2020 Guild Hall Decoration Cap discussion

[Radjan Majere.4208]

As a mostly solo decorator of our guild hall, it's taken me a long time, but I'm at the decoration cap and it's one of the saddest days of my GW2 experience.

 

I've got theme areas for special events, raid trophies, WvW decorations, the gods themselves, and other general ambiance and so much more I want to do. To be fair, there are a lot of things like an early "JP" that goes up to max height, which I've tweaked once before knowing I was at the cap to remove some of the "constant stairs" style decorations - I can embed it more into the terrain, use more oakhearts or teleporters and other stuff - I know there's room I can free up. That said, I have a large appetite for expansion plans and the idea that I will start being inhibited by this cap more than my lone ability to fund all this is incredibly disappointing, and now having to lock down decoration privileges for people so we don't "waste" those slots... it's sad. I loathe that I now have to decide if my platypus hedge-duck is worth the 10-15 decorations or if my super adventure box zone needs to have more linear routes with fewer side options just so we stay under the cap.

 

So, here's my suggestions:

 

1. Look into technical feasibility of raising the guild decoration cap. I shudder as I say it, but if it were reasonably priced for a small guild, I'd pay gems to unlock it. (I will DEFINITELY regret saying that if you do it, but... if it's the difference between getting the work done and not....) Guild halls are MASSIVE compared to the 2,000 decoration limit, and modern machines can certainly handle it if your back end can manage it.

2. You made GOOD progress with some of the later decorations being larger in size - think snow mounds to replace groups of snow piles. (The boring oversize snow blocks, not so much TBH, though long-live my robot snowman!) Look at what people are routinely doing with the decorations and try to design new decorations that free us from using lots of little decorations just for "Structure" or to give a player extra height to glide - think the SUPER TREE and SUPER MOUNTAIN where one decoration can replace a stack of, say, blocks of the solid ocean or something to get a player more height to glide from. Or things like the Djinn launching device (why not make higher ones like varying height bouncy mushrooms?) or teleporters and oakheart essences that we can use to connect areas with minimal "scaffolding" decoration use just to make paths between them. More of these kinds of things in the newer decorations will help minimize the impact of any cap.

 

I am sure I'm in the minority, but I love the current system, even with all its faults. This player-generated content is a wonderful creative outlet and I hope you find a way to support its expansion.

 

Respectfully,

Lamont/Radjan

 

[Randulf.7614]

Some of the problems are a wall hit by minimum specs (their words). They outright said aren't going to raise the min specs anytime soon (that was a couple of years ago for context), so unless they raise them for a more important reason (an expac), some of the issues will continue.

 

Keep in mind 2000 decorations is absolutely huge - sure it might be a hindrance to the popular lego/minecraft style of building many use, but ultimately there has to be a cap and it will be questioned and asked to be raised no matter what that cap will be.

 

Obviously no one would object to it being raised, but it is there because it has to be. Unless the tech limitations can be worked round (I'm thinking unlikely as more time passes and the game ages and naturally declines), the cap will forever stay at that level

 

[FrizzFreston.5290]

The most refreshing thing is the "remove all decorations" - button.

 

I just took screenshot of what I build, removed it and rebuild something else in place.

[hugo.4705]

> @"Randulf.7614" said:

> Some of the problems are a wall hit by minimum specs (their words). They outright said aren't going to raise the min specs anytime soon (that was a couple of years ago for context), so unless they raise them for a more important reason (an expac), some of the issues will continue.

>

> Keep in mind 2000 decorations is absolutely huge - sure it might be a hindrance to the popular lego/minecraft style of building many use, but ultimately there has to be a cap and it will be questioned and asked to be raised no matter what that cap will be.

>

> Obviously no one would object to it being raised, but it is there because it has to be. Unless the tech limitations can be worked round (I'm thinking unlikely as more time passes and the game ages and naturally declines), the cap will forever stay at that level

>

 

You know, I would not mind the guild hall limit If I were able to put those 2000 at the same spot. As example a guildie tried to make a house in a corner of Gilded Hollow. Just the walls, some paintings and a carpet and the limit is reached ;/ He doesn't even have the roof or the furnitures! :o Well not 2000, but at least an area limit of 25...

[TheIceman.1039]

> @"Randulf.7614" said:

>

> Keep in mind 2000 decorations is absolutely huge - sure it might be a hindrance to the popular lego/minecraft style of building many use, but ultimately there has to be a cap and it will be questioned and asked to be raised no matter what that cap will be.

>

 

For Windstep is huge, but for Lost Precipice this is very small number. Should be minimal 6000

 

 

[Randulf.7614]

> @"TheIceman.1039" said:

> > @"Randulf.7614" said:

> >

> > Keep in mind 2000 decorations is absolutely huge - sure it might be a hindrance to the popular lego/minecraft style of building many use, but ultimately there has to be a cap and it will be questioned and asked to be raised no matter what that cap will be.

> >

>

> For Windstep is huge, but for Lost Precipice this is very small number. Should be minimal 6000

>

>

 

And if you read the paragraphs around the one you quoted, you will understand why it can't be 6000

[TheIceman.1039]

It's just your subjective opinion.

[MikeG.6389]

While I have no problem with the limit currently in place, I do think it's worth a revisit, seeing how it's based on now years-old specifications. Maybe at some point, possibly with a a future expansion, it gets updated, too.

And while they are at it, they should adjust the draw distance settings of some decorations, as well. Case in point: I'd like to put the raven statue high on a distant ledge, but it's pointless because it seems to be missing the distant meshes and is only visible within a certain range.

[Batman.7041]

There are two components to this issue. Local Area Deco Cap, and the Max Deco Cap. The Local Area Cap dictates how many decorations can be placed in a single blob, and the Max Deco Cap is obviously how many total decorations can be placed in the hall everywhere. Based on 4 years of building and managing communities of builders in guild halls, both of these numbers are from a User Experience perspective for the Average Builder too low. They are also much too low when compared to similar features in Competing games.

 

The cap that always infuriates people sooner than later, (simply because you will run into the issue before you hit the max deco cap), is the Local Area Deco Cap. It has not changed from 20 in about 4 years now, since basically release time. A massive wall or tower piece counts as 1, a single tiny candle counts as 1. Basically the Local Area Deco Cap is so low that it can be difficult as others have stated to build the tiniest of homes; (yes it's possible, but I have no understanding of why players of this game continually come out IN DEFENSE of keeping the existing caps as if they are the expert developer's of Anet's specific deco systems, verbally implying they favor forbidding any progress in this area when the caps are clearly too low from a basic User Experience point of view, and why they personally are having zero issues with it so it should not ever be upgraded... No one is not giving ANET credit for the system, we all appreciate the work Anet has done and is continuing to do in Other areas. We are simply asking after FOUR YEARS of zero progress in regards to limits that this part of the game Also continues to get some love to bring it back to what modern computers can do today, and what competing games are offering today.)

 

Please for the love of Balthazar increase the Local Area Deco Limit, provide guild admins a slider for both caps so they can be custom set for their hall and members, or literally any other option that would make this possible, including as a last resort pushing people's 10 year old mac book airs below minimum spec. Pls and ty.

 

~With love and respect, but with practicality and logic.