The New AI: The Unpragmatic Rationale

What is really dumb about this thread is that only a matter of weeks ago, I was reading threads where people were whinning that Guild Wars was never intended to be a Farming/Grind style game.

And now that A-net has taken a step towards slowing down such, people are whining about it taking longer and not being so easy to do...

A-net reads these boards people... They are trying to give their target player demographic what it wants. Last week you complained about people over-farming for rares, uniques, gold, rare skins, and Faction Points! Now you're complaining about actually having to work and think in order to accomplish exactly that!

Here is how I see it... If you are spending your time farming, then chances are pretty good that you aren't just a casual player. I'm a casual player. I play 2, maybe 3, hours a night. I only recently made it through Factions and it has taken me 3 months. Does that make me a noob? No. I've just been to busy playing the actual game and enjoying the social interactions, then being worried about pressing through it as quickly as I can so that I can go farm to get some fancy looking set of armor that has the same exact stats as the set I already have, but paid 1/10th of the price for. If it wasn't for the Farmers/Grinders, they wouldn't have needed to include 15k armor because there'd be little need for large gold sinks.

A-net wants the game series to appeal to the average gamer, which have jobs and families, thus only spend 10-16 hours a week playing. These gamers play to have fun and forget about the stress in their life, not to get uber items and unimaginable gold made of pixels. They want the game to be challenging so that they will feel that the $50 they spent wasn't wasted. And once they are bored of the game, they'll move on to something new. That's how the gamer demographics are, no matter what country or culture you are refering to.

And before I start getting flamed (which I know I will), I'm not talking out of my rear about this. I studied Game Art and Design through Westwood College. I know how the industry works and I know how game development companies target their marketing. They are doing exactly what they need to in order to appeal to their target market. If you don't like the changes, then chances are you are not (or are no longer) part of their target market.

JR
I love the new update. I think it is the best PvP update (SF update was the best PvE update).

But your logic does not make sense whatsoever. Why should he care about the 'game as a whole'??
He paid to play the game to entertain him not for some altruistic reasons.
He did not pay to make GW better. He paid to be entertained. The update is bad for him. That is what all that matters.

However!... the nerf to farming should not lead to people QQing about it. I'm sure people will find new ways to farm. They always have. I give it a week.

Not to mention people whinning about Chinese and Bot farmers. Now they fix it and see what happens... :/

IMO, this is still the best update since Sorrows Furnace.

I'm a little split on the numbers... I think they're a bit distracting, but they're far better then the ones we had before.

yeah, I like the new changes.

The new position of the money takes some time getting used to though, but in a few weeks we're laughing at ourselves for crying about it.

The numbers really are just a tad too big. When running a MM, they're all I can see on my screen, and I honestly never had a problem with the old numbers. I love that they're trying to make the game look more polished, even in the small aspects, but...maybe an option to scale them back a little?

And as for the skill icons popping up over your head, you can change that back to text in your options menu (I did...once again, 17 months of the old system and I'm kinda used to it).

Can someone post a screen of the numbers. People at work havent seen the new stuff yet

i lve the big numbers lol

I like the changes as well. ITs very informative now.

I like the changes I found the bigger numbers make it easier to see what is going on and the skill icon just show why you lost that amount.

That is double the work for the developers.

I'm not at home to log in, but I read that you can turn off the combat feedback if you don't like it. I for one like being able to see my damage because I like to zoom out when i fight so I can see other mobs & where they are going & doing.

This is an awesome update. Monsters are less retarded than they were and PvE doesn't feel like as much of an exploit-fest.

That being said, everywhere I farm remains untouched. Ranger FoW forest, elementalist titan farming, runs through talmarck with my ranger, trapping in the UW, all untouched. The people whining about this need to move on, try other builds, and quit whining.

I'm actually looking forward to the oppurtunity to get a full group in the UW instead of 2 manning everything.

QFT

some areas can still be farmed, you just have to take on smaller groups. You just wont make money as fast.

All of the "end of Guild Wars" and "I'm quitting" talk is a bit much.
Anet has made changes before that weren't popular and people adapted.
Farming nerfs happen deal with it.

Most people posting are acting as if you cannot possibly play the game without gold or expensive weapons and armor.
This is not true.
Yeah, yeah...15k looks great and I want to flaunt my status, but get over yourselves.
Anet is now making you work for the best items in the game. While the casual player (me) will suffer, the best armor and weapons will become more prestigious.
Instead of whining and declaring the end of the world...stop being lazy and figure out a build that will allow you to farm your favorite areas.
In a game with hundreds of skills and thousands of combinations, there will be something that works.
Since all of the hardcore farmers out there are so "leet" or "pro," you should have no problem with that.

If you are too lazy to do that or not as "leet" as you claim to be, just wait.
You can bet, in a few weeks time, there will be that solo farm build that works against the new AI (thank you chinese/bot farmers). Then all will be "right" with the world.

Grimarren is on point. People have been complaining for months about how easy it is to farm this and that, and how the value of greens and rare weapons have plummeted. A change to correct this has been made and it's mass hysteria.
I welcome the change. I will make the game more challenging as well as open the pool for people to do missions and questing, as opposed to solo farming. This will make for a better gaming experience.

I'm a PVE player - but I dont like to farm


*both* henchies and monsters AI was improved


I'm happy with the update
- Henchies perform better
- Monsters are more challenging

Or you could read the update for a change...

The thing that makes farming big mobs impossible now is that everything runs away with even 1 AoE spell. Tell me, how do you want to farm when every1 runs away just by doing 1 single spell?

What Anet's doing now is making gold harder to get, and items are harder to get now as well, as a result, there will be less supply in Gold and Items, so things will start to become worth more. Just look at the ecto prices - it's been only 1 day and the price raised with 2K already.

Also, we don't need all the luxury to play the game, but buying a good Rune of Superior Vigor would help big time with just playing the game, but Anet decided to make it rather impossible to get as a drop, and 'farming' for it (which will become killing groups of 2 monsters, I guess) will take alot of time.

So yeah, you could say the normal thing 'ohh but you can do without the rune of Superior Vigor', but that's not how it works, we can also play the game without any armor at all, while we're at it. But I don't think it'll make things easier.

Of course, if Anet was smart, they'd just let monsters drop more loot when you're in a party, so everyone can get some cash, and not only the rich people.

Anyone else see a problem with this statement? Assuming 10 million "cash not ecto no dye, cash and cash":

1 million in bank + 100k on each character...
means 90 characters. How many of us have 90 characters?

So i doubt your claim and defy you to prove it.


Anyway, overall I'm pretty pissed with the overall nerf to farming. It seems that ANET has gone after bots and instead wound up screwing us all over. I expect material prices to increase a fair amount, and if you've noticed, blue and red dyes are already SOLD OUT.

I'm pissed, but not discouraged. We have 300 new skills to work with. Many skills target many foes and AREN'T AoE. We'll figure it out.

1: Run up to monster
2: Hit monster repeatedly
3: When monster moves, continue hitting it
4: Pick up loot
5: Rinse
6: Repeat
7: Wipe hands on pants

It's still plenty easy to get gold and plenty easy to farm. It will, however, require a bit more thought. At any rate, slowing down the rate at which thousands of bot farmers inflate the economy with ebay gold can't eb THAT bad an idea, eh?

Everyone isn't SUPPOSED to be rich. Everyone can't have a superior vigor rune. There just aren't enough to go around. The high prices price poorer folks out of the market. Armor,on the other hand, has a fixed price, and a relatively low one at that. If you can't manage to pick up 7.5k by the time you need to buy max armor, well, I suggest you spend more time playing the game instead of getting run everywhere.

Here's what the AI improvements (as far as the AoE change) means for the PvE player:

Monsters are now far smarter than their human 'real' counterparts. They run out of AoE spells when they notice they're getting hurt unlike 'real' players who stand there and keep expecting the monks to heal their stupidity.

I can certainly understand how that pisses a lot of people off. However, it's a good thing for those of us who actually PLAY the game without incessantly bitching because our cushy little farm build/area takes a hit.

Understand now? BoofrickinHoo.

You can only have 1 million in cash in your stash and 100k on each of your characters.
But alot of players also have tons of stashed items, materials, dyes, ectos, shards, etc.

Yes indeed but that requires real effort and sometimes even thought, not just copying 55 monk builds and press the right buttons. Thats way too hard for some people.
I've always found farming the most tedious, boring waste of game time I ever experienced yet I managed to make well over 500K in this game, equip several characters with 15K armors and buy whatever I needed over time.

QFT and yet I'm willing to bet the whiners will just go on whining

Seriously... Every time Anet changes some AI mechanic, nerfs a popular farming ground or build this entire forum gets filled with flames, whines and complaints. Are there still some people here that actually think an update like this will put an end to farming? The end of farming was forecalled when Flesh Gollems first got nerfed, it was said to have happened when the first invinci-monk got nerfed, same again when they changed AoE or the torch trick... But what do you know... It's still here and it's still big as ever.

Farming has been around forever and will stay around forever. How can you possibly complain when within the day you're getting access to a 300 new skills that make new farmbuilds possible and an entire new continent filled with new goodies and farmgrounds?

This update changes some farmgrounds and some farmbuilds, it doesn't kill farming at all... Now can we move on and please notice how awesome this update is?

Besides, superior vigor runes are just like 15k armors: they're for prestiege. Honestly, how many of you can justify 30k for 9hp? Soak that up.

...I have been waiting months for someone to say that. The Droknar run is one thing, for people who've been through the storyline once or twice already and just want to get some max armor to make their third, fourth or twentieth tour a bit easier. But it's turned into a run EVERYWHERE. I'm sick of seeing lvl 6's being run through ascension. I'm tired of level 10's in Naphui wondering why they can't get a group. Well said!

when NF launches tonite,
you can do "To Dye For" quest over and over and over again with different new chars --- takes less than 15min (including gettin past the 1st mission)

Heh-heh-heh, I LOVE THIS PATCH !!!

I have "one of each" character, overnight have tested my multiple farming builds and did not find much troubles. A few builds are dead, so what? Look at your skills and be a little bit creative. Yeah, runs now a bit longer...

Only dumb farmers without any sign of brain were affected. Now monsters are "smarter" and have higher IQ then some farmers, LOL.

Good luck whining.

Well met!

1. IMHO, if monsters act more intelligently, then the game is improved.
The game was challenging, now it is more so. This is good.
The focus of the game is even more on skill as opposed to the
accumulation of gold and fancy gear. This is good.
The quality of the experience is more important than the material gain.
People who have lives do not necessarily lack the patience to enjoy the
natural evolution of a player's and/or character's development.

2. See above. Also, it is my understanding that one of the major undrelying
concepts behind the creation of Guild Wars was eliminating the need for
"farming" and/or "grind" to develop viable characters. To now complain
because Guild Wars has done this is illogical.

3. See above. The consequences, again IMHO, will hopefully be that Guild
Wars will continue its encouragement of skill and creativity and resist
any "realistic concerns" to be more like some other game (WoW).
In my experience, joining a good PvE guild makes every aspect of the
game easier and more enjoyable, and renders the "need" for farming moot.

Melandru's blessings!

+9 hp has nothing to do with prestige.
+9 hp is not visible to other characters.
+9 hp affects your performance in game.

those digits do feel a tad big...

Funny how I seem to have lasted for 17 months without a single Sup Vigor rune.

+9 hp is 4 seconds of -1 degen. Parasitic Bond > Sup Vigor.

They look perfect on my monitor, but I have extremely high resonolution on my 21" widescreen monitor. Would be nice if you could adjust the 'font pitch' or size of the numbers. I actually like seeing what damage i'm doing, was harder for me to see before, now I can see when I need to swap axes if i'm not paying attention or get distracted based on knowing about what damage I 'should' be doing...I can now see when I haven't changed axe types for various mob/armor conditions.

Following all the whining about the AI change to the enemy, skill changes and aoe stuff, I logged on last night to see it for myself.

After downloading all 4000+ files, I jumped into a UW 8 man pug as a monk to check it out myself. Typical unorganized pug - headed by a mesmer who had never been there, a no-stance heal sig+mending only 1st time warrior, a SS necro, 2 eles, a mending/heal party monk, another first time monk and my monk. The only thing unusual was there were 3 monks instead of 2. So I went in expecting the worst as the eles started burning and aggroing w/ flare, and the mending monk ran around aimlessly, the warrior starting to quake at the thought of lvl 29 mobs.

Surprisingly hardly anyone died, the bladed aatxes seem to run around maybe a tiny bit more than usual, but they always seemed to return to the warrior. He hardly died though as we had 3 monks on him and he was to naive to think he might die (2 of us were carrying prot spirit).

Anyway, it was almost too easy to make it to the chamber in which someone grabbed all 3 quests. Seemed like another typical pug run to me. Especially since I was expecting quite a aggro nightmare w/ the new update.


So Back in TOA, i hop on my SS necro and join a pug going to FOW. It was another typical pug, grab some guys and go - none of that skill chech crap =). We had 2 monks, a mes, 2 ele nukers w/ m shower, 2 warriors and my echo SS necro.

So the run seems to go pretty normally, I'm throwing SS on everything and getting used to these huge screen hogging yellow numbers pop up everywhere. Eles are nuking, mobs are dying, shards are dropping. Nothing new. By the time we finish the first quest our warrior has dropped and so has the other monk.

We decide to continue on our merry way, our monk is excellent and loves a good challenge, both eles have some heals, I brought BR and blood wells.

That's when we start noticing that the FOW mobs really, really love our warrior. I mean, they can't keep off of him. In fact versus the first group of icehands, hardly any maelstroms or lighting spikes hit us at all.

We weren't all that careful about aggro either. We always let our lone warrior go in first, but our aggro always overlapped as we would be about 1/2 aggro behind him. Before the update, the skeletal beserkers would chain aggro right to the monk or ele, but last night they woud just run straight for our warrior. I'd cast my SS, the nukes would start falling and the mobs would prety much suicide themselves to death. They might run away a few times, but not far, and would almost eagerly run right back into the meteor showers where the tank was.

This became really noticaeble when we hit the infernul worms area in FOW, we felt pretty invincible by then, just sending off our tank into packs of abyssmals, monks and warriors. Then nuking+SS would finish them off really, really quickly. By then aggro was pretty intense and w/ one monk our warrior died a few times. The funny part is, the aggro would break and they would come for us. But one of our eles would ressurect the warrior, and as soon as the warrior was back up, all the loose abyssmals and shadow warriors would immediately turn around and make a beeline right back towards the warrior. Of course we'd all run in and start nuking again. It was hilarious, if the warrior was up, that's all the mobs seem interested in attacking.

I had never had a simpler time clearing the infernul worm area, in a group of 6 w/ 1 monk no less.

And the sipder caves where usually you get interrupted half a dozen times by the spiders + poison on everyone. Well, once again I could be standing right in the middle as the spiders drop down and they would only be interseted in attacking the warrior. I didn't get interrupted once. In fact the casters were almost never a target, and we all know how loved by mobs mesmers usually are.

The entire run it was almost as if our warrior was carrying an invisible aggro book.

Anyway, we went on to clear out the burning forest and free the eternal hero w/ just a group of 5 after the mesmer had to leave. A 5 man pug doing what other top quality 2 monk pugs I've been in have never been able to do. Sure we all had degen on us, but the melee mobs tended to stay on our warrior, even when they ran away from aoe. That and we knew when we should run. Never had so much fun in fow before heh.

The only time we observed some really interesting aoe behavior, was on a group of icehands + berserkers (we had accidentally aggro'd a extra patrol), SS was taking them down, nukes were falling, and at about 50% health, the entire enemy mob just sort of exploded outward - the beserkers just spun around and charged us casters, immediately maelstrom, lighting and chaos storms dropped on us. We ran around a bit, and all the enemy seemed to return right back to the warrior.


In the end, we cleared the 2 hardest areas in fow, cleared the forgemaster, saved the wailing lord, escorted the griffons and bagged about 25 shards and dozens of golds. And never had an easier time of it.

I don't know.. is this due to the updates for where the enemy will keep attacking a player they think is going to die? Or their more persistent aggro that I keep hearing about (they just couldn't get enough of our warrior, or whoever obtained first aggro)? Or did the 2 trips I went on just bug out?

Well you could've also lasted 17 months without armor at all. Runes are things that improve your gameplay, they aren't just things to show off with.


Also, what's with all the 'start PLAYING the game' in this thread, you guys want to say that gathering gold to buy something in the game is NOT playing the game? 15K armor and perfect weapons aren;t in the game for nothing, how is it wrong to collect gold to buy them? Well it's okay when you say that you only play the game when doing missions or quests, but just do every friggin mission 12 times like I did, and you'll be bored with 'playing the game'.

Heh my experience isn't quite like that, but I haven't done uw or fow yet. Instead in SF I have to chase the friggen priests clear across the rooms. They just take off running as soon as they know they've been targeted. Can be annoying when you target them, they take off, and look there go your henchies on after him. By the time I get the hench flag down for them to run back, they had already invited 4 more mobs to join the fray :S Ah well, other than a few bugs in it the henchies do seem smarter. Though I'd think they'd fix the monk rezzing by now. Seriously do both monks really need to rez the SAME guy? And do they have to do it while the rest of the party is being slaughtered?

I have noticed the Warrior centered aggro, however I haven't seen much of the scattering that people have been talking about. One problem I have faced is the monks no longer want to rez...I actually have to put a flag right on my corpse just to get rezzed now.

Exactly. I don't do farming myself; I've completed the game with 5 characters (3xproph and 2xfactions). Money is easy to come by, by simply doing quests and missions (do an experiment: just play thru the game normally with a character, you'll find yourself with about 30k when you're finished). I don't have thousands of ectos or millions of gold stored away, but guess what, I don't need them. Collectors, and the now easier-to-salvage mods can easily get a character up to snuff. Heck, I even have two full and one partial 15 armor sets; all you need to do is finish two campaigns with the same character and you'll surely have enough money and materials to equip that char with 15k armor.

Bottomline is: there's no reason to farm in this game (and no reason to buy ebay gold), other than getting the omfgwowbbqwtfuberleet weapon skins, or the obsidian armor (both of which are totally uneccessary, anyway), or perhaps some title or another. So, if you're in the niche that wants those (or worse yet, if you believe you NEED those), get ready to sweat a little more, and leave behind the solo/duo farming mentality. - Or maybe not, maybe all that's needed is some time for people to adapt and find other ways of exploiting the system...

Don't really have a problem with the new numbers, though an option for the old style would be nice.

I'd like to be able to turn off the text too if I want.

Bugs:

• Old dyes not stacking with new dyes.
• Inventory items that have been dyed (like collector shields, chaos axes, etc) do not show the colored they were dyed on the inventory icon.
• I can no longer make a pale lavender color due to no dye remover, which made things transparent a bit.

Requests

• Add in a mappable keyboard shortcut for turning the mouseover info windows on and off.
• Allow us to use command keys (shift, ctrl, alt) + another key for keymapping.

Ok, a couple things to touch on here.

To the comment of the effect on the economy.
Initially prices will go up, sure, its the reaction you would expect from a society in which the future promise of a good or service has suddenly become scarce. Given a little time, those who want to sell their goods/service will find less of an audiance capable of supporting their price. So now they have two choices, not sell or sell cheaper.

So either you're not having items change hands, or prices will come down to meet the now adjusted high-end player's ability to earn. Basic economics.

To those saying this encourages Ebay usage.
This is just an inherant part of human nature, not a direct effect due to a video game. People want what is considered desirable. There are currently two ways of gaining those desirable items. Earn them, Ebay them. Given that humans, in an unchecked environment, will opt towards the easiest method. That's human nature, not ANet's programmers intentions.

The problem is players are greedy, and impatient. You can see that in each and every post complaining about the AoE "nerf" or farming "nerfs." People who had become accustomed to an easier method of obtaining wealth or an easier method of engaging an enemy are finding their old methods not quite as effective.

The average player may WANT FoW Armor, Crystalline Swords and Superior Vigor Runes, but these items are NOT intended for them by the game programmers. Its a high end item, for the most dedicated of players. It should be a small percentage of players who have this. Its a status symbol, and nothing more.

You can *gasp* beat the game without farming. I know, I've done it twice before I ever figured out what farming was. And back then, I was definately not a "hard core" player, I barely knew what I was doing.

If you want a coveted item, you have to accept that you need to invest a LOT of time and effort into it. It's a very real-world concept, which is why I think some people are unable to grasp it yet. Guild Wars isn't a game of "Mommy buy me this! I want! I want!"


To the AoE changes directly
You mean my enemies now realise that when a continuous amount of damage comes from a certain source, they move away from it?

To think, it only took about a year and a half to get the neurons to signal from the hand, to the spinal column and back that the hot pan needs to be dropped...

To say that you would want your enemy to stay in place and recieve massive amounts of damage while you would (hopefully) move away from such a thing is hypocritical and elludes to the greed and desire to have things easy as I stated before.

So the enemy has a little better perception of self-presivation and isn't your personal suicidal group of targets? That's called an improvement.


To those saying the end of soloing/dualing.
Do me a favor. Look at your party-forming window and tell me how many slots are availible? Also, I do remember a little popup warning that would say "this mission is inteded for X amount of characters, are you sure you want to proceed?" I must say, I'm shocked that ANet is actually reinforcing this element of the game.... Shocked and knocked down.

If you first invented a particular solo or dual build, congradulations, it took a little work, I know. To those that might have also created similar builds seperately without any knowledge of the established builds, congradulations as well. But beyond that is where it ends. You found a narrow exploit (exploit not used in the 'bad' sense), but now the game has changed.

Those that actually create the builds, I'm sure they're a little miffed, but in the end, they can just make a new one. After all, they did it before. The reality I'm seeing is those who simply coppied another person's build now are left in the cold, and those are the most vocal of the group. You were using a borrowed idea, and now its changed, you really have no room to complain.

It isn't just a suggestion that there are certain party numbers for certain areas. Hell, you don't see a "Would you like to join a party of 8 or a party of 1-7?" For Fort Aspenwood or Jade Quarry.

---

The game is evolving, and in my opinion, its getting better.

Have no farmers ever heard the word "Snare"?

So it takes a bit more skill now instead of standing in one spot and spamming skills. Use a bit more imagination and come up with some better builds.

I bet it's cause he had mending. *adds it to skills*

You're right, +9 hp isn't visible to other players because it's usually gone in one hit. Is that worth 30k? One more hit? Major vigor runes are just as good, but many players insist on having "perfect" items.

Hello gold sink.