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

[Ruse]

The mentality makes absolutely no sense to me whatsoever.

I actually a guild chat about it in game today where I stepped around every argument making the whole complaint seem pretty stupid even to those who were regurgitating it. I honestly believe that this free new stuff is nothing more than an excuse that people are latching onto to express their evolved dislike or boredom with the game. The sad thing is that actual dislike and/or boredom of the game is understandable... games are not for everyone and after playing for periods of time, your emotions towards them can change (people come and go all the time for various reasons, and boredom is a big one in video game land).

I just wish people could take a step back and realize that they're problems are much deeper than "Anet went back on their promise," blah blah blah, whaah whaah whaah. The only argument that even makes a little bit of sense is that it hurts WvW players since there is no PvP exclusive answer to it... YET... but really, if that's all you do on GW2, maybe you'd have more fun with something else... like League of Legends, for example.

That's my opinion, anyway.

I'm sorry your guildmates aren't more articulate, but that doesn't mean you aren't still laughably off base.

I, and those guildmates of mine who quit, were logging in every day. We logged in struggling to decide what to do -- not because there wasn't anything we wanted to do, but because we had so much we DID want to do. Map completions? A dungeon? More WvW (this usually won out)? Maybe play on an alt for a change? We were having a blast.

If you really can't understand why somebody bought a game promising horizontal progression, then decides to bail when vertical progression is added less than three months in, I really don't know what to say. Age of Conan started out with gear mattering very little, too; and they went back on that, and stat gaps got more and more ridiculous and I had less and less fun. I've seen this scenario play out once. This ain't my first rodeo.

As to your, "You should have been playing LoL" comments -- Why? Why should I be playing a different game, when I was having an absolute blast in the game I was already playing? "Well if you were having such a good time in GW2, you should have been playing some other game." LOL what? Congratulations on generating the most ignorant argument I've seen yet on the topic.

That little "That's just my opinion" tagline doesn't mean you aren't being condescending as hell while trying to marginalize other people's objections to the game. You don't mind a new tier of gear? Bully for you. But stop trying to pretend people are upset for reasons they aren't. I don't speak for you; stop trying to speak for me and others.

[Vayne]

I'm sorry your guildmates aren't more articulate, but that doesn't mean you aren't still laughably off base.

I, and those guildmates of mine who quit, were logging in every day. We logged in struggling to decide what to do -- not because there wasn't anything we wanted to do, but because we had so much we DID want to do. Map completions? A dungeon? More WvW (this usually won out)? Maybe play on an alt for a change? We were having a blast.

If you really can't understand why somebody bought a game promising horizontal progression, then decides to bail when vertical progression is added less than three months in, I really don't know what to say. Age of Conan started out with gear mattering very little, too; and they went back on that, and stat gaps got more and more ridiculous and I had less and less fun. I've seen this scenario play out once. This ain't my first rodeo.

As to your, "You should have been playing LoL" comments -- Why? Why should I be playing a different game, when I was having an absolute blast in the game I was already playing? "Well if you were having such a good time in GW2, you should have been playing some other game." LOL what? Congratulations on generating the most ignorant argument I've seen yet on the topic.

That little "That's just my opinion" tagline doesn't mean you aren't being condescending as hell while trying to marginalize other people's objections to the game. You don't mind a new tier of gear? Bully for you. But stop trying to pretend people are upset for reasons they aren't. I don't speak for you; stop trying to speak for me and others.

The question is, Ruse, is this vertical progression something that is going to continue, or is it something that was, in the opinion of the devs and lots of players too, left out unintentionally.

It's a new game. They saw a gap. they filled the gap. That's what they're saying and that's what I think it is too.

There was too big a game from exotic to legendary in my opinion. And I don't CARE if legendary weapons are a bit more powerful, as long as it's not stopping me from doing content. If they were so much more powerful that I had to have one, well that would be a problem.

But as it is, I don't see. Even in WvW, roughly the same percentage of people on different servers should have acquired high end gear. It all should balance out.

[Ruse]

I'm not trying to talk you out of playing, Vayne. But suggesting that we're mad as hell about changes to a game we've supposedly secretly grown tired of just isn't logical. If you don't care much about something, you don't get angry when it turns out to be different than you thought. I used the analogy of being cheated on by some guy you don't really care about. Yeah, you're irritated, but really? Big deal. Being cheated on by the guy you were crazy about though? You don't ever want to see his face again, unless it's to break it for him.

Now obviously being lied to by a videogame company isn't on par with being cheated on. Still, the parallel of being angrier because you cared is still there.

To answer your question specifically, Vayne, if they thought it was missing all along they should have been up front about it. Anet is a huge media whore; there's no excuse not to inform people ahead of time. They were more than happy to ram manifestos and "Is it fun?" blog posts down our throats.

Getting max gear was designed to be relatively easy. They even lowered the original token costs on dungeon gear to back this fact up. It doesn't look like filling a gap to me; it looks like backpeddling on their original design principles. Maybe they won't screw you guys over with continued progression; for your sake, I hope they don't. Their credibility has gone down the crapper, though, as far as I'm concerned. It's a little hard to trust that "It's just this once." I feel like making another cheating analogy here, but I think you get the point.

[Vayne]

I'm not trying to talk you out of playing, Vayne. But suggesting that we're mad as hell about changes to a game we've supposedly secretly grown tired of just isn't logical. If you don't care much about something, you don't get angry when it turns out to be different than you thought. I used the analogy of being cheated on by some guy you don't really care about. Yeah, you're irritated, but really? Big deal. Being cheated on by the guy you were crazy about though? You don't ever want to see his face again, unless it's to break it for him.

Now obviously being lied to by a videogame company isn't on par with being cheated on. Still, the parallel of being angrier because you cared is still there.

To answer your question specifically, Vayne, if they thought it was missing all along they should have been up front about it. Anet is a huge media whore; there's no excuse not to inform people ahead of time. They were more than happy to ram manifestos and "Is it fun?" blog posts down our throats.

Getting max gear was designed to be relatively easy. They even lowered the original token costs on dungeon gear to back this fact up. It doesn't look like filling a gap to me; it looks like backpeddling on their original design principles. Maybe they won't screw you guys over with continued progression; for your sake, I hope they don't. Their credibility has gone down the crapper, though, as far as I'm concerned. It's a little hard to trust that "It's just this once." I feel like making another cheating analogy here, but I think you get the point.

This isn't what I'm saying at all, and I fear I've been grossly misunderstood. I'm not trying to say that your dlislike of vertical progression is a bad thing or not valid at all. I'm saying that I don't actually see this as vertical progression at all.

In other words, the game came out, there was a void they wanted to fill. That's it. That's not what vertical progression means, because this stuff should have been in the game from day one. They ran out of time to put in everything they wanted, and in fact, had the game launched with this, I don't think there's be this storm of discontent.

I see a vast difference between a company trying to fill in what they feel is missing and a game that's centered around vertical progression. They're not the same thing.

If they made this game about gear grind and vertical progression, I'd be as disillusioned as you are right now. I just don't believe that is what has happened here.

[Ruse]

We'll have to agree to disagree. :B Again, if this was their intention all along, they did a piss poor job of communicating it despite being very media savvy. It's also not all that easy to craft the backpieces and whatnot, either, or to acquire the highest tier of gear -- which was supposed to be relatively easy.

It just doesn't add up.

[Jim Hunter]

This isn't what I'm saying at all, and I fear I've been grossly misunderstood. I'm not trying to say that your dlislike of vertical progression is a bad thing or not valid at all. I'm saying that I don't actually see this as vertical progression at all.

In other words, the game came out, there was a void they wanted to fill. That's it. That's not what vertical progression means, because this stuff should have been in the game from day one. They ran out of time to put in everything they wanted, and in fact, had the game launched with this, I don't think there's be this storm of discontent.

I see a vast difference between a company trying to fill in what they feel is missing and a game that's centered around vertical progression. They're not the same thing.

If they made this game about gear grind and vertical progression, I'd be as disillusioned as you are right now. I just don't believe that is what has happened here.

I honestly think you are fooling yourself so you can continue to enjoy the game. Ruse's analogy fits pretty well there too lol.

If it really wasn't about vertical progression and they just felt like this gear with better stats was missing then why are they trying to stretch it out and only make it available through 1 path instead of just making this gear that "has been missing" available.

Before you jump all over the gear being available through 1 path, I know they have said they will be eventually adding new ways to acquire it but I have the feeling that will only come out when there is a new higher tier to grind for.

[Vayne]

We'll have to agree to disagree. :B Again, if this was their intention all along, they did a piss poor job of communicating it despite being very media savvy. It's also not all that easy to craft the backpieces and whatnot, either, or to acquire the highest tier of gear -- which was supposed to be relatively easy.

It just doesn't add up.

Well they have said in interviews that they're talking about raising the level cap in expansions. That's one thing. But I've never felt Anet was good at communicating at all. They communicate a lot, but they're not like a single unified entity. That is to say, there's not one Anet. It's a creative company with a ton of designers and they all don't agree on everything. Stuff that gets into the game sometimes has to go past opposing factions, even. There must surely be disagreements all the time. They can't think as one.

And they can't be all knowing either. So if they launch thinking, okay this worked on GW 1 we'll do the same thing and find people are leaving, or not playing and not logging in, they have to do something to fix that. That doesn't mean it was a long term intention.

The difference is, there really is a huge gap between the legendaries and exotics. I mean huge. If you're decked out in exotics, and you're done, for a whole lot of people that means being done with the game. Not me, and not you, but a whole lot of people. And you need a whole lot of people playing to support a staff of 270.

So they have to play it down the middle. Yes, give people progression so they'll actually stay and go for the stuff, but make it minimal so that people who don't want to won't be particularly disadvantaged. It's called a compromise.

The way people are talking, they are implying this was the intention all along. What if they stuck to their guns, lost most of their players and the game ended up not being able to have the content upgrades, or they had to start laying off people like SWToR and TSW had to?

We don't really know what goes on at Anet headquarters but I'm relatively sure this game isn't going to become a gear grind, because if you don't get that gear, you can still do everything.

Anyone who feels forced to get that gear is forcing themselves. I mean people even played WoW not feeling the need for gear, and that game had levels of gear actually required to do content. In Rift, you can't even queue for certain dungeons without meeting minimum gear requirements.

I just don't see anything like this happening here.

[Vayne]

I honestly think you are fooling yourself so you can continue to enjoy the game. Ruse's analogy fits pretty well there too lol.

If it really wasn't about vertical progression and they just felt like this gear with better stats was missing then why are they trying to stretch it out and only make it available through 1 path instead of just making this gear that "has been missing" available.

Before you jump all over the gear being available through 1 path, I know they have said they will be eventually adding new ways to acquire it but I have the feeling that will only come out when there is a new higher tier to grind for.

Well your feeling is as valid as mine. I suspect that there'll always be a higher level of gear that you have to work for that will be a tad better than the top level gear that's relatively easy to get. And I don't mind this, because it won't affect me.

Once they go to gear you need to do content, like how it was in Rift when I left, I'll be worried, but I just don't see it here. And no one can tell me there wasn't a huge gap between legendaries and exotics. A great big whopping hole. I think Anet really believed people would go for exotics for the cosmetics and were genuinely surprised at how many people weren't going to and didn't care, because there was no difference.

So then you have an end to gear progression for a big lot of people at exotics and for many, unfortunately, that's the time you stop playing.

Horizontal progression works for me, you and most Guild Wars 1 players. But if only Guild Wars 1 players stay with this game, it wont' be viable. The overhead is too high. There's too much competition.

I'm not fooling myself at all. I'm the one that's remembering Anet is a business and has a huge overhead. That's just being realistic. I'm enjoying the game, because I'm playing with my wife and friends and a great guild and having a good time. And everyone else in the guild is having a good time as well. There's no run of people in my guild leaving because of this, even those who played Guild Wars 1, which is a lot of us.

In fact, I think it's quite funny that you think I'm fooling myself to enjoy the game. I walked away from Rift I can walk away from Guild Wars.

But maybe it's because of my experience in Rift that i don't see what you do. Rift had gear grind, and this ain't it. Not yet, certainly.

[Ruse]

Actually, there were already plenty of rare weapon skins between the regular exotics (pearl crafted stuff, dungeon stuff) and legendaries. I can't find the complete list but here's a sampling. Some of those, like Foefire's Essence, are basically mini legendaries.

Just because they hid them behind a thoroughly opaque Mystic Forge system doesn't mean there aren't prestige skins already out there to bridge the gap. If they'd kept statistical parity between exotics and legendaries, the gap was already nicely bridged.

Point being, there was a ton of things they could have tried to get people who weren't logging in to come back. They could have tried just new content. They could have added things to the cash shop people have actually been asking for, like makeovers and name changes. They could have added new customization options, done a blog about the hidden unique skins, implemented ladders (for WvW individual prowess, for PvE prowess), implemented the Agony/Infusion mechanic only (without stat creep), etc.

But no. They went for adding bigger numbers to things

EDIT: You said yourself though that when you left Rift, you still had GW2 to look forward to. You don't have another game on the horizon ... consider that you may be more willing to give Anet a pass because of this.

[Jim Hunter]

Interesting you can say this.

I suspect that there'll always be a higher level of gear that you have to work for that will be a tad better than the top level gear that's relatively easy to get.

And this in the same post.

But maybe it's because of my experience in Rift that i don't see what you do. Rift had gear grind, and this ain't it. Not yet, certainly.

And you say there is no gear check and maybe that's why you don't see this as a gear grind but a gear check doesn't need to be someone standing in front of the dungeon not letting you in. Agony is a gear check, they said you will only be able to progress to a certain point before you are overwhelmed by agony if you are not infused.

This all directly leads to having content in the game that you cannot access without the highest level of gear. If that doesn't make it a gear grind for you then you will need to give me your definition because I am stumped.