Einlanzer.1627

> @"gateless gate.8406" said:

> Coming from WoW, it's very strange to see such a massive gap between DPS in this game.

>

> Here's the breakdown of DPS classes in my previous MMO: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/statistics/17#

> There is only a 15% difference between the best and worst specs. Removing the absolute best and absolute worst, that difference shrinks to just 10%. Compare that to the 24% difference between a GW2 Necro's 29k and a Weaver's 36k. For kicks, compare it to the 52% (!!!) difference between 29k and 44k. You cannot have a class doing 52% more damage than another.

>

> Arguments like "class X is harder to play than Y so therefore it NEEDS to do more DPS" is a fallacy, as (1) any gameplay difficulty is often both overstated and easily overcome by good players, and (2) raid groups will always demand the best and reject the worst, especially when you have sites like metabattle and tools like DPS meters. And that's really the most toxic effect of egregious balancing: Players who have spent possibly hundreds of hours on Necro are simply locked out of a significant portion of game content.

You have to understand that this isn't WoW. This game doesn't use the trinity, so "DPS" is a softer role than it is in WoW. The amount of damage you deal isn't the only thing that matters even as a damage dealer. Eles sacrifice a lot of utility and mobility to reach those numbers compared to other classes AND they are more fragile and harder to maintain those numbers with. It probably doesn't justify a 50% difference, but it does justify some difference - especially considering you can't only balance classes around raids since that's only a small (or nonexistent) part of the end game for a lot of players.

If Necros did the same damage as Eles, they would become more valuable than Eles because they are easier to play, have more survivability, and can do all quite a bit while maintaining their damage, including providing barrier. And that's not even getting into the fact that Necros are already much better than Eles for general play due to their attrition.

> @"Mortymes.7139" said:

> So Ion said we wouldn't get HIgh Elves in WoW, so how about High Elves introduced in Guild Wars? Most games have elves in their fantasy, but GW has no elves at all.

I know it's offtopic, but his reasoning was stupid. High Elves deserve to be playable in WoW.

> @"broFenix.1632" said:

> I think the character progression is just fine as it is. I feel sincerely that the Elite Specializations and Mastery system blend nearly seamlessly with the original progression system. I love the hero point and mastery mix of progression post level 80.

I'd like to understand why people think that skills and traits being tied to the same resource is fine, since they are designed to complement each other. They aren't supposed to be in competition with each other. That's why the system at launch had them on separate progression tracks. You weren't sacrificing acquisition of skills for acquisition of traits, and vice versa, because doing that makes no sense given their respective roles in character building.

To me, this is a very obvious and fundamental "bad game design" problem. Ditto with how elite specs work. You unlock them along with a new weapon for them, but you can't really use it because you have no traits unlocked, so equipping it actually makes you weaker until you fully trait it out after many more hours of gameplay. That's a nonsensical system.

I definitely think there are some flaws with the progression system, and there are an infinite number of ways it could be revamped. I think my methods would be something like the below:

- reduce levels from 80 to 50, slow the leveling speed down a little, and make the rewards for each level feel a bit more significant. 80 levels just feels like too many for the leveling content the game offers, and because there are so many levels you end up zipping through them at an awkwardly fast pace.

- re-separate trait and skill progression systems. Consolidating them under a unified resource and train UI was a weird move that resulted in a system that feels too simple while also being clunkier and more awkward than the original system used at launch. Skills and traits are supposed to complement each other, not be in a resource competition with one another. This would also allow them to rethink the progression of elite specs, which is also weird (you unlock it immediately but can't really use it because equipping actually weakens you due to having no traits unlocked for it, so you can't really experiment with it without gimping yourself until you've fully unlocked it. That makes no sense. )

- this one would have a huge impact on the economy if changed now, but I would have designed gear with only rarity and not levels. Attribute bonuses should scale by character level and gear rarity, not by gear level. This design has two unfortunate in-game effects - a.) way too much green/blue gear loot bloat, which makes the whole looting process (as well as crafting) feel really trite and uninteresting, and b.) disincentivizing experimentation while leveling due to how quickly you outlevel gear (i.e. who buys sigils and runes for anything other than level 80 exotics?)

- I would significantly revise the personal story. They tried to do too much with the branching paths and whatnot and it resulted in a story narrative that felt mediocre in terms of writing and development compared to GW1's story. It also pigeonholed the game in really myopic ways, like making it very difficult to introduce new races.

- add at least one or two reserve weapon skills for all weapons that can be swapped with existing skills to provide some degree of weapon customization. Having your first 5 skills be totally locked based on your weapon choice was a very iffy move. MMOs like GW2 really thrive on customization, which is the main reason GW1 was loved so much.

- I think the mastery system is actually really solid, but it's still a bit light in execution and could use some meaty enhancements.

> @"Tails.9372" said:

> > @"RicochetXD.4128" said:

> > people have been complaining about the new DE mechanics since they launched. They don't work. They're broken. There's pages and pages of reasons on it.

> >

> > And we haven't heard a peep from you.

> People have been complaining about how underperforming P/P is for years and did they ever respond to any of the complaints? Or even explain any of the more questionable changes like the removal of the ricochet trait? Exactly, don't be suprised if it's the same thing here.

>

>

Yeah, P/P was terrible for years before it finally received a bunch of buffs to make it at least usable. What's worse is that the main reason it was terrible was very obvious and not that complex (Vital Shot was majorly undertuned, which broke the Initiative mechanic by forcing players to continuously dump all of it into Unload, which in turn massively gutted your mobility AND any utility offered by the set).

Thankfully it did finally (after over 3 years) get enough of an overhaul to be functional, but I still don't understand why it took so long OR why Ricochet was removed. That continues to feel nonsensical even after all this time.

In truth, this is something the game hasn't really fully learned from - there's really no compensating for having an undertuned autoattack on a weapon. This is particularly true for Thieves due to Initiative, but it's also true more generally. I've been advocating for normalization of these for a long time. A lot have been buffed over the years, but some are still pointlessly weak, which relegates those sets into being highly situational if not downright useless.

> @"Linken.6345" said:

> > @"Einlanzer.1627" said:

> > > @"BlaqueFyre.5678" said:

> > > > @"Lily.1935" said:

> > > > What was supposed to be the introduction into End game content in GW2 as well as supposed to be part of that end game content that does a poor job at teaching new players how to play as well as being wildly unbalanced? Dungeons!

> > > >

> > > > When trying to convince a new player to stay in the game who enjoys PvE one of the first things they ask about is Dungeons. The question usually goes like this "Which dungeons provide the best loot/have the best rewards?" Or "I want to run dungeons, why is it so difficult to get a group for it?" And it shows me right off the bat as a veteran player that there is a certain expectation from them that isn't being met by the Balance team for PvE. New players expect that dungeons are supposed to be the content they do while leveling and expect that they are an option for the End game. Yet in both cases dungeons fail their expectation. And when they talk to veteran players the response from the community is almost always filled with bitterness.

> > > >

> > > > First impressions are extremely important. But dungeons give an extremely bad first impression of the game. Part of this has to do with how the community complains about the forgotten content but the other part of it is that their complaints are justified. Arena net gives off this impression to new players that they don't care about the old content and it instantly puts the thought in their head "Well if I enjoy something It will be ignored and forgotten in the future." This isn't something any business in gaming should want. Forgotten old content is why many players leave MMOs in favor of new ones. WoW for example had did this for years, obsoleting their old content in favor of new content and this eventually cut their numbers. I'm not saying this is the only reason but to say it wasn't a factor is foolish. Many WoW veterans have told me that they quit because of this reason and that game is seeing new energy with their next expansion from what I've heard. But that's because they are reinvigorating old content with new things.

> > > >

> > > > Dungeons are clunky in their current form. Their difficulty scaling is usually based on cheap tricks and players have been insensitivity into bad habits which lead to one of the worst PvE balancing experiences in the game and those tactics still exist in dungeons. Dungeons are a relic of a bygone era of GW2 that doesn't fit the current balance of the game. Because of this the dungeons being used as a teaching tool for players to get into Raids or Fractals just isn't an option because of what's optimal in Dungeons compared to the other content is quite different. Healers are not required in dungeons, Condition damage is often punished, stacking in the corner is rewarded and strange mechanics are used in the dungeons that have no equivalent outside of that specific fight. As a teaching tool, dungeons give players skills they don't need and fail to teach skills they do need. But this is the content that was supposed to be the preparation for Fractals. Yet it fails at this.

> > > >

> > > > Additionally, Arena net have stated that Fractals do everything that dungeons are supposed to do or capable of doing. Yet no one but the hardest core of fanbois really believes this. Its clearly a cost cutting measure and that's it. And part of the community has just accepted that and wont even ask for scraps from the devs when we should be demanding the world. Fractals fail as a replacement for Dungeons because the experience you get, even if its only a physiological one is extremely different. Fractals are like mini dungeons. Bit sized bits of content that almost acts as a sampler platter. This isn't what I'd call a replacement. 4 sides can't replace a steak. Dungeons uniqueness would allow them to actively teach players how to do the harder content without as much of a risk. A boss that acts as a quicker fight that fights kinda like Gorseval but doesn't have the ability to instantly kill the party if you fail to interrupt him could be great at the end of a dungeon. Having mechanics that seem similar, like the green Circles in Vale but as a mini game in a dungeon about color matching could be a good way to get players used to these mechanics without having to be punished. Fractals can't teach this because of its Roll in the game, but dungeons absolutely could because the roll they were supposed to have isn't being used.

> > > >

> > > > **Suggestions:**

> > > > With some of this in mind lets getting some suggestions going for dungeons. I'll post some of mine to really add new spice to the dungeons that could make them a unique experience for players looking to have some fun.

> > > > 1. **Party Bonus:** This idea for the dungeons is to help incentivise players to work together. Having a point system that shows up at the end of the dungeon that offers bonus rewards for the party for members using things like combo fields, healing allies, reviving downed allies, destroying break bards and so on could be a great way to help teach players to work together and teach them about these things.

> > > > 2. **Time Trial:** There are quite a few speedrunners in the community and having a timed trial leader board would be great for them. Giving them extra rewards or titles for completing each path in a specific time limit or gaining a daily record holder title or maybe a monthly one would be something that many players would absolutely love.

> > > > 3. **Dungeon Events:** Having Events that pop up In a dungeon run and perhaps even having them be random so they don't always pop up in the same run that add to your overall bonus rewards at the end of it could give players a reason to not just run past everything to get to the end as quickly as possible. These events would incentivize players to stick in the dungeons longer and get bonus rewards for doing so. But could be skipped without punishing the player for doing so.

> > > > 4. **Bonus Objective:** A daily bonus objective that you could do once a day in any dungeon path could be a good thing to add as well. Something extra you need to do much like the bonus objectives back in GW1 for the missions which could have its own unique title or reward track associated with it.

> > > > 5. **Hard Mode:** One of the biggest suggestions that Everyone I talk to who misses doing dungeons have said is the desire for a hard mode. Scaling all dungeons in hard mode up to level 80 and making it more challenging with more rewards and new rewards. This is highly desirable and gives even more replay value to the dungeon enthusiasts.

> > > > 6. **New Rewards/New Skins:** Going along with the Hard mode, having the Hard mode rewards be different from the Normal mode counterpart could be a major boon. New weapon and armor skins that are ascended could give players a great way to play this content over and over again. And considering that the armor would be dungeon armor the devs could do something really simple with it. Making them elite versions of Existing Dungeon armor. Using the same models as the previous armor sets but changing the skin much like they did with prestigious armor back in GW1. This would save arena net a lot of time in designing new armors while also making the fashion community of GW2 extremely happy.

> > > >

> > > > I know I'm not alone in wanting dungeons to return in a big way in GW2. In fact there are plenty of benefits of improving this content long term for the game. Short term is sounds like a pretty big work load and cost, but long term this really gives new players an extremely Good impression of the game right off the bat and helps keep GW2 far safer from losing players who could otherwise move on to a new game that does what GW2 does, but actually does keep their content relevant for longer. I feel that perhaps all my suggestions don't need to be put in place, but I do know that dungeons should be updated for the health of the game. And we as players who love the game should absolutely DEMAND it! If we keep making the "Time and money" Excuse for arena net they will never give us what we want because we wont demand it from them. If you think being insistent doesn't work, well there are other games that prove that it absolutely does. Just look at Nintendo and their game Super Smash bros. The SSB community has been screaming for years for Sonic, Megaman, Cloud and many others to get in the game, something that probably SHOULD have been impossible for nintendo, but they kept on demanding it and demanding it. And you know what they got? Almost everything they wanted from the roster! It should show you just how much of an impact that we as fans can have on a game. Arena Net is a company, yes. But they are also beholden to US! They need to give us what we want because there are hundreds of other options we can take. So they have a lot of pressure to listen to us as long as we demand it from them. So no more excuses, Arena net! Update the dungeons!

> > >

> > > It’s not Forgotten, it’s Abandoned, Anet Stated that they are no longer going to support the content especially with the Dungeon team no longer being existent, and they also stated that Fractals took the place of Dungeons and that’s what they are actually Supporting.

> >

> > Which means nothing. They have the ability to change their minds at any given time, and pressure needs to keep building until they do. It's absurd to have abandoned all of the original dungeon content. FotM is not enough on its own. The game needs real dungeons.

> >

> > If there's anything that deserves to be abandoned, it's the PS.

>

> What can be done in a new dungeon that cant be done in a new fractal mate?

FotM are mini dungeons that utilize their own framework. That alone is a sufficient to say "they aren't enough". More than that, however, world dungeons add a sense of immersion that FotM can't by tying dungeons to specific locations , enhancing the flavor, depth, and lore of those locations. I think this sense of immersion is one of the main things GW2 is lacking in. A lot of people don't consciously recognize it, but MMOs really need this to attract and keep players.

> @"BlaqueFyre.5678" said:

> > @"Lily.1935" said:

> > What was supposed to be the introduction into End game content in GW2 as well as supposed to be part of that end game content that does a poor job at teaching new players how to play as well as being wildly unbalanced? Dungeons!

> >

> > When trying to convince a new player to stay in the game who enjoys PvE one of the first things they ask about is Dungeons. The question usually goes like this "Which dungeons provide the best loot/have the best rewards?" Or "I want to run dungeons, why is it so difficult to get a group for it?" And it shows me right off the bat as a veteran player that there is a certain expectation from them that isn't being met by the Balance team for PvE. New players expect that dungeons are supposed to be the content they do while leveling and expect that they are an option for the End game. Yet in both cases dungeons fail their expectation. And when they talk to veteran players the response from the community is almost always filled with bitterness.

> >

> > First impressions are extremely important. But dungeons give an extremely bad first impression of the game. Part of this has to do with how the community complains about the forgotten content but the other part of it is that their complaints are justified. Arena net gives off this impression to new players that they don't care about the old content and it instantly puts the thought in their head "Well if I enjoy something It will be ignored and forgotten in the future." This isn't something any business in gaming should want. Forgotten old content is why many players leave MMOs in favor of new ones. WoW for example had did this for years, obsoleting their old content in favor of new content and this eventually cut their numbers. I'm not saying this is the only reason but to say it wasn't a factor is foolish. Many WoW veterans have told me that they quit because of this reason and that game is seeing new energy with their next expansion from what I've heard. But that's because they are reinvigorating old content with new things.

> >

> > Dungeons are clunky in their current form. Their difficulty scaling is usually based on cheap tricks and players have been insensitivity into bad habits which lead to one of the worst PvE balancing experiences in the game and those tactics still exist in dungeons. Dungeons are a relic of a bygone era of GW2 that doesn't fit the current balance of the game. Because of this the dungeons being used as a teaching tool for players to get into Raids or Fractals just isn't an option because of what's optimal in Dungeons compared to the other content is quite different. Healers are not required in dungeons, Condition damage is often punished, stacking in the corner is rewarded and strange mechanics are used in the dungeons that have no equivalent outside of that specific fight. As a teaching tool, dungeons give players skills they don't need and fail to teach skills they do need. But this is the content that was supposed to be the preparation for Fractals. Yet it fails at this.

> >

> > Additionally, Arena net have stated that Fractals do everything that dungeons are supposed to do or capable of doing. Yet no one but the hardest core of fanbois really believes this. Its clearly a cost cutting measure and that's it. And part of the community has just accepted that and wont even ask for scraps from the devs when we should be demanding the world. Fractals fail as a replacement for Dungeons because the experience you get, even if its only a physiological one is extremely different. Fractals are like mini dungeons. Bit sized bits of content that almost acts as a sampler platter. This isn't what I'd call a replacement. 4 sides can't replace a steak. Dungeons uniqueness would allow them to actively teach players how to do the harder content without as much of a risk. A boss that acts as a quicker fight that fights kinda like Gorseval but doesn't have the ability to instantly kill the party if you fail to interrupt him could be great at the end of a dungeon. Having mechanics that seem similar, like the green Circles in Vale but as a mini game in a dungeon about color matching could be a good way to get players used to these mechanics without having to be punished. Fractals can't teach this because of its Roll in the game, but dungeons absolutely could because the roll they were supposed to have isn't being used.

> >

> > **Suggestions:**

> > With some of this in mind lets getting some suggestions going for dungeons. I'll post some of mine to really add new spice to the dungeons that could make them a unique experience for players looking to have some fun.

> > 1. **Party Bonus:** This idea for the dungeons is to help incentivise players to work together. Having a point system that shows up at the end of the dungeon that offers bonus rewards for the party for members using things like combo fields, healing allies, reviving downed allies, destroying break bards and so on could be a great way to help teach players to work together and teach them about these things.

> > 2. **Time Trial:** There are quite a few speedrunners in the community and having a timed trial leader board would be great for them. Giving them extra rewards or titles for completing each path in a specific time limit or gaining a daily record holder title or maybe a monthly one would be something that many players would absolutely love.

> > 3. **Dungeon Events:** Having Events that pop up In a dungeon run and perhaps even having them be random so they don't always pop up in the same run that add to your overall bonus rewards at the end of it could give players a reason to not just run past everything to get to the end as quickly as possible. These events would incentivize players to stick in the dungeons longer and get bonus rewards for doing so. But could be skipped without punishing the player for doing so.

> > 4. **Bonus Objective:** A daily bonus objective that you could do once a day in any dungeon path could be a good thing to add as well. Something extra you need to do much like the bonus objectives back in GW1 for the missions which could have its own unique title or reward track associated with it.

> > 5. **Hard Mode:** One of the biggest suggestions that Everyone I talk to who misses doing dungeons have said is the desire for a hard mode. Scaling all dungeons in hard mode up to level 80 and making it more challenging with more rewards and new rewards. This is highly desirable and gives even more replay value to the dungeon enthusiasts.

> > 6. **New Rewards/New Skins:** Going along with the Hard mode, having the Hard mode rewards be different from the Normal mode counterpart could be a major boon. New weapon and armor skins that are ascended could give players a great way to play this content over and over again. And considering that the armor would be dungeon armor the devs could do something really simple with it. Making them elite versions of Existing Dungeon armor. Using the same models as the previous armor sets but changing the skin much like they did with prestigious armor back in GW1. This would save arena net a lot of time in designing new armors while also making the fashion community of GW2 extremely happy.

> >

> > I know I'm not alone in wanting dungeons to return in a big way in GW2. In fact there are plenty of benefits of improving this content long term for the game. Short term is sounds like a pretty big work load and cost, but long term this really gives new players an extremely Good impression of the game right off the bat and helps keep GW2 far safer from losing players who could otherwise move on to a new game that does what GW2 does, but actually does keep their content relevant for longer. I feel that perhaps all my suggestions don't need to be put in place, but I do know that dungeons should be updated for the health of the game. And we as players who love the game should absolutely DEMAND it! If we keep making the "Time and money" Excuse for arena net they will never give us what we want because we wont demand it from them. If you think being insistent doesn't work, well there are other games that prove that it absolutely does. Just look at Nintendo and their game Super Smash bros. The SSB community has been screaming for years for Sonic, Megaman, Cloud and many others to get in the game, something that probably SHOULD have been impossible for nintendo, but they kept on demanding it and demanding it. And you know what they got? Almost everything they wanted from the roster! It should show you just how much of an impact that we as fans can have on a game. Arena Net is a company, yes. But they are also beholden to US! They need to give us what we want because there are hundreds of other options we can take. So they have a lot of pressure to listen to us as long as we demand it from them. So no more excuses, Arena net! Update the dungeons!

>

> It’s not Forgotten, it’s Abandoned, Anet Stated that they are no longer going to support the content especially with the Dungeon team no longer being existent, and they also stated that Fractals took the place of Dungeons and that’s what they are actually Supporting.

Which means nothing. They have the ability to change their minds at any given time, and pressure needs to keep building until they do. It's absurd to have abandoned all of the original dungeon content. FotM is not enough on its own. The game needs real dungeons.

If there's anything that deserves to be abandoned, it's the PS.

yeah, this honestly deserves to continue gaining momentum and being talked about until they finally decide to do something about it. Abandoning dungeon content was a poor decision from the get go - one that's long overdue for being reversed.

> @"Arkantos.7460" said:

> i think after mesma and deadeye rework , we have to wait half or 1 year for our revamp because other classes need theese a lot more then renegade

I disagree. Revs are the least popular class in the game, and are the most restricted in terms of how one is able to play them. They almost definitely need a "revamp" more than other classes, who may at most need some tweaks.

Yeah the Revenant has a very deeply flawed execution. The main problem is that there's no skill customization, and the legends each have a specialized role. That renders legend swapping a lot less interesting and useful a mechanic than it should be - I'm not sure why this wasn't obvious when the class was being designed. I mean, it's not like you can swap your gear and traits mid-combat.

To make things worse, each weapon ALSO has a specialized role, which creates a severe rigidity to the way the class is played. Want to be condition oriented? Well, here's your exact loadout to a tee - no experimentation or customization for you!

In short - there are too few skills, and there's too little synergy between the ones they have. If Revs aren't going to have skill customization, then both weapon and legend swapping should feel more fluid than they do, with skills that synergize better between different groups, allowing for some degree of versatility and customization.

I think the class would probably feel a lot more complete if either Glint or Kalla (probably Kalla) were made core and we got a new more specialized elite in its place. Then Kalla would make sense in its current design because it's fairly non-specialized and can supplement several other legends.

Yeah, this is (one of) the obvious way to design the revenant from the get-go. Hopefully they get a similar land update in the near future.

Hopefully the enthusiasm for this shows devs that it's sometimes worth updating things they don't think are worth updating. People get excited for launch content to be made relevant again when it hasn't been in ages.

ahem ahem dungeons ahem.

> @"Ojimaru.8970" said:

> > @BlindeyeInsight.5367 said:

> > Traveling with mounts is more fun than clicking through loading screens. I never enjoyed the waypoints in this game as they break-up the feeling of immersion and exploration I enjoy in open games like this. So to _me_ they would add value.

>

> So pulling a horse out of your pocket is totally immersive? Right...

>

> Adding a form of non-character-based speed boost for traversal is akin to a developer saying from the start, "My content is worthless and doesn't have any value, therefore here I am providing you a way to skip my content." Then when players are allowed to ignore the world around them and simply speed past plains, swamps, and mountain ranges alike, there is much less of a need to populate the world with _anything_.

>

> This may work in games where the end goals was confined in a very specific niche of the game, such as raid instances like WoW, or hard-mode dungeons like TERA. Fact of the matter is, Guild Wars 2 was _never_ created around those kinds of content, especially considering the incentives for instanced content do not progress a character. This means that, after zooming past all the maps on all your characters... what then?

This is a very flawed argument. For one, you could make the exact same argument about waypoints and speedboosts, and it's a bad argument in either case. Nobody wants to make the same slow run over and over and over again, and developers shouldn't force you to have to.

Second, even in a world with waypoint travel, it's difficult to imagine that mountable animals exist and yet people would for some reason choose not to use them for traveling and would instead run to every destination as they cross a desert or a mountain. It makes no sense and is immersion breaking. Riding a mount through the countryside is far, far, far better for immersion than running slowly through it is. It doesn't matter if the horse "popped out of your pocket" - it's easy to accept that as a gameplay convention.

On top of all of that, they're a highly attractive collectible for a lot of people that play MMOs. It was pretty dumb to not have them to help fund the game from the beginning.

Yeah, there's no way 3 million players is accurate. I don't think WoW even has that many active players left, and WoW is definitely still more popular than GW2 by a large margin.

That said, I don't think Vayne is wrong, here - GW2 doesn't seem to be drowning either and all signs point to healthy stability with a decent if not exceptional future. It made 35 mil in Q4 of 2017, due in large part to sales for PoF. I'm curious to see the Q1 numbers, but I'm sure they'll be comparable to what preceded that launch at least. As the game grows in size and scope, it's likely it'll attract new players unless they make a lot of screw ups that betray the player base.

I think lack of good content is the main thing that's held GW2 back from the beginning, and it's still a problem even if it's less of a problem than before HoT. Both expansions have offered only a handful of zones with no new races, dungeons, weapon types, and only one new raid and a few new graphic models. Not a great track record, and the game still has a lot of catching up to do.

They'd probably be doing better overall if they'd gone with an expansion model from the beginning instead of wasting 3 years on LW updates of dubious quality that can't compete with the release of an expansion (very bad leadership move.) I think some of the issue is they had a lack of foresight in the game's development and designed it in a way that was difficult to scale, which is a very bad move for an MMO. The problem with new races is a perfect example of this. They sort of dug themselves into a corner.

I really think underwater combat is pretty great with two exceptions:

a.) too few usable skills - seems to be getting fixed.

b.) too much mob density - mob density needs to be significantly lower with 3d movement vs 2d. Pretty easy thing to fix.

So I think we should see the following new races with their own new story:

Tengu

Elonian Humans

Canthan Humans

Kodan

Dwarves

Skritt

Choya

Quaggan

Largos

In all seriousness, it wouldn't need to be as hard as it seems. They would just craft a new story around a new set of races in a new region. I actually think it's something the game needs.

> @"Raigai.4218" said:

> NPC's not resurrecting while standing right next to me, boss fights that are cheap & chaotic and occasionally in a very tight space so that you cannot see anything. Occasional story missions dragging on and on.. It's been nothing but frustration for me. The last boss fight in living story season 3 in episode 4 was godawful. Really forcing myself to do this. I guess I should probably just stop and watch the story from somewhere else because actually playing it is an unbelievable chore. And to think I actually paid for a few chapters too. Stupid of me.

Actually I always had the same experience of the PS and LW. It's not well done.

Yeah. There are some serious systemic problems with the game's balance that are bigger than "x ability is overtuned". It's really, really hard to understand what the dev team is thinking sometimes.

Conditions are (still) too prolific and do too much damage, as if Arenanet completely forgot the main purpose of conditions was to give you a way to ignore armor. The subsequent proliferation of immunity and resistance has restricted build depth, removed strategy, undermined the usefulness of vitality/toughness, and made the gameplay generally feel to twitchy.

Damage in general has continued to creep upward relative to passive defense, which just makes combat feel way too abrupt and bursty with little actual strategy involved. I don't know why they seem to think this is "fun". To some degree this even applies to PvE.

> @"Inculpatus cedo.9234" said:

> Well, the Devs (or more to the point, Josh) did state there would likely be no World 3. Thus, not surprising there is no World 3.

The fact that they said it doesn't make it any more okay, really. If they're going to have something in the game, they need to iterate on it. See dungeons, for example.

This is basically the exact same suggestion I made a few months back and is clearly the "right" way to do revenant.

I think that the non-legend should have 10-15 switchable utility skills, with each of the legends retaining their 5 fixed skills.

I think this is just one example of where we have an outdated gearing system, frankly. I think it's time Anet do some serious brainstorming on how to refresh the way gearing and attributes work.

I'd suggest adding flexibility to the system by making attribute combinations permanently unlockable rather than having to work hard for every individual gear piece. But I realize that's a major change. Still, I think it's time for something shake up the system.

> @"Ardenwolfe.8590" said:

> On a side note, mad props to Gaile for her and the moderation team's patience. Some of these comments would've got you insta-banned if I was in charge. :#

Which would most likely not be appropriate, unless you're talking about direct attacks and harassment of individuals in the thread or at Arenanet.

> @"Mewcifer.5198" said:

> > @"Einlanzer.1627" said:

> > > @"Mewcifer.5198" said:

> > > Comparing people to mass murderers is insulting because not only is it meant to try and shame the person you are talking about by comparing them to something horrible, but it also trivializes the people who lost their lives by comparing their deaths to getting a post removed on the forum.

> > >

> > > It is not helpful to the discussion at all. It causes strife and insult.

> > >

> > > And, in my eyes at least, it is a cheap trick to try and "win" a discussion by making the implication of "if you disagree with me you are agreeing with mass murderers" .

> >

> > You're the one who keeps equating N. Korea with mass murderers. I was just talking about excessive censorship. Your second sentence is also what we commonly call a strawman fallacy.

>

> If you really think what goes on these forums is equal to the amount of censorship that goes on in North Korea then you might need to do a little bit more research as to what happens in North Korea.

>

> Also, a government completely blocking off it's citizens ability to obtain information while simultaneously barring them from ever being able to leave is not even remotely close to having a few posts being removed from an online forum. The comparison is so wildly ridiculous that I am struggling to find the exact words to explain it. It goes beyond apples to oranges. You are comparing a system meant to oppress the entire lives of people while murdering those who attempt to escape it to having some posts removed on a forum.

>

None of this is pertinent to this discussion. You're being incredibly pedantic about a random off-handed remark that shouldn't have been taken that seriously. Presumably, it's because you're grasping at whatever you can to try to weaken my argument, which really isn't that effective.

> @"Mewcifer.5198" said:

> Comparing people to mass murderers is insulting because not only is it meant to try and shame the person you are talking about by comparing them to something horrible, but it also trivializes the people who lost their lives by comparing their deaths to getting a post removed on the forum.

>

> It is not helpful to the discussion at all. It causes strife and insult.

>

> And, in my eyes at least, it is a cheap trick to try and "win" a discussion by making the implication of "if you disagree with me you are agreeing with mass murderers" .

You're the one who keeps equating N. Korea with mass murderers. I was just talking about excessive censorship. Your last sentence is also what we commonly call a strawman fallacy.

> @"Randulf.7614" said:

> > @"Einlanzer.1627" said:

>

> > And, yes, the players do fund the boards. Literally. And yes, your company's customers pay for your website. Literally.

> >

> >

>

> This is 100% incorrect, but I wont derail any further by detailing the ins and outs of how and why it is incorrect. If Gaile wishes, she might elaborate on behalf of Anet, but it is without question, an untrue statement even though I can understand why this is believed to be the case.

No, it's 100% correct. If you're referring to the fact that companies build infrastructure around investments, that still only gets developed and maintained as a result of their market and their paying customers.