Make up your mind Arenanet

[DoomNexus.5324]

Guild Wars 2 does not really stand out in any aspect on the MMO market and it's kinda sad. I just want to know what you guys are thinking about what I have to say, there's no hate, I don't even want to make suggestions what Anet should do or not, I just want to tell my opinion about the state of the game and if there are at least some that agree or if I'm delusional here. So.. No need to get aggressive in here.

 

PvE is vastly outperformed by FF14 and WoW for example and I think that's pretty much all I have to say. If you are serious about PvE and progression then there's simply no way Anet could catch up and offer a great alternative. Maybe some side content between major patches/expacs of said games but other than that I think good PvE is pretty much non-existent in GW2. I'm not saying we don't have a lot of PvE-only players or that there's 0 PvE content but Anet doesn't particularly focus on delivering content to sustain a PvE community. I mean, almost everyone plays PvE, even competitive players sometimes need to relax and do some fractals, open world farms, maybe even raids,.. but you simply can't argue that GW2 is nowhere near the quality and quantity other mmos provide and I'd even go as far and say that GW1 had and to this day still has better PvE content than GW2.

 

Now competitive modes are a bit tricky since no MMO has been really "good" at it in the past decade or so. Guild Wars 1 had amazing PvP and while some players are still organizing large player groups to play together at specific times pvp in this game is unfortunately pretty much dead.

There are some contenders for competitive modes however. For both sPvP and WvW there's probably first and foremost ESO and BDO.

BDO lacks a good game mode for small scale fights however so I kinda don't really consider it a contender in small scale content but I know that a lot of people are dueling in arenas, running around PK'ing (as "pvp content"..) or fighting in RBF and stuff soo.. Also it's a huge grindfest (has been improved tho) and large scale content is not really viable for (semi-)casuals so it's probably not really a good example in the eyes of the gw2 community but well.. it's there and it's popular for those who enjoy and are able to invest a lot of time.

ESO on the other hand is hands down better in every way when it comes to competitive content by design. The sPvP is way more balanced, Battlegrounds are imo (or at least used to be until they made it solo only - haven't played much since then but removing full team COMPLETELY is always a bad move) vastly more enjoyable due to the design with relatively speaking a lot of pvp modes to choose from (5 to be exact, if you own the dlcs), Imperial City as a PvEvP mode is also decent..

I can't say too much about Cyrodiil since I haven't played it much, but from what I can tell it's a lot better structured than WvW.. Don't quote me on that tho.. A lot of people are enjoying the game mode but have their issues too. But that's also not the point, the point is that WvW in gw2 is not unique in a modern mmo and if you want an alternative then you can get it.

Not to mention that these are just some examples, there are also other games offering similar features.

Not everybody likes any of the games mentioned above and that's ok, I don't like most of them or at least aspects of them either. But this should not be a "Look at dis game, it's so much better- Anet please make GW2 like [insert other mmo]" to begin with. It's a fact that a lot of people quit gw2 to play some games mentioned previously for said reasons.

I enjoy the combat system and class designs in Gw2 A LOT more tho, hence why I'm not playing ESO and talking about the state of the game on their forums (I simply don't really care, unlike for gw2) but.. It just shows that GW2 doesn't have any uniqueness or edge over any other game. Nor have others over gw2 btw, they are just as lazy as Anet in some areas (at least competitive modes), however it's kinda obvious that Anet doesn't really deliver in _any_ game mode sooo...

 

The only thing GW2 can bring to the table is Living Story and the story itself, however I think it's super boring and I would bet quite a bit of money that if Anet made LS episodes b2p from the moment they released only a few percent of the playerbase would consider buying them for the story. If it offers a good farm map, maybe, but for the story? probably only a handful of people. But monetization is a whole other topic I don't want to get into with this thread.

Now don't get me wrong, there are plenty reasons to stick with gw2 like the casual friendly non-existence of gear progression or that everything is "kinda enjoyable" to a reasonable extent or for a limited amount of time. But is this really what GW2 should be? A kinda enjoyable gap filler for releases in other mmos/games? Idk.

 

Soo... I'd love to see Anet make up their mind and settle on something they want their game to identify. Something they can really invest their resources in and capture a larger audience. I'm not even saying "focus on that one thing and nothing else".. Maybe ditch Living Story entirely and focus on _Something_.. Idc, I'm a PvP player so I'd obviously prefer PvP but even if Anet decided to go with Raid and Fractals then I'd be ok with it. As long as they don't add some new "mode" like Strikes, DRM, ... only to let them die in the next patch by introducing some new flashy mode nobody cares for since there won't be any variety.

 

So I'd like to read your thoughts about whether or not you think Anet should settle on some existing features, if yes which one, or if they should just continue experimenting with new forms of content, continue the Living Story cycle, etc..

Just please don't make comments like "that's not going to happen because X" - Yes.. I know.. I know nothing will improve, it's Anet and GW2 we are talking about. If they wanted to please their game community then they could've done so somewhere along those last 8 years. But they continue to fail, it's nothing new. And yes, Anet apparently makes enough money to justify their path they're going with the game but that's also not the topic. I'd just like to hear in which direction the game should head during the next couple years, not what direction is likely to be.

I for example would wish for Anet to bring back Fort Aspenwood and Jade Quarry in EoD. It would be a perfect fit since those were introduced in the Cantha expansion back in GW1 as well. Maybe give us an additional Eternal Battleground-style map and the Alliance update _eventually_.

[HotDelirium.7984]

Players voting and helping to come up with actual content was one of the coolest moments from this company. But thats just 2 our of 8 years. If they brought out more of this interaction it would create so much fanfare.

[Infusion.7149]

Three things:

 

1. There is recruitment for a **WVW** dev , but likely most people on here that complain constantly are not even remotely qualified. I'd say WvW is the most unique part and a wasted asset on their part but at the same time the server demands are most likely higher. The New World hype for example proved to be a failure before it even launched. If Arenanet can deliver on Alliances or a better form of team balancing it would probably be a highlight to new players. As a former GW1 player , I would say that this upcoming EOD expansion could be their GW1 Factions competitive focused expansion.

 

2. The esports thing for **PVP** was a failed endeavor and there has been reports that most of the ladder is match manipulating in some fashion whether queue dodging, queuing offhours with a top 50 duo Q , etc. At the bottom, rampant ragequitting and botting. Monthly Automated tournaments are better in this regard but suffer somewhat due to this ; unranked matchmaking could still use work but the stakes are low so it is not an utmost priority. Having equalized stats and instant readiness via amulets (even if you just made the character 10 minutes ago) is healthier for an esport-type competitive game

--- I'd disagree on having "more PVP modes" as they would likely need to be in rotation. The uptake on stronghold is rather low once people finished the achievements there ; deathmatch has its own balancing issues. More PvP modes fragments an already dwindling playerbase in that mode.

 

3. The **PVE** living story formula works for their business model, like it or not. It is far more profitable to churn out living story than to push out instanced content that a small minority of players per use. People that play heavily only when living story episodes come out and then remain dormant provide less strain on their server infrastructure which is on AWS. AWS charges based on activity and this is a sub-free game.

--- There's also a lack of equality in many MMOs in terms of aesthetic and options, GW2 does rather well in this regard with a few exceptions (starter light armor :# ).

 

 

---

 

Some other observations:

 

The skills engine and the entire skill system seemingly was designed with 5 players in mind so we have skill scaling issues both in WvW and in PVE maps. To top it off , raids and strikes basically show the difference between 5 man content (story instances, fractals, DRMs) and the 10 man buffs factor. Even though it is twice the players the time to form a group is exponentially higher as well unless it is something extremely easy and a daily (see Shiverpeak Pass).

 

I would also add that the lack of vertical progression that keeps players on an even footing gear-wise is healthier than a constant level and gear grind , even more so for PVP game modes. I was one of the people that was against ascended when it first came out in this game, actually. BDO preys on players in this fashion , the grass is _not_ greener on the other side unless you want to treat a game as if it is a job. By far the most popular games regardless of genre are those that require less time commitment to be relevant even if player mastery (as opposed to arbitrary things such as exp) is not attained (see FPS, MOBAs, RTS, action games, racing games, etc ... even games that aren't exclusively digital such as chess).

 

The biggest obstacle to the improvement of WvW from the technical side is multi-threading the engine and overall engine performance (including network side) with 50+ players in one area.

[Crono.4197]

Everything you said is subjective, especially the PVE part.

 

PVE: I like it because it's EXACTLY different from how other MMOs do it. I don't wanna farm my brains out for 3 months to get max gear, then get new gear and have to farm my brains out again and so on, like it is in other MMOs. Same with level cap. I'm fine increasing masteries instead of new max level every expansion. You want the game to be another grind fest full of elitism and toxicity like WoW/TERA/*insert any other dungeon/grear based MMO*? If Guild Wars 2 also had these, I wouldn't even play it. We already have Raids (which I personally think were a mistake because they brought toxicity to the game), which I never touch because of how toxic people doing those are. It's more than enough.

You said that the game has no PvE content. I kind of disagree, because I always find things to do in-game, even if we ignore dungeons and such, there are still so many stuff to do.

We have a few raids, a few strikes, a few DRMs, content for every type of person. Also, what exactly is "abandoned content" for you? They'll probably add a new raid at one point, maybe even a new strike, but I feel like people want them to add a new one every month. I don't see how people would be able to do that many raids, it would be an overkill. The only games that add new raids every 1-2-3 months are the ones that are gear focused. Is this game gear focused? No, so that kind of drops the point of having a Raid spamfest.

 

PvP: The game has several PvP modes, I don't see where the problem is. Sure, a new PvP mode every 2-3 years or so would've been nice, but oh well. They could improve a bit here.

 

WvW: A new WvW map would be welcome, but that's about it. More than that I cannot comment since I don't do WvW that much (I join maybe a few times per year).

 

Most of the complaints on the forums are how Guild Wars 2 isn't like other MMOs where you constantly grind for level and gear. This maybe just means the game isn't for you. That doesn't mean the whole community agrees. Arena Net has their own vision of the game (it's their game after all) and the game mostly caters to casual people instead of people who prefer hard content and constant gear farming. I mostly like the game the way it is.

[maddoctor.2738]

> @"DoomNexus.5324" said:

> Guild Wars 2 does not really stand out in any aspect on the MMO market and it's kinda sad.

 

I think the tab target + action combat is rather unique in Guild Wars 2. The event system is (was?) unique although many mmorpgs are copying it nowadays. Not having to grind for higher level caps, the build system, picking your skills, weapons defining your skills, weapon swapping are also not features you see in every game. Gliding and the excellent mounts are also not seen in most games in the market. Sure if you want to see what's unique in GW2 compared to every game out there you might be hard pressed to find anything, that's true for every other game as well.

 

> PvE is vastly outperformed by FF14 and WoW for example and I think that's pretty much all I have to say.

 

Well I dislike the PVE in WOW and find it garbage, always chasing the next big carrot on a stick to improve your stats. Always becoming invalidated with each expansion. yawn. And let's not talk about the atrocious combat of WOW. So no GW2 isn't outperformed by WOW, not even close, it's of course your opinion if you think it does, if you are into constant gear progression and endless gear treadmills and boring combat, that's up to you.

[DoomNexus.5324]

> @"Crono.4197" said:

> Everything you said is subjective, especially the PVE part.

> You said that the game has no PvE content. I kind of disagree, because I always find things to do in-game, even if we ignore dungeons and such, there are still so many stuff to do.

I hope you don't mean my initial comment? Since I didn't say that.

> @"DoomNexus.5324" said:

> I'm not saying (...) there's 0 PvE content (...).

Also the stuff regarding horizontal progression.. Yea, I also like not being forced to farm shit every couple months, that's also a huge factor why I keep coming back to gw2.

I don't think the PvE part is _bad_, I like that it's non-standard and doesn't force me to do anything. But you simply can't deny that Anet doesn't particularly focus on delivering content, which was my whole point.

 

> @"maddoctor.2738" said:

So no GW2 isn't outperformed by WOW, not even close, it's of course your opinion if you think it does, if you are into constant gear progression and endless gear treadmills and boring combat, that's up to you.

 

Also no, that's not _my_ opinion, like I also said in my initial comment. I don't like or prefer the games mentioned in my post so I don't like FF14 nor WoW, but I know that a ton of people are leaving for either of those game for their PvE aspects. See my quote below.

> @"DoomNexus.5324" said:

> Not everybody likes any of the games mentioned above and that's ok, I don't like most of them or at least aspects of them either. But this should not be a "Look at dis game, it's so much better- Anet please make GW2 like [insert other mmo]" to begin with. It's a fact that a lot of people quit gw2 to play some games mentioned previously for said reasons.

 

[Ben K.6238]

The aspects in which it stands out are the feel of the combat system and the quality of the mounts.

[maddoctor.2738]

> @"DoomNexus.5324" said:

> Also no, that's not _my_ opinion, like I also said in my initial comment. I don't like or prefer the games mentioned in my post so I don't like FF14 nor WoW, but I know that a ton of people are leaving for either of those game for their PvE aspects.

 

You said that

> PvE is vastly outperformed by FF14 and WoW for example and I think that's pretty much all I have to say.

 

Funnily enough even though you added that's all you had to say, you proceeded to say more.

 

Also, and many players stay with Guild Wars 2 for its PVE aspects, and players are leaving WOW and FF14 for the PVE of GW2, that's how gaming works and always did.

[Astralporing.1957]

> @"DoomNexus.5324" said:

> PvE is vastly outperformed by FF14 and WoW for example and I think that's pretty much all I have to say.

Because if you said something more, you would realize it's not as clearcut as you make it seem.

 

> If you are serious about PvE and progression then there's simply no way Anet could catch up and offer a great alternative.

...and you basically said it in the next sentence. Yes. FF XIV vastly outperforms GW2. In the _instanced content and high-end endgame category_, that is. As far as open world though, it's exactly the opposite - here, GW2 has basically no competition on the MMORG market whatsoever.

 

And of course any MMORPG outperforms GW2 as far as progression goes - that's because GW2 is _not a progression game_. Although, notice how you can reverse that statement, and say that in this it outperforms any game thar _is_ progression-based. That's because progression is not inherently better for some reason than non-progression. These are _equal_ choices, that appeal to different people.

 

That's exactly the aspect where Guild Wars 2 _does_ stand out on the MMO market. It's basically the only game on the market that is aimed at casual to semi-casual crowd that doesn't want to constantly run in hamster wheels. If that is the experience you want, you have _nowhere_ else to go.

 

[mercury ranique.2170]

I think Arenanet does a great job in defining the game AND you also named why.

The two games you mention that are outstanding in PvE (I disagree by the way!) are games with a monthly fee.

Arenanet defines the game in actually not doing that. They do not charge you monthly fees and they do not depend on you paying them. The result is that they do not give you so many incentives to keep playing as those games do. But they still deliver a good amount of PvE content. GW2 is most of all a pve orientated game. But PvE is more then raids and releasing new content each few weeks. GW2 is much more designed as a sandbox game where you can spend your time in any way you like and how often you would like. That it might not keep you entertained 24/7 is something that to me is much healthier.

The same goes with other game modes. They offer variety. I know a lot of people who enjou PvE and PvP and WvW. To be honest, there is nothing wrong with that. It contributes to a sandbox where you decide what you should do.

[Zephire.8049]

I find it strange that you say GW2 "doesn't have any uniqueness or edge" over other MMOs but then talk about ways that GW2 could adopt systems, mimic, or outright copy game designs from other MMOs.

 

Not every game appeals to everyone and GW2 was never intended to appeal to the traditional MMO player who wants to grind for gear and forever have a carrot they need to chase, it was designed to appeal to players who _don't_ like that. In doing so, it was appealing to adults who have other commitments in their lives so they don't have time to grind dungeons/raids for hours a week every week and who don't want to be punished if they're not able to play regularly. That combined with it being buy-to-play and letting players buy premium currency with gold (both being a big deal when GW2 came out) is why GW2 stood out for _me_ in the first place and still does.

 

I quit WoW and FFXIV couldn't hold my interest. I pre-ordered RIFT but ended up forgetting about it after a month or two. I've lost track of all the other MMOs I've played over the years but there's one that's been a constant: GW2. I have taken hiatuses before but the nice thing about GW2 is that it was designed for that in mind (iirc in one of the development videos before release, it was stated that they only want players to keep playing if they find it fun, not because they have to keep up on a grind or something) so not having to worry about gear scaling alone is a reason why I've picked up GW2 again rather than dropping it completely.

 

No hate at you or how you've presented this, but so much of it is subjective and treats gamers as a monolith instead of a very diverse group who have different interests and varying amounts of time they can allocate to gaming. It's an easy trap to fall into and one of the reasons why so many games from the MMO boom post-WoW have had to change to free-to-play, have low populations (or both), or have shut down the servers entirely. Yet GW2 is over 8 years old now and still going steady without completely changing up their financial model. This despite the hiccups and failures of leadership that negatively affected players, the lack of QoL features players have been asking for for years, and the utter lack of communication.

 

If GW2 offered nothing special or different compared to other MMOs, why would so many people have stuck around through all that?

 

But to break down your list, I'll go point by point. Not to prove you wrong—you are welcome to your opinion and aren't wrong for not being into these game designs—but to give you an idea of why myself and others like what you consider mediocre.

 

> PvE is vastly outperformed by FF14 and WoW

Subjective. When I played WoW, I didn't have any desire to do things in the open world unless there was a specific reason to. I don't find the combat or graphics particularly special and anything but the current content wasn't useful so there was no point doing things outside of the latest expansion area. Dungeons got repetitive but were required to gear up or try for an RNG drop and raids were once a week and even then got boring after half a dozen runs.

 

FFXIV kept me for a month, maybe two, before I couldn't stand it. I don't care if the end-game is great when a game requires you to spend so many hours grinding levels before you get a hint of what people rave about. Especially when you have to pay for that "privilege".

 

I vastly prefer the PvE in GW2 which is why I've 100%'d core Tyria, HoT, LW3-4, and IBS 30+ times. PoF sucks though but thankfully it's not forced on you outside a handful of things. There are issues in how the LFG needs an overhaul, dungeons a revamp of some sort, and raids... raids and its community are something and that's a whole other topic but to keep it short, I did wings 1-4, some of 5 and 6, and that's it not because I don't like the raids themselves but other things about them.

 

> Progression

The lack of numbers progression is great. Some people want/need the vertical progression but the visual progression is far more appealing to me and something I do take seriously. Countless hours and thousands of gold have gone into it, something I can't say about other MMOs that have vertical progression. For Anet to "catch up" they would have to completely change a fundamental design of GW2 and something that was central to GW1 as well.

 

> I think good PvE is pretty much non-existent in GW2

> ... but Anet doesn't particularly focus on delivering content to sustain a PvE community.

There's a content patch every 2-4 months for PvE. You may not like it either for the writing or how it's bite-sized, but it happens far more often with GW2 than a lot of other MMOs that go 6+ months between content patches. Would I like it if every 2 months there was enough content to drop that would take weeks to go through? Absolutely, but that's not realistic and would be unhealthy for the devs to do so. There has been (and currently is) and issue about the lack of content and especially the lack of communication, but PvE content has been dropping every 2-4 months since LW3 and nearly each time with a brand new map and new metas.

 

> GW2 is nowhere near the quality and quantity other mmos

Purely subjective and you have to look at how _active_ other MMOs are on non-current content/maps. I map complete a lot and at off-hours for NA yet there's almost always others around, especially post-Covid. New players for sure, but also older players since <80 maps aren't invalidated and there are reasons for people to be on HoT, PoF, and LW3-4 maps even though they're technically old content at this point.

 

To me that's both quality and quantity and the size of your game doesn't matter if non-new players only hang out in 5% of it.

 

> Competitive stuff

Not my forte so won't speak on that.

 

> The only thing GW2 can bring to the table is Living Story and the story itself, however I think it's super boring

You're applying what you like to everyone again. The story is definitely polarizing but I personally enjoy it. It's not perfect or anything like that (I could write a massive post on the technical flaws alone), but I don't expect a single-player RPG story in an MMO. I also prefer the bite-sized additions in the form of LW episodes over having to wait 6-12 months for a patch before the story continues, especially when the story is locked behind dungeons or raids. Waiting for an expansion is even worse.

 

> I would bet quite a bit of money that if Anet made LS episodes b2p from the moment they released only a few percent of the playerbase would consider buying them for the story.

But that's not the case and it was likely a deliberate choice not to put a financial barrier up between episodes unless you don't log in for 5 seconds every 2-4 months or weren't even playing the game at the time. There should definitely be a review of the sale of LW seasons for new players, but saying people wouldn't buy something when the company knew people weren't likely to buy something thus made it free (for a time) is kind of redundant. If someone offers me free pie, even if it's not amazing, it's still free. Maybe I would buy it because it sounded interesting or because I liked the person, maybe I wouldn't, but at the end of the day it was still free and unless the person asks for my feedback, it's just idle speculation about if/how much I'd pay for something I got for free.

 

> But is this really what GW2 should be? A kinda enjoyable gap filler for releases in other mmos/games?

Considering that was one of the main ideas behind GW2, yes. It wasn't designed to take up your entire time gaming, it was designed so you could play however much you wanted, play or do something else for weeks/months/years, then come back without having to worry about being behind on gear or levels.

 

> I'd love to see Anet make up their mind and settle on something they want their game to identify.

GW2 is an accessible MMO aimed more at people with limited amounts of time than people who can spend hours a day every day on a game. That has always been its identity and is one of the reasons why when they went back on that (raids) it created a ton of issues that they were reluctant to talk about and still refuse to talk about in some cases. Even fractals can be done in short bursts even though they're end-game content.

 

> I'm a PvP player

That definitely explains some of all this. I'm not saying that in a mean way, just that people who prefer/stick with one gamemode tend to not be the best judge on why others prefer other modes.

 

As for things I think they should change/focus on:

* Communication

 

I honestly wouldn't care nearly as much about things or get frustrated if Anet simply communicated what they were doing or why they made various choices. Lack of communication is the most likely reason I'll drop GW2 if/when I do. Not issues with the story, not scrapped content, not the spaghetti engine, but the simple lack of letting players know what to expect and that they are listening to player feedback.

 

- If they're no longer going to work on raids, tell players that.

- If DRMs are going to be the new thing, tell players that.

- If strikes are going to going to be scrapped, tell players that.

- Tell players how WvW alliances is going.

- Inform players that there's not going to be a Q4 balance patch because of EoD.

- If players need to hang onto items for months before they can use them, make it clear that's the case.

 

Honestly the list goes on and on and you probably get the picture. I don't PvP and only casually WvW so I'm coming at it from a primarily PvE point of view, but I'd be fine with how things are going if there was clear and constant communication about what was going on (an off-hand comment in a dev chat is not meaningful communication) and it would be far easier to offer feedback if it was known what was going on and what the plan is. The latest IBS episode really made it clear how bad they're at communicating and everyone I talked to about it stated that they would have been fine with the episode being cut in half and stopping suddenly if they had been told that would be the case. And I imagine PvP would also improve if they talked about what was in the works, trends they've noticed, and acknowledging hackers are an issue and that they're working on something in regard to that.

 

I just can't get concerned about a game's perceived identity or niche when the studio operates in radio silence despite its one current game being an MMO (AKA a "live service game") and it's hard to offer feedback when a studio doesn't even tell players what it's doing outside a vague quarterly roadmap and player feedback is rarely ever acknowledged so players are flying blind with what happens each content patch.

 

(Some PvE mount skins would also be nice, just throwing that out there since mounts are a big thing now but the base skins are so limited. It seems strange to not have some PvE-exclusive skins for rewards and to entice people to buy more from the store.)

[Dawdler.8521]

> @"HotDelirium.7984" said:

> Players voting and helping to come up with actual content was one of the coolest moments from this company. But thats just 2 our of 8 years. If they brought out more of this interaction it would create so much fanfare.

I particularly like that moment when the WvW community nearly killed WvW because of Anets diffuse voting scheme with the veiled promise of more content if the outcome was "positive". But luckily we avoided disaster on a narrow margin by keeping 1 DBL and 2 ABL. Otherwise we would have had 3 DBL half the year and 3 ABL the other half.

 

The few of us that was sane actually voted to remove DBL prior to what we saw was about to happen. Even if I like DBL and happily play on it, I will never regret making that choice.

 

Oh and the content, we never got that.

 

[Fipmip.7219]

Guild wars is excellent to come back to and play around with the new stuff for a couple of months, then drop out agian. Having an MMO option that welcomes you back with open arms whenever you wish is a corner of the market that I think GW2 comfortably occupies, and I see no need to change that. I'd like to see your thoughts on what exactly it is that elevates ff14's PvE against guild wars.

[AshkyLicious.4729]

I'd never want Guild Wars 2 to become another FF14 or WOW!

and I think GW2 has tons of unique attributes which makes it stand out from the rest of the mmos on the market. So dont really know how much more "identity" the game needs?..

 

I respect your arguments but I totally disagree with you in every part.

 

Yeah there's always room for improvement in every mode (PvE, PvP, WvW), but that doesnt mean that it needs to be more like the generic type of mmos out there.

 

And hey! Other mmos has been copying GW2, that to me is proof that Anet is doing something right with their game.

 

 

[Danikat.8537]

I think GW2 already has it's unique identity, and I actually think you highlighted it in your post, whether you realise it or not. Unlike the other MMOs you mentioned (and other ones I'm aware of) this game focuses on open-world PvE and storylines and minimal character progression once you've levelled up, which makes it appealing to people who enjoy those things.

 

I like the living story updates - I look forward to playing the new storylines and finding out what happens and I'm often very curious about how things are going to work out both in the short term and in the long term (I don't know if all those concerns will ever be addressed, some might not actually be relevant, but speculating on it is interesting). I like exploring the maps too and sometimes doing the achievements and collections when I get around to it.

 

But I also like that this game is _not_ a big commitment. Like most people I have a life outside the game, a job, family and other hobbies so I'm not looking for something which can take up the majority of my free time and demand I play on a regular basis just to keep up with everyone else. I like that I can stop playing GW2 whenever I want or need to and then come back to it, knowing the worst that will happen is I'll need to pay for living story episodes if I missed unlocking them. And no that's not because it's a "filler" game in between my other MMOs. The only other MMO I play is Elder Scrolls Online and I spend far less time on it than this game. (I don't dislike it, but the only thing it has going for it is the Elder Scrolls setting.) Until I discovered GW1 I had assumed MMOs just weren't for me, precisely because so many of them demand so much time.

 

I like that once I get a character to level 80 I can quickly and cheaply buy or craft them some exotics and then any other progression is optional. It gives me more time to focus on things I enjoy playing rather than ticking things off an endless list of tasks required to be allowed to play other parts of the game. To me that's a big part of this game's identity - what sets it apart from other MMOs and means I've chosen to play this one instead of them.

 

As you mentioned the profession and combat system is also pretty different to other MMOs.

[Veprovina.4876]

How are people complaining about content in GW2, i mean seriously?

 

This game has **tons** of content. I've been playin on and off for years since the game came out and since then, we got a **huge** amount of content, and i still haven't seen half of it. Why do people feel the need to pressure companies for more content ever week? That's not sustainable and i'd rather have them put out quality content with long periods of nothing than garbage content every month or so. Cause that's what you get if a company puts out new content too often. Maybe don't plow through the content as its released and you'll have things to do. And even if you do plow through it - there's still things to do in any given content, the problem is - you're bored with the game because of yourself, not because there's no content or lack of content. You're bored for any number of reasons, and that's ok, nothing wrong with that, take a break and decompress, return when you get an interest again but asking for more content because you're bored with it when in reality, most people haven't seen half of it is disingenuous at best. There's nothing wrong with the content in the game. There's plenty of it, and a lot of it stands out from other MMOs as well. It's just that people have played a long time and they don't see it anymore because they take it for granted. Take Fractals for example. I'm not going to pretend to know what every MMO offers, but Fractals and the Agony mechanic is not only i think pretty unique, but also works within the game's own context of gear progression (as you need ascended and then progress by making infusions). You have Raids now (which i think was a mistake but whatever). DRMs, Strikes... **None** of that was present before HoT where Raids were introduced. New Living world every so often, new elites, new collections that are like little side stories for you to explore, and you get good rewards for doing them... I mean jumping puzzles alone are pretty unique for the game, and it has the best mounts **period** in any game to date. You can't say this game is lacking in content or that the content is bad... If you're bored with it, then you're bored with it, but it's not Anet's job to pander to bored people that have done it all and now ask for content constantly because there's so much more people that haven't done most of it. This will especially be true once the Steam version is released and there's an influx of new players.

 

Also, i feel like when people talk about PvE they *only* talk about Raids and Fractals. There's so much more to the game than this, and if you only play one type of content, of course you'll get burned out. But GW2 is and always was designed like a playground with you doing whatever you want across the world. It doesn't force you to do anything, and it doesn't condemn you for not playing it for periods of time like other MMOs do. This is partly because there's nothing to gain from constantly pressuring players into a gear race or simmilar because there's no monthly subscription fees. Overall, i think of GW2 as a "mmo that doesn't kill babies for a quick buck" type fo thing, as people aren't forced to constantly keep up so that companies could leech them for a subscription.

 

The rest i beg to differ. I play GW2 **because** it's different from other MMOs. I play because when i get ascended, i'm done (except legendary but that's just convenience). Because i know that no matter what they release, i won't have to grind again. That i can just jump in and play. I play WvW because (despite glaring engine issues) is one of the most fun modes mostly due to how the combat works. I don't want to play WOW or ESO or BDO or whatever and constantly have to "chase the carrot on a stick" to catch up to everybody. Then do "content" with garbage game and combat mechanics like WOW has. That game is popular because of the nostalgia and because people have dead babies on their conscience because of playing it so much when it came out, not because it still holds up today. So comparing anything to WOW is irrelevant. It'll always be popular because it "invented" MMOs (it didn't but rather popularized them but whatever - people will always argue that WOW invented that). It's popular because the MMO thing was new-ish back then, at least on that scale, and people invested tons of time in it, got friends, etc., in it and are now playing it for nostalgia alone. The game mechanically was garbage back then, and still is now. I tried playing it but it was so bad that i couldn't stand it and never understood why people liked it in the first place.

 

One of the biggest wins for Guild Wars 2 is how the gear works. I've been on a hiatus for years, but when i came back, i didn't have to bend over backwards to catch up to everyone, i just took my ascended, spent a few gold to change my build and i'm done. I'm at everyone elses gear level - if not above since some people don't even have ascended yet which is also fine because they don't need it. That's the beauty of GW2. In my eyes - that stands out a **lot** from other MMOs. I love the fact that, if i get bored and stop playing for a while, then return when something new gets released, i won't be behind people who kept plaiyng and grinded max new gear in a day. I'll just maybe change my stats and that's it, but in most cases if you're running something like Berserker's there's no need to do even that.

 

I feel like what you're asking for is for GW2 to be like other MMOs. The point of GW2 is to NOT be like others. And if you want what every other MMO offers, then just play those, no one will have hard feelings about it, not every game is for everyone and that's ok. But wanting this game to change because you want what other MMOs have in this game doesn't make sense.

 

As for competitive modes, WvW is pretty healthy on most servers despite what people on the forums say. Most people on the forums are just negative, while people who do enjoy it, don't come to the forums at all most of the time so you get a skewed vision of what people actually think. I think it's fine. It **could** do with some more love, and since they're hiring now for it, i think it will, but hey, even WvW got gliding and mounts, new map, exclusive legendary etc., so it's not like they're doing nothing for it. They're just not doing maybe "enough" compared to other modes. We'll see if that changes.

 

I don't play PvP so i can't comment on it, i'll take your word for it.

 

In the end, i think the game is doing fine, and that it shouldn't change to follow other MMOs fads and trends. After all, most others stole their shtick from GW2 anyway.

 

And this is just my opinion, not a criticism or anything OP, you have your opinions and i have mine and that's fine, i respect your opinion on things, i just happen to disagree mostly. :smile:

[CashCow.9548]

> @"Veprovina.4876" said:

> How are people complaining about content in GW2, i mean seriously?

>

> This game has **tons** of content.

 

I don't think OP was complaining about the lack of content but rather the lack of game's identity overall. GW2 has alot of stuff to do but it doesen't excel in any of those. PvE truly is a joke in this game. Open world PvE is just press "W" to move forward and "1" for auto attacks. This game has no challenge.

 

PvP is long forgotten by the devs. We're lucky to get balance patches here and there. Personally I think WvW is still very fun despite being completly unchanged since the game's introduction.

 

But I disagree with OP when they say GW2 has no identity. GW2 has identity and they sure know it, they just don't like it.

And that is that GW2 is a casual game that will never be your main game, but rather just something you play on the background whilst playing other games or something you touch a couple of times in a year (usually with new living world patches) just to disappear again for the next 3 months.

 

And I think it's good that MMO genre has one of those casual games in the roster.

[Obtena.7952]

Lots of overthinking here and there is a chicken egg thing going on ... Anet implements a concept for a game, certain features, certain business model, etc ... and the WHOLE combination of those things has made it successful. GW2 does or doesn't have something? Sure, but that doesn't matter ... fundamentally, it's a product line in a business and it's successful. Maybe some of those things it doesn't have lends to that success. Feels like this thread is just another one of those "_game doesn't do what I want_" complaints in the unrealistic hope Anet gets 'enlightened' and fixes it.

[Veprovina.4876]

> @"CashCow.9548" said:

> > @"Veprovina.4876" said:

> > How are people complaining about content in GW2, i mean seriously?

> >

> > This game has **tons** of content.

>

> I don't think OP was complaining about the lack of content but rather the lack of game's identity overall. GW2 has alot of stuff to do but it doesen't excel in any of those. PvE truly is a joke in this game. Open world PvE is just press "W" to move forward and "1" for auto attacks. This game has no challenge.

>

> PvP is long forgotten by the devs. We're lucky to get balance patches here and there. Personally I think WvW is still very fun despite being completly unchanged since the game's introduction.

>

> But I disagree with OP when they say GW2 has no identity. GW2 has identity and they sure know it, they just don't like it.

> And that is that GW2 is a casual game that will never be your main game, but rather just something you play on the background whilst playing other games or something you touch a couple of times in a year (usually with new living world patches) just to disappear again for the next 3 months.

>

> And I think it's good that MMO genre has one of those casual games in the roster.

 

I don't know, i don't see it like that. I'd argue that PvE is one of the best in any MMO, which comes down to basic combat, glide and mount mechanics as well as Map specific stuff like metas. But that again comes down to preference. GW2 PvE is like it is because of stuff peple already said, no subscription fees so no need to keep people in PvE with extremely directed stuff, no gear grind so no need for any content to accomodate that. It's just "here's a bunch of stuff" , enjoy! And if you don't enjoy that, it's fine, it's not for you then, but that design philosophy is why most people played and stayed in GW2.

 

Open world is plenty challanging so that's not a sincere assesment from you so i'll treat it as an opinion. In reality though - even gathering in some HoT and PoF maps is pretty challenging, not to mention, skill needed to traverse some of it with gliders or moutns (skyscale excluded because that make some stuff trivial). Especially if you take into account meta events and bosses. You can't just 11111 therm and expect to finish them, especially not alone or with few people, or even with a lot of people (as you won't do enough damage to bossses if everyone just 1111 the entire time), so since those are also open world PvE then your comment has no basis in reality, and isn't true on an empyrical level. If you only think trash mobs then fine, but that largely depends on the class. I can't go into PoF with a mesmer and expect to 1111 even trash mobs there. And trash mobs are just part of the PvE, not the entirety. If you're bored with open world PvE, that's entirely different and it has nothign to do with the game not being a challange, or something like that.

 

I'd say also Raids and high level Fractals are also challenging seeing as how people won't even party with someone that didn't kill the boss 10000 times so, "the game has no challange" also can't apply here and is also your opinion, which is fine.

 

And since you mention WvW, i agree, it's super fun, and that's probably the game mode for you if you don't enjoy PvE. But you can't really compare theese two, and a lot of WvW players that i play with don't like PvE in this game. Compared to WvW, PvE has predictible monsters and attacks, and therefore when viewed in that context, isn't as challanging as WvW which i agree with. But to blanket a statement that "PvE is not cahllanging and you can autoattack only" - i don't agree with that. I'll say that it's easier and more predictable than WvW and therefore might be seen as boring and not challanging by WvW players, that much i know from just playing WvW and seeing what people say about it.

 

Again, that's just my opinion, i like both PvE and WvW, and though i like WvW way more, i don't mind some PvE and don't consider it that boring.

So just out of curiousity, what do you think they need to change in WvW? I see people say alliances, but at this point i think that's a meme and i doubt it would improve WvW in any way. I don't think anyone thinks it would improve WvW, they just say that asa joke when something needs pointing out that Anet promised something and didn't deliver. But WvW got some "attention" here and there like gliding, desert map, mount, WvW specific legendary... So they're doing something at least. I agree it needs way more love but idk, when people say like you now that it's completely unchanged - what does that even mean? What would you change, what do people mean by that and does it need changing?

 

What's your take on that? :smile:

 

I can't comment on PvP as i don't play that mode so idk what's happening in there. I will say that classes like mesmer have been unfairly gutted and tortured compared to everyone else, and that classes like Revenants are currently so op it's not even funny to revenant players anymore, so they really need to balance some of this stuff out. I won't get into detail about that here though, i'm in plenty of other threads expressing my opinions on balance.

 

In the end i agrree that GW2 has a lot to offer and that, compared to other MMOs that demand an inordinante amounts of your time, is pretty casual. And i like it that way, and so do a lot of people, which makes it pretty unique and accessible to new players and returning players alike. I wouldn't change a thing about that core philosophy of the game. :smile:

[uberkingkong.8041]

> @"Ben K.6238" said:

> The aspects in which it stands out are the feel of the combat system and the quality of the mounts.

 

I agree with mounts,

This game has more going for it than 'find npcs and kill' 'quest is kill npc'

More racing and other stuff than 'kill npcs' please

 

I should be able to do like Automated Tournament Monthly, 500 gold for first place.... I should be able to get same tourny and rewards with racing. I should be able to race every 2 hours in the daily racing tournament.

Same rewards.

 

I should be able to get gold from racing just as fast from 'killing npcs'

 

**All rewards equal, I'd be racing 24/7 in this game, rather than boring fractals, raids, world bosses aka 'kill npc events'** and over boring wvw and pvp too

WOW does raids better

ESO does wvw better

Old School Runescape does pvp better

**GW2, racing is better**

[Opopanax.1803]

> @"Ben K.6238" said:

> The aspects in which it stands out are the feel of the combat system and the quality of the mounts.

 

Agreed. Dynamic events are so much better than quests, too.

 

All of those and pve content delivery are what make me play.

[Jilora.9524]

First you compare GW2 to 2 $15 a month games but lets take FF14 and it's you will play at our pace crap.

FF14 is nothing but a gear grind then wait 3 months for that gear to become obsolete to gear grind again. It is also time gated af. You can only earn so much per week and get 1 or 2 pieces per week. They release everything in the same order. Beast tribe then you grind dailys then craft grind and gather grind. Not to mention the forced story to progress with hard group encounters to easily get stuck with bad luck which can prevent you from going to the next zone. Then the cutscenes where if 1 person in your group wants to watch it adds 5-10m each dungeon with you sitting in a box waiting.

It's fun at first because so much to do but it is so repetitive and forced no choice which path you take.

Gw2 blows right now ngl. These Drms and chopping this episode into 4 parts and depending on festivals to carry them is bad but still better then $15 FF14 and I can casually play GW2 but never will touch FF14 and that progression system again.

[Infusion.7149]

> @"CashCow.9548" said:

> I don't think OP was complaining about the lack of content but rather the lack of game's identity overall. GW2 has alot of stuff to do but it doesen't excel in any of those. PvE truly is a joke in this game. Open world PvE is just press "W" to move forward and "1" for auto attacks. This game has no challenge.

>

> PvP is long forgotten by the devs. We're lucky to get balance patches here and there. Personally I think WvW is still very fun despite being completly unchanged since the game's introduction.

>

> But I disagree with OP when they say GW2 has no identity. GW2 has identity and they sure know it, they just don't like it.

> And that is that GW2 is a casual game that will never be your main game, but rather just something you play on the background whilst playing other games or something you touch a couple of times in a year (usually with new living world patches) just to disappear again for the next 3 months.

>

> And I think it's good that MMO genre has one of those casual games in the roster.

 

People that have to treat a MMO like a job generally have less disposable income unless they're paying people to ~~play ~~ grind for them (which is a security risk in itself) or outright buying power off the gem shop. We have something similar in the level 80 boost or waypoint unlock boxes. Do people really want "unlock all IBS mastery points for 5000gems" or "legendary weapons for 10,000 gems" (I can see the rationalizing this already... "it's on the TP anyway") ? The disastrous Chinese version of GW2 already has those types of imbalances in that you can buy power infusions (not agony, _power_) (**+18 power** I believe , so a massive stat boost if you have real money to burn). So if you have money you can make +19 power infusions with over +300 power bonuses.

 

The biggest gaming market right now is mobile which is casual by definition at 51% , followed by console at 25% , and 24% on PC.

Of mobile games, ~59% are casual type games followed by puzzle, arcade, action, racing, etc. None of those are grindfests.

 

More than 50% of gamers are over age 34.

 

---

(I excerpted this post)

 

> @"Zephire.8049" said:

> I honestly wouldn't care nearly as much about things or get frustrated if Anet simply communicated what they were doing or why they made various choices. Lack of communication is the most likely reason I'll drop GW2 if/when I do. Not issues with the story, not scrapped content, not the spaghetti engine, but the simple lack of letting players know what to expect and that they are listening to player feedback.

>

> - If they're no longer going to work on raids, tell players that.

> - If DRMs are going to be the new thing, tell players that.

> - If strikes are going to going to be scrapped, tell players that.

> - Tell players how WvW alliances is going.

> - Inform players that there's not going to be a Q4 balance patch because of EoD.

> - If players need to hang onto items for months before they can use them, make it clear that's the case.

>

> Honestly the list goes on and on and you probably get the picture. I don't PvP and only casually WvW so I'm coming at it from a primarily PvE point of view, but I'd be fine with how things are going if there was clear and constant communication about what was going on (an off-hand comment in a dev chat is not meaningful communication) and it would be far easier to offer feedback if it was known what was going on and what the plan is. The latest IBS episode really made it clear how bad they're at communicating and everyone I talked to about it stated that they would have been fine with the episode being cut in half and stopping suddenly if they had been told that would be the case. And I imagine PvP would also improve if they talked about what was in the works, trends they've noticed, and acknowledging hackers are an issue and that they're working on something in regard to that.

>

> I just can't get concerned about a game's perceived identity or niche when the studio operates in radio silence despite its one current game being an MMO (AKA a "live service game") and it's hard to offer feedback when a studio doesn't even tell players what it's doing outside a vague quarterly roadmap and player feedback is rarely ever acknowledged so players are flying blind with what happens each content patch.

>

> (Some PvE mount skins would also be nice, just throwing that out there since mounts are a big thing now but the base skins are so limited. It seems strange to not have some PvE-exclusive skins for rewards and to entice people to buy more from the store.)

 

Well they do communicate it , just not directly. For example see this article: https://massivelyop.com/2020/11/17/flameseeker-chronicles-first-impressions-of-guild-wars-2s-icebrood-saga-truce/

Re: DRM

> We asked ArenaNet’s representatives why this new type of instance is capped at 5 players rather than 10 like Steel and Fire. Their reason was that Steel and Fire, while designed to scale from 5-10 players, becomes much more challenging in smaller groups, a frustrating experience that I think a lot of players have shared. They found that the mechanics scale much better in the 1-5 player range

Re: fractals/strikes

> If you’re a fractal fan, you might be understandably worried about the future of your favorite mode. ArenaNet was quick to assure us that the purpose of dragon response missions was not to replace fractals or strikes, but as something new and different, and that they have no plans to discontinue work on those any time soon.

 

There's also direct information on the main site: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/the-icebrood-saga-champions/ which is linked in the log-in window.

>! November 2020

>! Chapter 1: Truce—November 17

>!

>! December 2020

>! Wintersday

>!

>! January 2021

>! Chapter 2: Power

>!

>! February 2021

>! Lunar New Year

>!

>! March 2021

>! Chapter 3: Balance

>!

>! April 2021

>! Super Adventure Festival

>!

>! May 2021

>! Chapter 4: Judgment

 

 

On top of that wiki users try to update

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Upcoming_changes_and_features

[zealex.9410]

> @"maddoctor.2738" said:

> > @"DoomNexus.5324" said:

> > Guild Wars 2 does not really stand out in any aspect on the MMO market and it's kinda sad.

>

> I think the tab target + action combat is rather unique in Guild Wars 2. The event system is (was?) unique although many mmorpgs are copying it nowadays. Not having to grind for higher level caps, the build system, picking your skills, weapons defining your skills, weapon swapping are also not features you see in every game. Gliding and the excellent mounts are also not seen in most games in the market. Sure if you want to see what's unique in GW2 compared to every game out there you might be hard pressed to find anything, that's true for every other game as well.

>

> > PvE is vastly outperformed by FF14 and WoW for example and I think that's pretty much all I have to say.

>

> Well I dislike the PVE in WOW and find it garbage, always chasing the next big carrot on a stick to improve your stats. Always becoming invalidated with each expansion. yawn. And let's not talk about the atrocious combat of WOW. So no GW2 isn't outperformed by WOW, not even close, it's of course your opinion if you think it does, if you are into constant gear progression and endless gear treadmills and boring combat, that's up to you.

 

Combat in wow get a bad rep, yes gw2's is supperior but at least wow releases new content for the combat to be used in.

 

Unless we consider the ow(or drms) content gw2 gets as content that utilises the combat. The ow content is balanced around aa and dodging occasionally, that type of gameplay would put gw2 way bellow even wow in terms of combat.

 

The combat in gw2 has so many unique mechanics (more cc than stuns and slow, blinds, reflects etc) but the content they keep releasing only requires you to be able to press one and the occasional dodge).

[zealex.9410]

> @"Jilora.9524" said:

> First you compare GW2 to 2 $15 a month games but lets take FF14 and it's you will play at our pace kitten.

> FF14 is nothing but a gear grind then wait 3 months for that gear to become obsolete to gear grind again. It is also time gated af. You can only earn so much per week and get 1 or 2 pieces per week. They release everything in the same order. Beast tribe then you grind dailys then craft grind and gather grind. Not to mention the forced story to progress with hard group encounters to easily get stuck with bad luck which can prevent you from going to the next zone. Then the cutscenes where if 1 person in your group wants to watch it adds 5-10m each dungeon with you sitting in a box waiting.

> It's fun at first because so much to do but it is so repetitive and forced no choice which path you take.

> Gw2 blows right now ngl. These Drms and chopping this episode into 4 parts and depending on festivals to carry them is bad but still better then $15 FF14 and I can casually play GW2 but never will touch FF14 and that progression system again.

 

Yet gear grind in ff14 takes very little time and its a pretty neglegable part of the game. Yes a couple months later you will have new gear to go for but its easy to get it and at the end of the day its there instead of gold.