ArenaNet: Linsey Murdock unveils High End Ascended Gear (2012-11-13)

[Centaur]

ArenaNet made the big mistake of giving legendaries a new level of stats. If legendaries had been at the same level of stats as exotics (and only differed in skin, as they were originally supposed to), there wouldn't have been a problem, and they wouldn't have needed to introduce ascended armor (now that they've discovered that people can obtain legendaries a lot easier/faster than was intended).
And imho the better solution would have been to either upgrade the stats on exotic armor, or downgrade the stats on legendaries. Both would probably have made some people (the group who farmed the legendaries for their stats) unhappy, but definitely not as much as introducing a new level of gear. And once all the ascended gear is introduced, nobody will want exotic gear anymore, as those stats will be inferior… so what’s the reason for NOT simply upgrading the exotic gear stats?
Regardless of how they introduce it, it will mean that people who spent a lot of time and money getting their current exotic gear, will be forced to go out and spend more time and more money on getting ascended gear... as their exotic gear will quickly become obsolete. In short: it is a gear treadmill.

[Centaur]

If they downgraded Ascended loot to exotic when outside of the Fractal that would be fine, but I don't think they'll be doing that.

That's not going to happen (not unless they downgrade legendary gear as well). Ascended gear is introduced because more and more people are obtaining Legendary gear, and the difference in stats will be a problem in the long run. So they want to bridge that gap. As I explained above, I don't really think this particular solution is the right one. I would much rather that they just upgrade all exotic gear to legendary stats and gave all gear an extra infusion slot (for those special purpose situations such as the fractal dungeon), making the addition of ascended gear completely unneccessary.

[StacyX]

In short: it is a gear treadmill.

I really hope not. The fact that you didn't have to grind gear was one of the best and most innovative parts of this game. The fact that Anet made it so that people didn't have to grind for gear or risk being left behind in PVP was fantastic. If the new gear throws that all out the window this is going to be extremely tragic for this game and totally flys in the face of what they seamed to have intended with this game from the start.

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In short: it is a gear treadmill.

I really hope not. The fact that you didn't have to grind gear was one of the best and most innovative parts of this game. The fact that Anet made it so that people didn't have to grind for gear or risk being left behind in PVP was fantastic. If the new gear throws that all out the window this is going to be extremely tragic for this game and totally flys in the face of what they seamed to have intended with this game from the start.

[Centaur]

Well, once they're finished with their multi-step program, you probably won't have to grind much for the next level of gear (that's why I was intentionally not using the word 'grind' in that post), but you will still have to get it. Your current exotic gear will be obsolete much faster than at the speed at which people were obtaining legendaries. And unless they allow everyone to upgrade their current exotic gear to ascended level stats for free, the upgrade will cost you time, money and/or karma. And frankly, I don't even care how much of that... even if ascended gear costs the same as exotic gear, it's the fact that you need to upgrade to not fall behind. In other words: get on the treadmill, or be left behind. And it's extremely disappointing to me that ArenaNet has chosen that road.

[Fey]

That's not going to happen (not unless they downgrade legendary gear as well). Ascended gear is introduced because more and more people are obtaining Legendary gear, and the difference in stats will be a problem in the long run. So they want to bridge that gap

This really doesn't make any sense. People with legendaries are just gonna get the new stuff too, it's not going to fix any gap. It'll still be there. This seems more like giving the game longevity more than balance.

[Centaur]

This really doesn't make any sense. People with legendaries are just gonna get the new stuff too, it's not going to fix any gap. It'll still be there. This seems more like giving the game longevity more than balance.

Actually, you're right that it doesn't make sense... guess I shouldn't start posting before I'm fully awake. I was thinking of legendary armor, but right now, there isn't any legendary armor available in the game... it's only legendary weapons (and those have higher stats than the exotic weapons).
Which makes the ascended gear even more unneccessary and unwanted, in my opinion. It's clear that ArenaNet are intending to release armor with better stats (legendary armor), and they're giving us ascended armor to make that gap smaller.
So yeah, this goes against everything they promised us in regard to only cosmetic gear above the max (exotic) level.

With all of this, I have lost my appetite to play the game, or even to see the upcoming Lost Shores content. Yesterday was the first time since headstart that I had the time and opportunity to play, but didn't feel like it.
I will be taking a break from this game, until I see how all of this turns out. I will still remain as moderator on this forum, though.

[Jim Hunter]

WvW aside one of the biggest problems is they just killed all the dungeons currently in game. What is the point of working your ass off for obsolete gear? Even if you feel inclined to run a dungeon just for the fun of it you are going to have a much harder time gathering people and about 0 chance pugging it.

[Fey]

WvW aside one of the biggest problems is they just killed all the dungeons currently in game. What is the point of working your ass off for obsolete gear? Even if you feel inclined to run a dungeon just for the fun of it you are going to have a much harder time gathering people and about 0 chance pugging it.

Gear isn't quite obsolete yet. You can't really get offset pieces from dungeons aside from random drops. So until they add in ascended armor sets, the other dungeons are still worth doing. The new armor sets they've mentioned aren't going to be better. But they are going to be gated since the whole agony thing will only help you in the new dungeon. So you'll need a specific amount to continue to progress through it.

Just waiting for them to reveal the rest and hoping it doesn't backfire ._.

[StacyX]

I will be taking a break from this game, until I see how all of this turns out. I will still remain as moderator on this forum, though.

I'm very glad to hear you'll still be moderating for us! I hope you'll be back playing the game eventually though.

[Jim Hunter]

Gear isn't quite obsolete yet. You can't really get offset pieces from dungeons aside from random drops. So until they add in ascended armor sets, the other dungeons are still worth doing. The new armor sets they've mentioned aren't going to be better. But they are going to be gated since the whole agony thing will only help you in the new dungeon. So you'll need a specific amount to continue to progress through it.

Just waiting for them to reveal the rest and hoping it doesn't backfire ._.

When I said they just killed the dungeons I didn't really mean right this second. I meant by adding the gear treadmill instead of leaving everything cosmetic they have just set it up so those dungeons will become obsolete.

Once there is armor with higher stats people will just buy the cheapest set of exotics they can get off the tp or just completely skip exotics and go straight to the dungeons offering the better armor.

So when we get new dungeons it's not that they are really adding new content for us to enjoy, instead they are leaving us with less to play because no one will want to do the old dungeons anymore.The only way they will keep those dungeons alive is if they offer some kind of incentive like very rare legendary drops or upgrading the armor you can get from exotic to whatever tier we are on at that point of the hamster wheel.