It it me or is guild wars losing it's diversity and direction?

[Westenev.5289]

I like the new direction Anet have been going - it's a tad more interesting than roaming core maps playing with what equates to a legendary boss mob. With HoT, LS3 and PoF, you're somewhat required to deviate from your usual build to fit the circumstance, lest you suffer the consequences.

 

The only concern I have is in how Anet handles champion mobs, specifically the breakbar that either doesn't work in low level content or exists for a short period in high level content. I really don’t get why Anet couldn’t build boss-level monsters while keeping cc mechanics in mind.

[Kalocin.5982]

I do think there's an argument here about difficulty being more reliant on mob damage than mob patterns/skills. Having high damage mobs is not really a good way of scaling difficulty, and I can only point to something like FFXIV where there's currently an unbeatable raid purely due to mechanics. Open world as a whole is harder to balance for though simply due to the nature of casual vs hardcore, and honestly I prefer the former as a preference while keeping hard encounters in their own arenas.

[Manasa Devi.7958]

> @Zenith.7301 said:

> I hate the duration of the current debuffs. I can end a fight in 5-7 seconds but am kept in combat for 10+ seconds because the slow and poison/vulnerability durations are so long....and then some pat has come by or the mob packs have respawned by the time the debuffs wear off and I'm in combat again.

I especially hate those non-condition effects that you can't remove. They're very prevalent in PoF.

[IndigoSundown.5419]

I went into the Labyrinth tonight for the first time this year. The mobs there don't elicit nostalgia for me. If they're an "old" mob design, then mob design has in some ways progressed. Mobs that have one move -- a CC -- plus a filler attack, so the CC gets used every few seconds? Yeah, there isn't enough stab to deal with that, at least not on every profession.

 

That said, some of ANet's newer mob designs leave me cold. Some of the reasons have been mentioned above. Mobs that apply a condition that you want to cleanse, and do it over, and over, and over every few seconds? Well, it makes me feel more sympathetic to people complaining about the same thing in WvW, except applied by a character. Some CC seems designed not to make the mob a challenge, but to make it annoying. Yeah, yeah, condi cleanse, stun break, dodge, yada yada. I run with three condi cleanses on my ranger, but fight a pack of Awakened, and three is not always enough. More often than not, , I end up with the cripple/slow combo at the end. It's annoying, not fun, at least to me.

 

It's not the difficulty. It's the annoyance factor. The only mob put in in the last two years I avoid because I'm not sure how to kill it is the Vet Magma Elemental while also taking fire from other mobs at Balth's Fane in SL. Way too much burning, almost as bad as fighting a Firebrand. ;)

[ThomasC.1056]

There're tons of mobs that have insanely OP, or have on-steroids versions of character's skills. That's the only cheap way they found to bring players _challenge_. Heck ! Even a veteran civilian ghost can hit with her bare hands harder than the commander of the pact in full ascended armor and weapons ! (pilgrim ghosts near augury rock)

 

What is challenge in GW2 now ? It's really simple. New mobs are made so that you're ineffective 80% (not real figure) of the time. Like those gorillas that have 3 skills that can knock you down for 3 seconds, with a 4,5 sec cooldown. So they're perma knocking you down, and stab is no use. Lions with the projectile denying, so you need to melee them, but you're perma blind. Like those scarabs that can summon their blinding tornado with no CD (I ran some tests, and if it's not "no CD" then it's really short). And the list could drag. Perma condi application, perma boon re-application, perma stun... It feels like WvW !

 

Issue is : that's no _challenge_. That's no _fun_. That's **boring**. That's dragging an uninteresting fight far beyond what it should be. These aren't really difficult mobs, yet they become a pain because players are denied their abilities, their hits, their skills because... ? Because otherwise, fights would be done in a matter of seconds, and developpers didn't want that. They didn't want players to clear content too fast. So they create frustration, mistaking it with _challenge_.

 

First, they created toys for us to play with. Second, they created toys for us to play against. Third, they created toys for them to play with. And now, they're creating toys for them to play against us.

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

> @Vayne.8563 said:

> Edit: This was true even in Guild Wars 1. Max level cap was 20, but when Eye of the North came out, we were fighting things that were 24 level minimum and even 28 level and 30th level in the "open world". Our levels and stats didn't go up, but what we were fighting got more powerful. Even the weakest eye of the north enemies had more health and armor than enemies prior to that, with no gain in player stats or level.

 

And it got more interesting in _Guild Wars: Beyond_. Foes were not only high level, but acted a lot like some of the more deadly hero builds. Lots of people loved it; some felt overwhelmed. I loved that it was overwhelming — it became some of the most difficult content in the game, to solo or even for teams, so being able to succeed was extremely satisfying, when I finally figured it out. It required having good builds and good tactics both.

 

Whether that was a good thing for GW1 (or GW2 in PoF) is a matter of preference, as is true with so much of gaming. There's no way of establishing that this content is "interesting" or "boring" nor whether this mob is OP or not; it depends on the player. That doesn't mean I don't hate fighting the desert lions — I do — but unlike the OP, I consider that my problem for not learning how to manage them better, rather than a problem with the difficulty of PoF.

[maddoctor.2738]

> @"Egrimm Van Horstmann.7921" said:

> I'm concerned with the constant escalation of damage and health of mobs. And this leads to a massive balance problem with the entire gameplay, Veterans that are worse than champions is now a here to stay problem (you can thank HoT being about group play for that one), but it's not just there you can find basic mobs that put vets to shame, then there's champions that are worse than world bosses. It's really starting to feel like there is no balance or more accurately keeping the mobs in check when it comes to gameplay. I would like to see a return to some semblance of balance and mob type, though at this point we already have had an entire expansion where this was ignored.

 

To be fair the mobs in both HoT and PoF have less overall health than core mobs, especially mobs that hit hard, for example Smokescales and the Shadowleapers have half the hit points of other mobs and Pocket Raptors have a little more health than critters. In PoF mobs that appear in large numbers usually have lower health totals, Sand Lions, Ibogas, the biped versions of Forged, Awakened Mummies and most types of Choya have less health than Risen mobs in Orr and die much faster. And that's normal, the higher the damage and/or numbers, the less the hit points.

 

I don't think the game lost it's direction but rather it finally found it. When you can fight even Champions in core tyria without using your entire skillbar then there is something wrong with a game. Why give you all these skills and abilities when you can auto-attack to death every mob around? With average masterwork gear you can stand still and auto-attack to death most Risen in Orr without fear of death, unless it's a Noble, then you need to move out of their aoe field. With PoF and HoT they force players to use their tools in order to fight the mobs, something core tyria never did.

[kharmin.7683]

> @Torolan.5816 said:

 

>

> I diagree with the idea that you have to get better in a game though. It´s neither a competetive sport or a real job. And even if it were true, the largest majority of players who call themself casual will not have an interest to better themselves in a game meant for enjoyment and relaxing. I am pretty sure that the largest majority of men or women who play this after work or when their kids are finally sleeping after a gruelling 2 hour battle full of tears and temper tantrums have no interest in hard fought battles with a mob they picked up around the next corner, they want to relax and cool down from a stressfull day.

 

Exactly so. This is almost the exact situation for me and my (few) guildies.

[Lanhelin.3480]

As Mesmer there's one thing I find pretty annoying about some mobs: if I summon an illusion in the second they become invulnerable, they make my illusion even not appearing at all but only the skill going on cd. Invulnerability should block attacks only but not the illusion itself.

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

> @Lanhelin.3480 said:

> As Mesmer there's one thing I find pretty annoying about some mobs: if I summon an illusion in the second they become invulnerable, they make my illusion even not appearing at all but only the skill going on cd. Invulnerability should block attacks only but not the illusion itself.

 

That's always been the bane of PvE mesmer. At launch, nearly all illusion skills worked without a target, but that turned out to be OP'd in competitive combat (for a variety of reasons, some of which even applied to PvE). Since then, quite a lot of mesmer skills illusions fail without an available target within line-of-sight.

[Annika.7084]

> @ThomasC.1056 said:

> There're tons of mobs that have insanely OP, or have on-steroids versions of character's skills. That's the only cheap way they found to bring players _challenge_. Heck ! Even a veteran civilian ghost can hit with her bare hands harder than the commander of the pact in full ascended armor and weapons ! (pilgrim ghosts near augury rock)

>

> What is challenge in GW2 now ? It's really simple. New mobs are made so that you're ineffective 80% (not real figure) of the time. Like those gorillas that have 3 skills that can knock you down for 3 seconds, with a 4,5 sec cooldown. So they're perma knocking you down, and stab is no use. Lions with the projectile denying, so you need to melee them, but you're perma blind. Like those scarabs that can summon their blinding tornado with no CD (I ran some tests, and if it's not "no CD" then it's really short). And the list could drag. Perma condi application, perma boon re-application, perma stun... It feels like WvW !

>

> Issue is : that's no _challenge_. That's no _fun_. That's **boring**. That's dragging an uninteresting fight far beyond what it should be. These aren't really difficult mobs, yet they become a pain because players are denied their abilities, their hits, their skills because... ? Because otherwise, fights would be done in a matter of seconds, and developpers didn't want that. They didn't want players to clear content too fast. So they create frustration, mistaking it with _challenge_.

>

> First, they created toys for us to play with. Second, they created toys for us to play against. Third, they created toys for them to play with. And now, they're creating toys for them to play against us.

 

I fully agree with your post. The mobs in PoF especially, gives me no challange they're just utterly boring. Personally I find it to be a lazy way of 'enhancing' combat equipping npc enemies with huge healthpools and infinate cc's, sharpshooters keeping their aim through building and mountains, while having no new tactics just the same old suicidal behaviour. Knocked over, limping crippled, chilled, dazed, blinded etc, waiting for our same old bog cleanses to come out of cooldown only to get a new batch of stacks on you since now there's 3 times as many npc's around you. One has to be into bondage to appreciate this...

[Morgan.5170]

The Veteran Fire Djinni hero point by the skimmer ranch wrecks every character I attempt it with. Meanwhile, the Champion Fire Djinni in the NE corner of Vabi is a cakewalk in comparison. It constantly drops easily avoidable aoe's that do little damage even if they hit.

[Mil.3562]

GW2 has already lost it's direction when Anet decided to go ascended 4 years ago : P

 

Not just bosses, it is not safe at all to park yourself even in the most remote places or even at some waypoints, if you need to afk for just a minute. Mobs will just spawned out of nowhere and attacked you. I think this is working as intended :/

[IndigoSundown.5419]

> @Morgan.5170 said:

> The Veteran Fire Djinni hero point by the skimmer ranch wrecks every character I attempt it with.

 

Did you mean the Lohrashi the Mournful HC SE of Skimmer Ranch? He's a Ghost Fire Elementalist, not a Fire Djinn.

 

 

[flog.3485]

> @Annika.7084 said:

> > @ThomasC.1056 said:

> > There're tons of mobs that have insanely OP, or have on-steroids versions of character's skills. That's the only cheap way they found to bring players _challenge_. Heck ! Even a veteran civilian ghost can hit with her bare hands harder than the commander of the pact in full ascended armor and weapons ! (pilgrim ghosts near augury rock)

> >

> > What is challenge in GW2 now ? It's really simple. New mobs are made so that you're ineffective 80% (not real figure) of the time. Like those gorillas that have 3 skills that can knock you down for 3 seconds, with a 4,5 sec cooldown. So they're perma knocking you down, and stab is no use. Lions with the projectile denying, so you need to melee them, but you're perma blind. Like those scarabs that can summon their blinding tornado with no CD (I ran some tests, and if it's not "no CD" then it's really short). And the list could drag. Perma condi application, perma boon re-application, perma stun... It feels like WvW !

> >

> > Issue is : that's no _challenge_. That's no _fun_. That's **boring**. That's dragging an uninteresting fight far beyond what it should be. These aren't really difficult mobs, yet they become a pain because players are denied their abilities, their hits, their skills because... ? Because otherwise, fights would be done in a matter of seconds, and developpers didn't want that. They didn't want players to clear content too fast. So they create frustration, mistaking it with _challenge_.

> >

> > First, they created toys for us to play with. Second, they created toys for us to play against. Third, they created toys for them to play with. And now, they're creating toys for them to play against us.

>

> I fully agree with your post. The mobs in PoF especially, gives me no challange they're just utterly boring. Personally I find it to be a lazy way of 'enhancing' combat equipping npc enemies with huge healthpools and infinate cc's, sharpshooters keeping their aim through building and mountains, while having no new tactics just the same old suicidal behaviour. Knocked over, limping crippled, chilled, dazed, blinded etc, waiting for our same old bog cleanses to come out of cooldown only to get a new batch of stacks on you since now there's 3 times as many npc's around you. One has to be into bondage to appreciate this...

 

I don't know what games you have been playing but your design complaints sounds like any game design whatsoever.

 

The fact that the player character has a vast array of skills with mobs that will use their own array of skills to try counter you. But generallly speaking, in any other games with a trinity for example, you can yell at your other teammate for doing a poor job at "cleansing" you.

 

To me it sounds like you just spam your skills, burn your cooldown, without much thought behind it, and then complain that there is too much of obstacles ruining your fun. It is not because you build for some stab that you are going to cc free. It is not because you can build for some condition clear that you are going to be conditions free. And it is certainly not because you build for high toughness and vitality that you can disregard your dodges. What matters is to use your abilities when appropriate and really needed.

 

Personally my only gripe in PoF in terms of mobs are the Jacarandas with no real animations of their skills.

[Annika.7084]

> @flog.3485 said:

> > @Annika.7084 said:

> > > @ThomasC.1056 said:

> > > There're tons of mobs that have insanely OP, or have on-steroids versions of character's skills. That's the only cheap way they found to bring players _challenge_. Heck ! Even a veteran civilian ghost can hit with her bare hands harder than the commander of the pact in full ascended armor and weapons ! (pilgrim ghosts near augury rock)

> > >

> > > What is challenge in GW2 now ? It's really simple. New mobs are made so that you're ineffective 80% (not real figure) of the time. Like those gorillas that have 3 skills that can knock you down for 3 seconds, with a 4,5 sec cooldown. So they're perma knocking you down, and stab is no use. Lions with the projectile denying, so you need to melee them, but you're perma blind. Like those scarabs that can summon their blinding tornado with no CD (I ran some tests, and if it's not "no CD" then it's really short). And the list could drag. Perma condi application, perma boon re-application, perma stun... It feels like WvW !

> > >

> > > Issue is : that's no _challenge_. That's no _fun_. That's **boring**. That's dragging an uninteresting fight far beyond what it should be. These aren't really difficult mobs, yet they become a pain because players are denied their abilities, their hits, their skills because... ? Because otherwise, fights would be done in a matter of seconds, and developpers didn't want that. They didn't want players to clear content too fast. So they create frustration, mistaking it with _challenge_.

> > >

> > > First, they created toys for us to play with. Second, they created toys for us to play against. Third, they created toys for them to play with. And now, they're creating toys for them to play against us.

> >

> > I fully agree with your post. The mobs in PoF especially, gives me no challange they're just utterly boring. Personally I find it to be a lazy way of 'enhancing' combat equipping npc enemies with huge healthpools and infinate cc's, sharpshooters keeping their aim through building and mountains, while having no new tactics just the same old suicidal behaviour. Knocked over, limping crippled, chilled, dazed, blinded etc, waiting for our same old bog cleanses to come out of cooldown only to get a new batch of stacks on you since now there's 3 times as many npc's around you. One has to be into bondage to appreciate this...

>

> I don't know what games you have been playing but your design complaints sounds like any game design whatsoever.

>

> The fact that the player character has a vast array of skills with mobs that will use their own array of skills to try counter you. But generallly speaking, in any other games with a trinity for example, you can yell at your other teammate for doing a poor job at "cleansing" you.

>

> To me it sounds like you just spam your skills, burn your cooldown, without much thought behind it, and then complain that there is too much of obstacles ruining your fun. It is not because you build for some stab that you are going to cc free. It is not because you can build for some condition clear that you are going to be conditions free. And it is certainly not because you build for high toughness and vitality that you can disregard your dodges. What matters is to use your abilities when appropriate and really needed.

>

> Personally my only gripe in PoF in terms of mobs are the Jacarandas with no real animations of their skills.

 

The reflections I added to the post I quoted were personal and I won't deviate from them.

 

Yet I'm very thankful you explained the elementaries of combat mechanics is such an educational way. I had no idea I would have to dodge with toughness and vitatily, I always thought I was unkillable with those. I suppose clearing the 5 maps on all my 8 characters getting all the masteries, mounts, achievements etc I sailed through on plain luck spamming away my skillzorx.

 

Oh, how does one "burn your cooldown" ?? Can you make yours longer? Shorter?

[flog.3485]

> @Annika.7084 said:

> > @flog.3485 said:

> > > @Annika.7084 said:

> > > > @ThomasC.1056 said:

> > > > There're tons of mobs that have insanely OP, or have on-steroids versions of character's skills. That's the only cheap way they found to bring players _challenge_. Heck ! Even a veteran civilian ghost can hit with her bare hands harder than the commander of the pact in full ascended armor and weapons ! (pilgrim ghosts near augury rock)

> > > >

> > > > What is challenge in GW2 now ? It's really simple. New mobs are made so that you're ineffective 80% (not real figure) of the time. Like those gorillas that have 3 skills that can knock you down for 3 seconds, with a 4,5 sec cooldown. So they're perma knocking you down, and stab is no use. Lions with the projectile denying, so you need to melee them, but you're perma blind. Like those scarabs that can summon their blinding tornado with no CD (I ran some tests, and if it's not "no CD" then it's really short). And the list could drag. Perma condi application, perma boon re-application, perma stun... It feels like WvW !

> > > >

> > > > Issue is : that's no _challenge_. That's no _fun_. That's **boring**. That's dragging an uninteresting fight far beyond what it should be. These aren't really difficult mobs, yet they become a pain because players are denied their abilities, their hits, their skills because... ? Because otherwise, fights would be done in a matter of seconds, and developpers didn't want that. They didn't want players to clear content too fast. So they create frustration, mistaking it with _challenge_.

> > > >

> > > > First, they created toys for us to play with. Second, they created toys for us to play against. Third, they created toys for them to play with. And now, they're creating toys for them to play against us.

> > >

> > > I fully agree with your post. The mobs in PoF especially, gives me no challange they're just utterly boring. Personally I find it to be a lazy way of 'enhancing' combat equipping npc enemies with huge healthpools and infinate cc's, sharpshooters keeping their aim through building and mountains, while having no new tactics just the same old suicidal behaviour. Knocked over, limping crippled, chilled, dazed, blinded etc, waiting for our same old bog cleanses to come out of cooldown only to get a new batch of stacks on you since now there's 3 times as many npc's around you. One has to be into bondage to appreciate this...

> >

> > I don't know what games you have been playing but your design complaints sounds like any game design whatsoever.

> >

> > The fact that the player character has a vast array of skills with mobs that will use their own array of skills to try counter you. But generallly speaking, in any other games with a trinity for example, you can yell at your other teammate for doing a poor job at "cleansing" you.

> >

> > To me it sounds like you just spam your skills, burn your cooldown, without much thought behind it, and then complain that there is too much of obstacles ruining your fun. It is not because you build for some stab that you are going to cc free. It is not because you can build for some condition clear that you are going to be conditions free. And it is certainly not because you build for high toughness and vitality that you can disregard your dodges. What matters is to use your abilities when appropriate and really needed.

> >

> > Personally my only gripe in PoF in terms of mobs are the Jacarandas with no real animations of their skills.

>

> The reflections I added to the post I quoted were personal and I won't deviate from them.

>

> Yet I'm very thankful you explained the elementaries of combat mechanics is such an educational way. I had no idea I would have to dodge with toughness and vitatily, I always thought I was unkillable with those. I suppose clearing the 5 maps on all my 8 characters getting all the masteries, mounts, achievements etc I sailed through on plain luck spamming away my skillzorx.

>

> Oh, how does one "burn your cooldown" ?? Can you make yours longer? Shorter?

 

I only referred to the fact that you don't have to use your condition cleanse for every single condition that will affect you. Likewise it is unreasonable to think about using your dodge key to evade single AoE. That is what I am talking about when it comes to "burning cooldowns" imo. And generally speaking, from my own experience, mobs don't have time to use their own abilities because I stun/daze/interrupt and dps them down before they can become a pain to deal with.

 

I am sorry you took personal offense. I was only speaking from personal experience but I never meant to imply that you were bad, that you needed to "git gud" or that you were inexperienced. Sorry again for being a bit too much upfront about my experience.

[battledrone.8315]

yes, it is farmville de luxe now...and the inflation is a sign of that

the playerbase is still declining, but the gear and skill gap gets even bigger

so, they have to work more and more, for lesser customers

some of us can see, where this is going

[zealex.9410]

> @"masskillerxploit.2165" said:

> nah just pay 60$$ and become a god.

 

Yeah i became a god when i bought the base game.

[Zedek.8932]

Excelsior.

 

The reason why I put my Engineer (or Scrapper) on retirement was the "avoids ranged attacks" nonsense in HoT.

This has barely to do with "adapting" as TexZero said, it's just stupid and feels very forced instead of, as the OP said, a identity.

I mean, in shooter games like Halo for example, I remember found it stupid the Jackals had the shield, but you could hit trough that if you took care or just walked there and pistol-whipped them or if you distract them so they turn or if you throw a grenade (behind them) or... These were real solutions or "adaptions" as Tex would call it. But in GW, many things are just annoying as heck. Well, I have Shadowstep, so I can at least get out of some stupid situations here and there, but else, it really feels like everyone is doing everything. When back in Central Tyria or even in a place where Harpies are, or Griffons, I know: They can do ONE or TWO things and I have to counter them, which can be troublesome when in groups. When I fight PoF mobs I see 50 conditions on my statusbar before the fight even starts and it's just a mess of a fight.

 

Smokescale for example is such a thing where I often just stand there and wait until this BS is over while getting hit down to 30% without any special counter (as Thief), then spam my attacks at it and win. Wow, such a great fight!!

[AliamRationem.5172]

> @"Egrimm Van Horstmann.7921" said:

> I have really enjoyed some of this game and at times loathed much of it. For me Halloween aka Mad King was fun. And that's where I had an opportunity to look back at the old vs the new.

>

> Mobs are losing their identity. What I mean by this, is every mob has some form of a ranged attack and can be tough in close or far range. I really don't like this particular change to NPC's in general. There should be a diversity of close combat mobs and ranged mobs that don't intermix. This allows player to utilize their weapons/ skills to the fight, if all of the mobs hit hard no matter how you fight them then it becomes a race to do the most damage.

>

> Too much projectile hate. This just goes for mobs and many special abilities that are outright broken. For instance smokescale/ smogscale/ dust lions all have some for of an AOE projectile field that no projectiles can hit them in it (even when your outside the field and not affected by the blind). A veteran Smokescale can one shot a full health character with it's opening attack. The abilities have long durations and little downtime. Dust lions added long duration knock downs to this annoyance. Though to be fair their field isn't as long lasting as the smokescale.

>

> Every awakened undead applies slow/ cripple combo for super long durations. Not to mention the one that bursts out of the ground and can down you in one attack since knock down takes way too long to recover from.

>

> Look at two condi's they buffed torment and confusion, and how many of the new mobs use those particular condi's.

>

> I'm concerned with the constant escalation of damage and health of mobs. And this leads to a massive balance problem with the entire gameplay, Veterans that are worse than champions is now a here to stay problem (you can thank HoT being about group play for that one), but it's not just there you can find basic mobs that put vets to shame, then there's champions that are worse than world bosses. It's really starting to feel like there is no balance or more accurately keeping the mobs in check when it comes to gameplay. I would like to see a return to some semblance of balance and mob type, though at this point we already have had an entire expansion where this was ignored.

>

> I enjoy the game for much of the time I play and this is where I'm torn. If I quit, that's it. I won't come back as nostalgia for the old isn't what I like spending time on.

>

> I do hope this game does get back to basics with less muddying of the water, only time will tell. Better gameplay should be more important than a new shiny.

>

 

You know, it would help your case if you understood how the abilities that you take issue with actually work. Take your first example, the smokescale. The field they produce does not block projectiles. It causes ALL attacks to miss as long as the smokescale is standing in the field. You have to drag the smokescale out of the field regardless of whether you're using melee or ranged attacks.

 

Moving on. A veteran smokescale cannot "1-shot" anything. Its opening attack is, in fact, a multi-hit attack and its behavior is easily predictable as evidenced by the fact that even you know it always does the same move upon engagement. Just stun it when it teleports to you, or dodge if you don't have anything off cooldown.

 

I like the way you can improve via practice and learning enemy moves. What at first seems impossible becomes totally doable, even many of the champions. PoF has been out for months and I'm still getting first-time solo kills on bounty champions even now. I just get better and better as I practice and learn the moves enemies make. I think that's a pretty good design, really.

 

 

 

 

[Goettel.4389]

"HoT being about group play" surely explains why its zones are best populated of all.

I love that they're moving the game towards more challenge for casual players, forcing playing together to maximize effective play. Yes, much of that effective play is about making the most gold per hour, but frankly, I'm here for the grind because I LOVE IT. A great leather farm is not much less fun for me than any raid I've ever done.

So hurrah to ANet for upping the game and fighting the Massively Single Player ehm Massive.

[Chasind.3128]

it's becoming like other asian mmos as far as fashion goes bc of all the shiny new items, gw2 has lost the aesthetic for me.

[Trise.2865]

How does one measure "difficulty"?

 

"I only died once, this boss is too easy!"

"I died! This boss is too hard!"

 

"I figured out this enemy mechanic right away, it's too easy!"

"I can't figure out this enemy mechanic, it's too hard!"

 

"I can take this enemy down with only weapon skills, too easy!"

"This enemy takes too long to kill, too hard!"

[Obtena.7952]

> @"TexZero.7910" said:

> I don't agree with any of the assessment.

>

> I think part of a growing / changing game is getting players to learn and adapt. No one should take range only options nor melee only. You should learn to carry a stunbreak/condi cleanse or transfer.

>

> Unfortunately people don't for some reason realize this and would rather complain about "hard Open World content" when its equally as challenging as GW1 only back there you actually adapted and changed your builds/comp accordingly.

 

Too many people taking OW for granted ... it has its 'meta' builds for every class just like raids/fractals. You nailed it: Optimal OW builds included ranged and melee options, a stun breaker and a cleanse ... that's been true since day one. The only difference is that Anet has now created OW encounters in HoT and PoF that can mess you up bad instead of being a minor annoyance.