of things all the time to having to join pugs or stick to solo content. If my friends didn't quit I would still be playing. You might say join another guild I don't really want to.

All in all this game is worth playing. You just need to find a group of people you enjoy playing with like any mmo.

[Huehuecoyotl]

You just need to find a group of people you enjoy playing with like any mmo.

You don't NEED to. Actually, let me rephrase that; YOU need to, because that's the way you enjoy playing. People that prefer to play solo, or are happy to use the mechanics of the game to "team up" with people informally, will be able to do so quite happily.

That's one of the things I love about the game, it's much more accommodating of different play-styles.

[Jngizu]

Yea, it's a really weird dichotomy no idea why it's like that.

I think it boils down to a few things. GW1 had a huge EU player-base, mostly PvP players, but even in PvE there were a lot of players. IIRC, not as many players in NA at the time. When GW2 was released, a big amount of those hardcore GW players (I am one of those) played the game for a few weeks, hated it and then quit while telling everyone it was a shit game. I personally don't think it's a shit game, but it definitely is a slap to the face if you were a huge fan of the original game. As one of my friends put it "It doesn't deserved to be called Guild Wars as they pretty much removed everything that made that game so special".

Now, it also looks like WoW and LoL are a lot more popular in EU. Of course, it's all pure guessing, I have no proof of what I'm saying but it makes sense. EU players tend to be more competitive in general too, and GW2's PvE doesn't bring much in that regard, while PvP is pretty horrible.

[unfilteredJW]

Going to piggy back on this thread since it's a similar question.

Played at launch till probably one of the later living stories before the expac. Have not bought expac. With how they sell the game and that they are working on the next expac, would it make better since just to keep waiting till the next expac drops to purchase the game?