GW2 PvE

[Jangri-]

Hello there.

I'm an EX-WoW player, played basicly from end of TBC to start of Cata. I guess im not a huge fan of MMORPGs(Let's face it, the RPG part in WoW in sh1t), but the thing that kept me playing it was PvE and the social aspects of it(PvE). Working together for 2 weeks with the same players, finaly downing that big bad boss, that's what WoW offered me. Unlike, aparently most of the playerbase, i was the player who was always up for progresion raids, heck, even if they meant 3/4 hour of wiping, it was okay for me, as long as we showed some progress. And unlike many, i tended to skip farm raids. Didn't care much for loot, as long as it was good enough to let me progress.

Now, I told all that so you could get an idea what I enjow in MMO's - working together, improving our play and achieving our goals. Altho i'm a long time dota player, the PvP part of WoW didn't appeal to me much.

So, basicly what i'm wondering, are there PvE side of the game be any good? Will there be any challanges hard enough that completing they will bring sense of achieving something? Will there by anything to work on, or the story and the rest of dungeons will be steamrollable on first playthrough?

Regards, Jangri-.

[Hellgaunt]

This is the bit your looking for from the above-mentioned link:

Dungeons – At launch there will be 8 dungeons, but don’t fret! This doesn’t mean they’re the same static thing over and over again.Like everything else in the game, ArenaNet is shaking up how dungeons work as well. Every dungeon has a Story mode and an Exploration mode. The Story mode uses concept art and exposition to tell the story similar to the Personal Story. After completing the Story mode of a dungeon, you will unlock Exploration mode. Exploration mode is significantly harder than the Story mode version. Story mode is meant for pretty much any random pick up group, whereas Exploration mode is very difficult content that is meant for a coordinated group of players. Whatever results come of the Story mode version will play out in the Exploration version of the dungeons. Each of the Exploration dungeons have at least 3 paths that the group can vote on that will determine what path they take. The Dynamic Event system is also present in both versions of the dungeons, so even if you play through multiple times, that doesn’t mean you’ll see the same exact thing. Bonus events could spawn from player actions, by location or even at random and change your experience.

But what about the loot you ask?

Every dungeon has its own unique weapon and armor sets. The Story mode has the unique weapons and the Exploration mode has the unique armor sets. When you complete a dungeon you'll be given a token that's used as a currency for either weaopons or armor. So rather than grinding a single dungeon 20 times in hopes that you get what you're looking for, you can just take the token and buy exactly what you want.

Aggro/AI –

Aggro will take into account quite a few factors:

Simple creatures use a system based on proximity, how much damage is being done to them, how much damage they're doing, health of the player, armor, etc. More complex creatures will use all of the above among other things such as using specific skills, attacking the player that is the furthest away from them, focus on players wearing medium or light armor and try to chase them. Some creatures might run away from you, swap weapons to have entirely new skills, dodge your attacks, use specific skills on players at specific times, etc. Different armies will also have their own systems that are based on different themes, skills, and AI.

[Malthurius]

Difficulty has yet to be seen. But dungeons are said to be very difficult. They also have 3 different paths and dynamic events that can change the nature of the dungeon. Your first run might not be the same as the last.

Working together? Guild Wars 2 should have that in spades. The game is actually designed to encourage teamwork and social play in large scale events and smaller events and dungeons.

Your personal story is one form of progression which you can choose to do alone or with friends. Leveling is another obvious one. However there is also progression in the acquisition of traits, skills, good looking gear, and gear with a specific stat distribution.

You can always return and do content you missed while you were leveling since all content is always viable because of scaling and they still give rewards adequate for your character to get the gear you like.

New content most likely will be harder as the game continues and people learn the game and the devs learn how to develop better encounters.

[Jangri-]

Thanks for the link and excerpt(did i said that right? Doubt it). I didn't read ALL of it yet, but skimmed true the most interesting parts, and all the bold text . The holy Trinity part was a nice found for me personaly.

Now, as Mathurius said, doifficulty is aparently yet to be seen. "whereas Exploration mode is very difficult content that is meant for a coordinated group of players. " could theoreticly apply to HC 5mans of Wow. Or maybe, I hope wow hc 5mans should be compared(to some extent ofc) to "Story mode is meant for pretty much any random pick up group". I guess the truth( as always) lies somewhere in middle.

Now, another question tough. I've seen lots of scaling things so far. I supose the dungeons will not all be scaling? Well, i think the story mode ones might be.

EDIT: Aggro looks pretty interesting as well.

[Zeek Daniels]

Dont know exactly what you mean by scaling but going to guess you mean sidekicking.

In Dungeons you will always be level appropriate even if you are a higher level. take the first dungeon available which is a level 35 dungeon. If you are level 80 you will be scaled down to lvl 38 or so. This way you still have a slight advantage over the content but not enough of an advantage that content becomes trivial.

Also if you go to lets say a lvl 70 dungeon and your only level 50 but your friends take you, you will be brought up to 70 to participate. This keeps every dungeon fun, and viable through out the leveling process and even after hitting level 80 you might wanna tackle the hard modes to get some cool looking sets. Which you can then show off in town showing that you have beaten the hardest content.

Aggro looks pretty interesting as well.

heh because their is non =p

[Tithonus]

http://www.guildwars2guru.com/forum/...66#post1008166

Mantose: Mediamaster did the fanday thing and I think his group finished the first dungeon on explorable mode, if I remember correctly it took them somewhere around 4 or so hours. But, for some of them it was their first time playing the game and playing with each other.

I cant find his great post on his experiance at fanday, but I am sure someone has to readily availible if you want to read it.

I am going to assume once strategies are developed a dungeon will probably be somewhere between 1 and 2 hours to complete.

Eric: Explorable mode dungeons can take a long time if you fail often. However, if you pretty much make it straight through they should be in the ballpark of an hour to complete.

[Jangri-]

Thank you Zeek, this did clear some things up for me. If I understood you and the mass info correctly, dungeons wont give wtf epic 1337lvl loot, which me likes.

[Zeek Daniels]

Thank you Zeek, this did clear some things up for me. If I understood you and the mass info correctly, dungeons wont give wtf epic 1337lvl loot, which me likes.

Nah they are still going to give you 1337 looking loot, it just wont be loot that increases your stats by so much that youll never want to run any of the other dungeons because you have the best stats on loot in game.

The game also has a system to transfer the look of one item to another like Transmogging in wow, so even if you have the set that you want you can still experience the challenges of getting all the other sets playing the explorable modes of the other dungeons.

[Tithonus]

If you are curious about looks there are a number of images in an old thread a few pages back.

http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...-THIS-armorset

[Malthurius]

Dont know exactly what you mean by scaling but going to guess you mean sidekicking.

Sheesh, I get those two terms mixed up more than I should.