ANet: Get rid of the "locked door" concept in Nightfall

Simply put, I love the locked gates. They're one of my favorite features of Factions.

I got so sick when I'd try and do a mission in the desert, and there are more people (significantly) looking for a runner, than doing the actual mission.

Although it might have been my fourth or fifth character through there, for others, it might be their first. That from a "fair play" stance is a big motivator for me to keep it as is.

That, and frankly, I hate the spam of "LFR" so damn much.

Play the game, replay the game, replay and replay. No more "level less than 18s" running around in high-end areas. Learn your character.

I'm kind of torn on this issue. On the one hand I liked being to skip through missions that I had already played 3+ times, and didn't feel like alot of the runs ruined the game because of how difficult they were so not just anyone could run them (Drokanrs, Granite, etc..). On the other hand, you started to see people getting run through ascalon, then to beacons, then to Droknars, then to Sanctum Cay, etc.. for what? just to be at the end?

I guess I'd like to see a middle of the road route, possibly allow paths to be open only with longer more difficult multi-zone runs, but not open enough to allow players to skip through the entierity of the game in a couple of hours. Maybe even something like gate guards that would charge a small fee "to get by" to players who had already pased that point in the game on another character, but who would deny entrance to players who had not.

*shrugs*

I like the locked gates, but I think in many ways Factions was too restrictive. The areas your characters were restricted to until they had done mission X were too small. I don't want to be forced to do missions simply to get into a new area for exploration and screenshots

If there were locked gates at certain points (I agree with the one in Raisu palace), appropriate points, in the storyline while allowing nice big areas for exploration, it would be nice.

Actually, I DID read your post. Just because you have completed the game on a warrior(example), it does not mean you know how to play a mesmer well. By playing through the storyline you gain experience and try different skill combos. If the gates unlocked then you could just go straight from Kaineng City to Raisu Palace. Also, a low level character can NOT do as well as a high level character. A level 3 cannot max out a single attribute to 16 can it? A level 20 with 200 attribute points would be more effective than any other level. The reason the gates are so good is that after a point all you get are level 20 players. Its a shame that point doesnt come before Nahpui Quarter. Maybe a few gates later on in the game could be unlocked, but not the ones before everyone reaches level 20.

I think the anti runner guys and the ones suggesting "play it again sam" either must be incredibly patient or are making a massive assumption that those who get runs have never even played the game once.

In fact I'd wager the majority of people who get run have in fact completed the game (either chapter) at least once and just don't want the hassle of being forced to replay various bits over and over again to get to the parts they enjoy.

How many times must someone be forced to play again? Especially given Factions has hardly lent itself well to parties (just working my monk through it now, almost all done with henches from lack of real players anywhere. That's not exactly interesting or fun for me, play online game with bots.. big woop!)

One time? Agreed. Twice? Well, possibly... Three? Four? Five? Six? No thanks. I think the ones who get run through on their first ever play of the game are most likely to be in the minority, and rubbish players will get through anyway being carried by groups that fight their way through. So that argument is moot.

To further hammer the point home: later missions still have the useless/not very good players (when you do finally get a human team) even despite the anti runner aspect of Factions so... it's had no effect.

Hate to break it to you, but having locked gates does nothing for levels - I've seen level 16 at Tannakanai Temple and beyond. the longer the game is around, the more people will take shortcuts, just like in prophecies.

The farthest you can get in the game without doing missions is Arborstone. Whether or not you would be able to skip the first few missions permenantly I don't know. The closed gate can't not be bypassed in certain circumstances.

Locked gates should be account based and not character based. You have to complete every mission at least once on your first play through, but after that they become unlocked for all subsequent characters.

I have 6 character, it feels like a grind just getting them through factions so I can get to more interesting things. The reason I liked Guild Wars in the first place is the amount of player freedom it gave you to do what you like, with factions it seems they took all of that away.

The only complaint against changing locked gates (to suggestion mentioned in first paragraph) seems to be "So I don’t have to put up with runners spamming" I find that extremely selfish, that a large proportion of players can no longer play the game in the way they enjoy just because it’s a minor inconvenience to you. Maybe they should remove the ability to trade to so we don't have to put up with all the "WTS" spam?

keep the locked doors

i like it. it filters out noobs and lazy bums. people should work harder in order to progress in the game. otherwise, go play the sims.

I agree.
Initially this is just another boohoo topic really. 'Oh noez I can't run or throw together a bunch of chars instantly cause I have to do the song and dance.' I hope they stay. It was a smart idea to add them. Additionally, there's already a few runners here and there as it is, so it's not like the locked door situation ceased some of the speed-up process. Last I checked this is isn't Let's-See-How-Lazy-I-Can-Be Wars.

i personally hated the locked doors and thety stopped me from exploring, and im tired of people saying that you MUST work for the exploration rewards in factions, gw is a game i can work at home i dont want too, though in a game. i think that the locked gates should be non existent in nightfall, and instead have barriers like in tyria (sanctum to desert and thunderhead to fire islands), yet still keep end game reward, which you should only get if you beat all the missions and primary quests.

I love and hate this new concept.I hate it because it takes me alot longer to beat the game,but I love it because it made me feel more pride after I beat it.Factions should also be harder to beat because there is an end-game reward worth a pretty penny.

As for being in Nightfall,I think it should be there in certain spots where really neccassary.

Just set it up like in the first game, prophecies pve rocks.

Locked gates were good for me because it made my guildies get bored with Factions PvE almost immediately, and start doing PvP much more. I enjoyed Prophecies PvE but PvP is where my heart truly is.

Of course it was very painful for many of us, myself included, to realize how repetitive and grind-filled Factions PvE was. We were all looking forward to the new PvE. Yet it was a letdown in many ways. It wasn't merely the locked gates. There are many run-around-endlessly quests in Factions. The locked gates merely force you to do these quests. This hinders replay since many people couldn't face the thought of doing all of those quests and missions again with another character. And these were people who were very hardcore PvEers in Ch. 1, with multiple accounts and many chars. So instead of playing PvE they started to PvP in earnest.

However the downside to this is that some of them are saying they won't even bother buying Nightfall. Because why buy a game that is boring and you don't want to play more than once? Of course to remain competitive in PvP I will be getting Nightfall, and I want my guildies to be able to play the new classes in PvP as well. But for my guildies the choice is not as clear cut. If I play through it and it turns out that they made the PvE fun and exciting then I am sure I will be able to persuade them to buy it. Otherwise, I doubt they will bother at all.

/not signed

Arenanet, although they've said they don't dislike running, would rather you have to earn your cool armor instead of having a friend run you there. They want all characters from that campaign to be "belanaced" with each other. No low level characters should have high end armor or elite skills.

lol shin, I WAS exaggerating, mainly to mirror how the whiners act, as a sort of slap to the face anyway, I also did the leet speak because it is a little bit more funny, and my message was not directed at you it was a most general statement about the whining population that sems to infest these forums which you had (hopefully only temporarily) thrown yourself into. Have a nice day

I'm all for removing the gates, mainly because the exploration. There's no areas in Factions that were there just really the sake of finding them. Now, some people say, "It's not GW, if you want to explore PvE world, play some other game." But it's just not true - the exploration factor was there in GW: Prophecies. And I loved it, love to find the weird out-of-place outposts and areas with little to do with the actual game progress.

And come Factions, the game area got more "dense" and got filled with mobs. Can't say I appreciated that. Here's to hoping for some more exploration and larger map area without the "density" in Nightfall: signed, I guess.

And find cool bosses like Rotscale!

he probably was one of those people that rushed through the game in a week, complained that it sucked cause it wasn't a prophoices clone or a WoW clone, then didn't play anymore.

Please, stop with the comments about "whiners." Seriously. Some of the people here have very strong opinions or legitimate complaints and are not whining as you see it. Sure there are some complaints with people who whine, but there are a majority that are solid complaints. If you been here long enough, this place is populated with hardcore players who have the spine to tell what is wrong or right about the game. It has always been that way and they were never afraid to express it. They never whine like babies. Most of the changes in the game were caused by the people in this forum because they weren't scared to give the hard-hitting answers. Some good, some bad, depending on the person. If you can't take the strong opinions of some players, maybe this is not the place for you.