Recommendation: 'SSF' or an 'Ironman' gamemode.

[SummerRayne.4672]

I agree with others who say GW2 doesn't need a dedicated game mode like you are suggesting. Path of Exile and Guild Wars 2 are two very different types of games. Your suggestion fits a game like PoE, but a dedicated game mode like that wouldn't fit a game like GW2 in my opinion.

 

You could do something like Danikat suggested without introducing the game mode into GW2. Even WoW players who want a challenge and a change have a dedicated "Iron Man" challenge and community. There is a website with the rules and different ways to play the game to pose a challenge, where you can track your character, etc. They even have a couple dedicated guilds on a couple different servers. It's actually quite fun. I tried the Iron Man challenge in WoW a couple years ago because even though at the time I still liked the game, the leveling experience has been so watered down so much over the years that it's just mind numbingly boring to me.

 

People can make their own challenges in games like WoW and GW2. I really can't see a mode being added to this type of game fitting very well. This isn't Path of Exile or a Diablo type game.

[mindcircus.1506]

> @"Danikat.8537" said:

A lot of cool stuff

 

1. Your fashion wars is on point

2. You should start a thread for people to show off their fashion transmutes using only ingame earnable options. It might open some eyes and have the side benefit of letting people swap ideas. I think even veterans could benefit from this.

 

[Khisanth.2948]

> @"AliamRationem.5172" said:

> So, maybe I am not understanding, but what challenge does this add? It sounds like it would just force players to farm everything themselves from scratch. Even if you never were able to craft full ascended, exotic is more than enough to do everything in game except fractals.

>

> I haven't played much PoE, but it's a diablo clone so it has a gear treadmill. This mode is probably a lot more meaningful in a game like that. In this game I think it just adds a lot of pointless farming, but no actual difficulty.

 

Gear treadmill doesn't really apply to PoE but a major difference is PoE's temporary leagues. The majority of its players play in the temp leagues rather than the permanent ones. This means the majority of players restart all their characters around every 3 months anyway, SSF or no SSF.

 

In terms of account progression, unlockable cosmetics are retained but these come from either the cash shop or obtainable through completing temp league achievements/challenges. For everything else everyone restarts as an exile washed up on the beach full of undead.

 

> @"Danikat.8537" said:

> For what it's worth I disagree that most cosmetics are obtained just by grinding gold.

 

It is also a very weird argument considering how much of the cosmetic in PoE requires buying from the cash shop. Not a complaint since the two games uses different business models. If you want the majority of the cosmetic in either game it will probably end up costing you around the same but IMO it is much cheaper to get a decent looking GW2 character while spending far less.

 

For what its worth. At least part of the technology for implementing something like this already exist. It is used to implement beta characters.

 

That + restricting mail(this technology already exist as well for free account restrictions) + disabling the TP(this should be pretty easy as well)

 

The only thing missing from PoE's SSF is the ability migrate a SSF character back to their parent league at any time(the other direction is not allowed).

 

SSF in PoE also has its own separate ladder for comparing how far people managed to make it each league on their own.

 

Almost forgot another very important thing. SSF in PoE also started with players doing exactly the sort of things other people have already suggested in this thread. Players were doing it on their own without aid from the devs. It was only after seeing that there was enough people interested in it that it became an official thing.

[Trise.2865]

These already exist. It's called "having some kitten self-discipline". Free of charge, no special mode or code required.

[maddoctor.2738]

> @"lokh.2695" said:

> Since these threads pop up every week, I haven't bothered reading your wall of text. Sry m8.

>

> Am I right to assume that any suggestions made in the OP could be done by an individual alone, restricting him/herself by chosing lower tier gear or deleting a character should the toon die for example, thus limiting the use of ressources by not adding game modes or special instanced maps?

 

That's one part of the suggestion yes, the other part is to get easier access to Legendary items and high value cosmetics without the "Grind".

[Ben K.6238]

> @"Khisanth.2948" said:

> > @"AliamRationem.5172" said:

> > So, maybe I am not understanding, but what challenge does this add? It sounds like it would just force players to farm everything themselves from scratch. Even if you never were able to craft full ascended, exotic is more than enough to do everything in game except fractals.

> >

> > I haven't played much PoE, but it's a diablo clone so it has a gear treadmill. This mode is probably a lot more meaningful in a game like that. In this game I think it just adds a lot of pointless farming, but no actual difficulty.

>

> Gear treadmill doesn't really apply to PoE but a major difference is PoE's temporary leagues. The majority of its players play in the temp leagues rather than the permanent ones. This means the majority of players restart all their characters around every 3 months anyway, SSF or no SSF.

>

> In terms of account progression, unlockable cosmetics are retained but these come from either the cash shop or obtainable through completing temp league achievements/challenges. For everything else everyone restarts as an exile washed up on the beach full of undead.

 

PoE kiiind of does have a gear treadmill, particularly in SSF. That's actually the main reason I like SSF there, because you have to work for any power you get rather than buying it with currency. Trade leagues are a different story since you can just slum it until you farm enough chaos and exalts to fill out your build... or even just buy maps with them (eww).

 

But because GW2 is relatively flat progression-wise and the focus is on how you use your character traits and skills, not your gear, I don't feel that SSF would really mean anything in GW2. Even going for self-found cosmetics isn't much of a challenge since GW2's relatively light on arcane mechanics to work out, and no-one's ever died because they faced an endgame boss while insufficiently pretty.

 

There's one other issue I noticed regarding the OP:

 

> @"Edward.8904" said:

> ** For Casual players, SSF is awesome when framed right**. The suggestion seems as though it is aimed primarily at Veteran players, but I don’t believe this to be the case. For casual players, letting go of the economic base is very freeing and rewarding. It allows you to let go of multi-character | account management on daily rewards, puzzle rewards etc. which is becoming much more normal in GW2. In fact, the only reason I became invested in PoE was this very gamemode where I attained levels I never thought I would aim for because of it.

 

SSF is strictly harder than trade leagues in PoE, and I think the reason some people might find it liberating is it forces them to stop using trade as a crutch to skip parts of the game, and instead learn the intricacies of the game, and how to build a character that isn't so dependent on specific pieces of gear. The only way it can feel _easier_ than a trade league is if your focus on acquisition was undermining your character (like one of my friends who tried to start the game on a build requiring Atziri's Acuity and a Starforge).

 

GW2 doesn't really have anything comparable. You don't become a better player by eschewing the trading post, not least because you don't need particularly good gear to play the game well, and you can acquire a set of exotics in most stat combinations from NPC vendors very cheaply. As such, I don't believe SSF would be beneficial to novice GW2 players, or veterans for that matter.

[Danikat.8537]

> @"Ben K.6238" said:

> GW2 doesn't really have anything comparable. You don't become a better player by eschewing the trading post, not least because you don't need particularly good gear to play the game well, and you can acquire a set of exotics in most stat combinations from NPC vendors very cheaply. As such, I don't believe SSF would be beneficial to novice GW2 players, or veterans for that matter.

 

I think that's what confused me about the OP's post at first. I've never played Path of Exile but I know some GW2 players do make a point of regularly buying a set of gear with matching stats from the TP as they're levelling up and sometimes question whether it's possible to level a character relying entirely on drops. So I was thinking of it in that context and while I know it's a novelty for some people to play that way and I imagine it does require some adjustment I doubt anyone would consider it a challenge mode.

 

For me it's actually the normal way to play. I started off just using drops because I didn't have a clue what to choose, then it seemed to work well enough and it let me save gold for other stuff so I kept doing it. I only buy equipment once the character gets to level 80, and that could be from the TP or from NPC merchants (like the karma vendors in Orr), whatever gets me the right stats most easily/cheaply.

 

(Incidentally my brain apparently cannot cope with seeing PoE as different to PoF. Every time someone talks about PoE having whatever I think "I don't remember that in Path of Fire".)

 

[lokh.2695]

> @"maddoctor.2738" said:

> > @"lokh.2695" said:

> > Since these threads pop up every week, I haven't bothered reading your wall of text. Sry m8.

> >

> > Am I right to assume that any suggestions made in the OP could be done by an individual alone, restricting him/herself by chosing lower tier gear or deleting a character should the toon die for example, thus limiting the use of ressources by not adding game modes or special instanced maps?

>

> That's one part of the suggestion yes, the other part is to get easier access to Legendary items and high value cosmetics without the "Grind".

 

Sure, I always forget that with "muh ironman mode" always comes "better/easier rewards for me plox". Should have known better.

[AliamRationem.5172]

> @"lokh.2695" said:

> > @"maddoctor.2738" said:

> > > @"lokh.2695" said:

> > > Since these threads pop up every week, I haven't bothered reading your wall of text. Sry m8.

> > >

> > > Am I right to assume that any suggestions made in the OP could be done by an individual alone, restricting him/herself by chosing lower tier gear or deleting a character should the toon die for example, thus limiting the use of ressources by not adding game modes or special instanced maps?

> >

> > That's one part of the suggestion yes, the other part is to get easier access to Legendary items and high value cosmetics without the "Grind".

>

> Sure, I always forget that with "muh ironman mode" always comes "better/easier rewards for me plox". Should have known better.

 

I've been wasting my time soloing bosses! I should be getting more Eternity drops for this!