GWEN...new title GRIND!

Between Ecto buyers and "pre-ground" characters? Nothing, they're both cheaters and should be banned immediately. Except the titles and any added bonuses the "pre-ground" characters have is a meaningless certificate.

A trophy is a hunk of metal without the deed.
A certificate is a piece of paper without the knowledge.
And any titles the "pre-ground" character may have is just a bunch of digital text. If that includes any bonus PvE skills... then I would feel pretty cheated.

But then the problem isn't the PvE skills isn't it, it's the cheater who purchased the "pre-ground" account.

Putting your fingers in your ears and singing "la la la" does not constitute a rebuttal.

And you're quite fine with the corruption of the game for those that beleive in the spirit of competition.

When someone can finish the deep 25% faster (a perfect example of an area that many of the new pve skills are ideal for) because they spent hundreds of hours grinding, the playing field is far from level.


And the people got it by using their noggin instead of "working" don't deserve it?

Kill counts are just as purchasable as gold or rank, there is no difference other than in your mind.


I'm not attacking you, I'm calling the stance that pve is not competitive a naive one because it deliberately ignores plain as day facts about how the game works.

You say that as though you've never heard of the power-leveling services that you're trying to create business for.

I thought power-leveling is someone else doing the killing and the cheater just standing there. I don't think that raises any kill counts for the cheater does it?

And which title does power leveling raise?

Do a Google search. Basically, you give them your account and some money in order to pay them to get you to level X and they hire some kid in China to spend however many hours leveling your account and give it back at level X. Or maybe they just steal your account, if you pick a "bad" company.

The prevalence of use of such services depends some on the amount of grinding in the game. If the grinding doesn't give an in-game advantage, then companies are less inclined to sell it, as no one would buy it. I don't know if there are companies out there selling GWEN title grinding, but if there aren't yet, there will be soon.

It's a little harder than buying gold, and certainly just as illegal (against the EULA or whatever), but it does exist.

Man, that sounds terrible. I had no idea such market exist.

But still they should increase their efforts to flush out this kind of action instead of taking away the titles. Otherwise it'll be like removing gold completely because someone is purchasing them.

People actually give their account info like that? :O I assumed power levelers just took you somewhere with difficult monsters and ran around killing while you sit back and drink up the XP.

But I'm veering off topic, assuming this thread still has one.

If you create enough demand for something (e.g., "I want max titles without grinding"), economics dictates that you'll create a black market for it.

I certainly agree that ArenaNet should try to catch and ban people who get their account leveled that way. They almost surely do so already. At the very least, if an account gets stolen that way, they're not inclined to help the would-be cheater get it back. See, for example:

I don't think use of such power-leveling services is common in Guild Wars. But they are important for what they say about a game. A game that too much demand for power-leveling is filled with monotonous grinding, and is not a good game.

Checking prices (without buying anything) gives useful information about a game. If they charge $40 to get a Guild Wars character to the level cap, $600 to do the same in WoW, and $2000 for Lineage, guess which game has more grinding. This is kind of like using the Iowa Electronic Markets to correct for errors in the polls and get the best possible information about who will be the next US President.

You seem to insist that this is a competition to see whose the bestest best player in the entire game. Why should it matter so much? If I see someone with a KoaBD title, does that mean I'm lagging behind and I need to get crackin at that title? What if I don't care about it?

And when another team finishes the Deep 25% faster than you, does that make it harder when you enter behind them? When they're done with their run, everything resets for you.

People with their crafty noggins can play better, but what about players who aren't so crafty? They're shit outa luck? The game has a relaxed environment because it doesn't force people to join the rat race competition you're talking about. A newbie 12 year old player can get just as far as a veteran 40 year old player can, even if he can't create the ultimate godlike build like you can.

Kill counts? I wasn't aware people were willing to illegally hand their accounts over to strangers to rake up kill counts. First of all, that's illegal, and like I said, removing titles because of this would be like removing gold because someone can buy gold. The problem is the cheater, not the product their buying.

Unless of course, you're talking about some other legitimate ways to buy kill counts that I'm unaware of...

Calling me Naive is offensive. I don't take that lightly. I play my game the way I want to play, I don't feel inadequate because I have lower ranks or that my PvE skills aren't as powerful. I play at my own pace and know that in the end, it's just about having fun.

But don't go thinking I'm trying to tell you how to play your game. You can play it just the way you like it. Except between us, I'm not the one saying the game is broken. I'm merely suggesting that you can relax and play at your own pace. Take it or leave it, I just don't think someone having more elite weapons and titles shouldn't mean squat to anyone other than the player who earned it themselves.

Actually I have no idea, I'm sorta new to this information. Which website shows these numbers? My guess is Lineage since it's more expensive...

To the contrary, if a significant fraction of the playerbase finds actually playing the game to be so onerous as to be willing to pay someone else to play it in their place, the product is a problem.

Linking gold-selling sites is probably against (or at least should be against) forum rules. Do a Google search for power leveling and you'll find plenty.

I would say the player have chose the wrong game. They should see if they're interested in an alternative game. Not everthing is for everyone...



This is some heavy duty stuff. Apparently its $20 a level for GW and $30 a level for Lineage for the span of about 5-10 days. The site I found even said they've terminated their WoW-Power leveling service due to having too many accounts banned, lol. It's like I stepped into some serious black market stuff here.... I feel so dirty!

There is unlimited demand for in game items and a limited supply. As soon as that situation arises there is competition. When you give competitive advantages to one group of the comunity at the expense of another, there's a problem.

They can use their 25% more gains to outcompete me for the limited supply of items in the game.

Prior to grind skills, there was no in game advantage available to anyone crafty or not.

You're in it whether you like it or not. The only way to make guildwars noncomptetitive would be to
1) Remove all player to player trades.
2) Fix the price on all npcs.
3) Not allow pugging.
4) Remove all pve leaderboards.
5) Remove town ownership
6) Remove all player to player communication.


The point of all that was to rebutt the your assertion that time spent grinding killcounts is somehow superior to any other measure of player achievment and should therefore receive greater rewards because people cheat. Achieving in any aspect of the game should be rewarded equally.

Perhaps we're running into cultural differences, because offense was not intended. Would "you're being deliberately blind to the way the game works" be less offensive?

You think the new direction guildwars has taken is an improvement and that it should stay, regardless of the people its hurting. I'm saying its a violation precept that made the game great in the first place.

Limited supply of what? What is this supply in PvE that will run out if I don't achieve KoaBD? So far it only seems like there are getting more and more of things, and the prices are dropping.


What, in the world is this limited supply you're talking about? Kanaxai's Edge will continue to drop when you go back.

Someone who isn't crafty enough will never be able to beat the Deep with their lousy builds.

1) Someone has something I want, I have something they need. Trade. Only greed can create an imaginary competition here. It's a nice form of capitalism.
2) That's actually not a bad idea. But even though they're variables, they seem pretty fix to me most of the time. I can't see the reason why Black Dye is 7k because someone can use Ear Bite.
3) How is pugging competitive? They're my fellow teammates, not my enemy.
4) The only leaderboard I know of is the Rollerbeetle leaderboards, let me know where there's a leaderboard where the actual competition allows you to use Ear Bite.
5) What's so competitive about chit-chatting?

If its truly this competitive, why aren't you worried about getting 15k and Obsidian armors for all your characters, alot of players already have! Unless you think you can just choose what you want to compete in...


I'm all for rewarding non-cheated efforts, as long as it doesn't alienate those who aren't elite enough to come up with some godly builds. Even shitty players deserve rewards for trying...


It insults me less, but you think I'm blind for not feeling inadequate around players with KoaBD titles? The reason I love this game is because, unlike WoW, I can log off the game for a month or two and won't suddenly log back into a game where I face players 50 levels ahead of me standing outside of town waiting to just pummel me with fireballs. I come back to guild wars, and the worst I see is just other players donning their 15k armors... that doesn't affect me.

I see the PvE as Cooperative online play instead of Competitive online play, that place is in the PvP.


I don't think it has changed, not much anyways. Any advantage a player gets will never affect another fellow player directly. But when it does, trust me, I won't be happy either.

I think your confusing advantage with opportunity here. This doesn't stand as a legitimate advantage over me, since I wouldn't want to be a part of this group anyway. Did I miss an opportunity to group with some people who I'd rather not group with? Yes, but I'm still not disadvantaged for not doing so.

Thankfully, no, this wouldn't affect me in the slightest. And you still wouldn't have any advantage over me since it's neither here nor there when we're not grouped together.

But I will happily see you at the end of GWEN, or any campaign for that matter, still using my collector axe from Prophecies, wearing my Vabbian armor from Nightfall, still using a few skills from Factions, and having rank 3 Asura at best, and ask you the same question:
So, where's this giant advantage you had over me?

I'd often be inclined to say that, too. But if for Prophecies, Factions, and Nightfall, this was the right game, and then for GWEN it suddenly becomes the wrong game, is the problem with the player or is the problem with GWEN?

Good thing GWEN is an expansion, because you're free to choose to not buy it.

Guild Wars had a large community, with various different kinds of players playing for various different kind of goals. Each time a campaign came out, they catered to the same large community.

This is their first expansion, and expansions are usually designed for a specifically targeted community, like those who enjoy titles, high-end rewards, and dungeon looting. If the player doesn't like it, obviously they're not part of the "target audience".

If anything is Anet's fault, it's that they should've just came out with another chapter... and I won't argue with you there.

And therein lies the conundrum. But honestly, when it comes to entertainment value, it's ultimately up to the consumer as to its pure value. I dont' see this as a problem for either party. It's your choice. Some people find chess extremely boring to play. But why are there annual world wide chess tournaments? Because there's others that find it to be the most exciting, challenging thing in the world.

The supply every item is limited to the rate at which the playing community can obtain them. When demand outstrips supply prices rise - its the basic principle of economics.


...Unless they learn and get better


If someone else is willing to pay more, you've just been outcompeted.



Because cost (not price) is relative to income, when they can earn money faster than you, the cost to price ratio is different.

Until you're dropped from a pug for someone else because they had level 10 deldrimor and you only had 2.

Dragon's Throat, Altrumm Ruins, Amatz Basin, Zos Shivros Channel, The Aurios Mines, Dajkah Inlet, The Shadow Nexus, Glint's Challenge.
http://gw.gamewikis.org/wiki/Challenge_mission

You wouldn't want to accidently compete by trying to do something as well as someone else.


... now appart from 4, which I could beleive you might have genuinely overlooked, did I really have to explain any of those or are you just being argumentative?


Yup, and I'd like to be able to compete in anything, but that can't without a level playing field.

Do they deserve to get better skills than those that don't grind... That's the problem right now, because thats what grinders are getting, shitty or not.

You play how you like, grind skills or not, you can still go on and play non-competitive pve. But you're trying to deny that these changes are ruining parts of the game for huge numbers players who are invested in the original guild wars manifesto - that is what I mean by blind

15k armor for grind is just dandy, we're not arguing about cosmetics, grinders can have all the pretty armours they want.
Whether they're 50 levels ahead of you or have skills which are twice as effective is just a question of degrees. What if instead of pve skills, they had did add a 20 level advantage for players that killed 200k monsters in GW:EN only? How about 10 levels or even just 1? For players that were already chargrinned by r7 items, can you not see how what you think is a minor skill advantage would be to them what 50 levels are to you?

If the GWEN skills were unusable outside of GWEN, you'd have a point. For that matter, even if only the title-track linked skills of GWEN were unusable outside of GWEN (like how Lightbringer is useless outside of Nightfall), you'd have a point. Is that the case?

It is perhaps a weakness of the Guild Wars model that future content has the potential to unbalance older content which is already released and working well. Perhaps it is a good thing and not a bad thing that GWEN is to be the last installment of Guild Wars 1.

You're worried that someone is going to outfarm you, or you're worried about the price of something being too expensive?

If you're farming, I don't see how killing monsters for ranks should be so hard.
If you're buying, generally the prices of things reduce over time, as people usually don't "trash" a perfect fellblade, but people will continue to farm them. The supply increases steadily because it's not being reduced at the same rate.

Unless you're so impatient and cometitive you have to have it right this very instance...

Easy for you to say.

1.) If I'm selling, and someone is willing to sell for less than me, the price just got reduced. Both happens all the time. Capitalism in all it's form.
2.) So something is more expensive for me because I earn money at a slower rate, but it doesn't mean I can't afford it one day. Unless again, I'm competitive. Which is what this is all about right? You think I should be worried because I can't get my goodies by tomorrow. But the competitive nature of this only arrises from someone whose being competitive to begin with.
3.) I don't see this any different than being dropped from a pug because someone else has a KoaBD title and an Obsidian armor and I don't. Ranks don't reflect anything about a players capability, and if it's because their Ear Bite bites harder, then it's no different than being dropped because my character has a terrible build. I don't have to "compete" to join a pug, I can either join another pug or hench my way.
4.) I'd imagine a competitive player like yourself would actively seek things like this out, that's why I was unaware of those levels. These scoreboard gets wiped regularly if I'm correct. I wouldn't worry about it.
5.) No, unless I'm the jealous/competitive type.

Argumentive? No, that would imply that I'm compromising my integrity and beliefs just for the sake of saying something opposite of you. Maybe that's what it seems like to you but everything I said has been truthfully how I felt. I'm not worried about my E-Pen like someone is.


E-pen


"A war can be fought and won by fighting smart, or just being patient."

Here's my answer to Quizzical, I think it applies to this situation as well.

You said you wanted to compete in every aspect of the game, yet you don't want to grind for rank? The grinders are your fellow competitors too, and they're ahead of you, you should be trying to outgrind them! Unless you want to compete in every aspect of the game except for titles...

Then I would say a new element was introduced with retrospective effects that changes the entire game. One that inadvertently alienates a group of competitive veteran players who are not ready for this new element.

Looks like either this "element" has to go, or the other group of competitive players should.

Maybe this is the answer you and Cellar were looking for...

They should just restrict the PvE skills to GWEN's environment. Win-Win.

If that were done, my complaints about GWEN would be completely resolved. New armor skins and new weapon skins don't unbalance old content at all.

Finding agreement after this many replies disagreeing has to be some sort of record.

I think it resolves for both parties, players who enjoy the titles and the PvE skills can continue to play in GW:EN while players who enjoy the old content are unaffected.

They're the same thing.

I'm not farming, nor do I advocate making farming compulsory for full access to skills.

That is true for low demand items like mostrous eyes, which is why they cost exactly 100g and non-sinked items weapons. For things like ectos where demand is higher than supply or unsuplied items like CE pets the opposite is the case.

Whether you buy it now or later, the cost is will be higher than it would have been as a direct result of others having better PvE skills.

Isn't this the very "bar lowering" that you've been complaining about?

Sounds strangely like competition.

repeat: Whether you buy it now or later, the cost is will be higher as a direct result of others having better PvE skills.

Whether you do or not, others do need to compete for pugs.

That seems to be a common answer with you - we should just throw away fun bits of the game because you think they shouldn't matter.

Because you don't want to be competitive, the game should be changed so that others can't enjoy any form of competition?

This is not about what you want, your gameplay is the same regardless of whether there are pve skills tied to grind or not. You'll keep on playing and pretending noone else is there, because you're not competing with them. Noone is going to take that away from you or tell you that its wrong to do that. It is an undenyable fact that these grind based skills do kill parts of the game for many players - how can defend that as good thing?

[QUOTE=Diablo™]E-pen[QUOTE=Diablo™]
Sportsmanship

Thats not the case with skills - you can only get them by grinding for hundreds of hours.

I think Quizzical answered you nicely.

If points were a points per minute were the measure, I'd love to, however whats there isn't a level playing field to compete on.

I dare you to answer these questions.

Except for one thing - the matter of other PvE-only skills in Factions and Nightfall that can be used in other chapters (faction and sunspear skills). You fix one end, you'd have to fix them all.

I thought we got to the win-win solution a few pages ago.

Add new ways to get rep points - some grind based and some skill based

I'm pretty sure we've been aguing semantics since.

You get the idea wrong.

What is wrong with grind?

You trolls keep starting threads and posts with the word "GRIND" in all caps and bold like it is a bad thing. But how does it affect you really?

GW's premise about skill > time spend applies where it counts, in PvP. Does any armor skin you "grind" give you any edge in PvP? Nope.

Since I've already found a solution to answer our questions, I'm going to pretend to answer these as if you'll continue to play in GW:EN.

A CE pet isn't farmable, using in-game methods that is. Ectos have dropped in prices before... same even with the most ridiculously priced items. A perfect elemental sword costed 100k+100ecto before these PvE skills, they still cost the same after these PvE skills. If farmers are getting these elemental swords at a faster rate, they wouldn't increase the price. The only difference is, the farmers are getting richer... something only a competitive person would worry about.


Such system is introduced so that players of all skills can earn rewards. The bar was already low, I just don't want it to go any "lower".


It is, I said greed creates the imaginary competition that raises and lowers prices. No denial there.


I'm not sure how PvE skills, something that makes farming for something easier, would reduce the supplies. If PvE skills are making farmers more efficient at what they do, they would yield more supply.

When something costs over 100k, it's usually because it costed over 100k the whole time, not because the farmer has Ear Bite.

I forgot about those competitive types...

Fun? If titles are fun for you by all means pursue it. Everyone's definition of what's fun is different, what I find fun, you may find dreadful, and I definitey find direct competitions dreadful and unfun, but I'm not the one asking for change, I LIKE the way things are so far.

If the competitive nature is what's fun for you, it's fine by me, it can stay. It just seems like the grinders decided to take this competition to the ranks... something you don't like.

Listen, it's perfectly fine to not want to compete in something.


I dunno, the idea that a bunch of competitive players feel like just because something is there in the game they gotta have it now, feels like a strange mentality to have.

With the solution I recommended, maybe this will be averted comepletely.

I guess I'll never understand players who constantly wants attention and worries about how the world thinks of them.

Considering they're bad players, I think they need those skills just to be on even grounds.

Yes he did.


What can they do that you can't? They can do it, so can we.


It would be no different than if they raised the level cap to 40. I would have to level up to them as well, because this actually does affect me directly. Unless monster levels are not affected at all, and when they enter the PvP arena and they drop back down to lvl 20. Then I would continue to play at my own pace.

same as above.

Because when I leave a town... I'm not dead?

As long as you agree that reducing the PvE skill into an instant freebie at rank 1 with all the powers you need is not the solution...because I'm sure Anet is always looking for ways to add new ways to get rep points to GW:EN.

But if the PvE skills are not restricted to GW:EN, they continue to affect players that wants to stay in the old world, and never wants to see GW:EN for a second.

Gaile probably stopped reading at least a hundred post ago, so I'm going to sign off. Its been fun clashing swords Diablo, see you in the next thread. I truely meant no offense by the naive thing earlier, don't hold it against me

And just for the record, I only ever play with my partner except to occasionally help out an alliance member or two - its what I think of myself that matters.

I think nerves were reached and we both went for words that we probably didn't mean, I don't think either of us are naive, we just had different ideas of what guild wars was really about. In any case I learned that we're just two very different players, representing two different groups. One of us is a competitive sportsman, while the others is a relaxed hobbyist, but the arena has shifted and the net only caught one of us.

Hopefully, they can compromise us both in the future. If I ever need a teammate in my pug, no rank 9 grinder will ever take your place .

I paid $49 for Prophecies. Unlock FoW armor for all my toons plz. Kthxbai.

What is so complicated about this? It has nothing to do with the chotchkies. If people want to spend their free time pretending they're a computer macro, whatever.

The point, that you and so many others are so desperately shaking and diving to avoid, is that until recently the pointless chotchkies never had anything to do with the MECHANICS of the game. Even in Nightfall where that started to become true in a meaningful way, you didn't have to clear instances again and again because the titles increased just by playing the story line through.

Now? Not so much. If you want maxed skills, you have no choice but to grind through mobs. More importantly, though, much of the focus of GW:EN is on these titles, to the point that most of the NPCs won't even talk to you unless you have a certain "rank".

Bull. I paid $40 for an expansion to Guild Wars. If I wanted to clear instances for uber-items I'd play WoW

hmm was debating to post after the great debate between cellardweller, diablo, and Quizzical. Do the best to sum up how I feel (which directly related to Qwen / Grind.

When Anet promised a game of skill vs grind (especially common of the grind fest known as Final Fantasy 11), I feel they delivered.

I can get get great weapons cheap (crafter), or via the collector. I don't have to go for high priced greens or "perfect" golds.

The "prestige" armor has the same combat defense of the "plain" max armor.

I can "complete" the main story with out having to grind for things. Nightfall has more of a "grind" then EOTN in terms of completing the game.

To me, pointing out things like ranks, or dungeon's as grind is the same as DoA in nightfall, FoW/Uw (in all games), Kuz/Lux Exclusive pve elite zones, Kuz/Lux faction based skills, Nightfall light bringer skills, Fow Armor, etc.

Especially looking at above, is it so strange the way Anet went this direction.

Eotn is the planned final expansion for guild wars before guild wars 2.

It design, other then introducing new future races, finishing up certain plot lines is to give us a bunch of stuff to do while we wait up to 2 years.

The Hall of Monuments by itself could cause people to feel the need complete stuff from other games that they been ignoring or were not motivated to do the 1st time.

Again, to enjoy Eotn, a casual player can do it, but there is other options stuff (imho) there to keep people busy if they persume them.
It's the feeling "I have to do it all" (imho) that drives people nuts. I can relate, I want that complete set of armor unlocks, weapon unlocks, and the titles I can get.

I resign myself I will never have all the mini-pets or the "legendary defender / survior titles" in my HoM.

There are my thoughts overall.

I felt I got my money's worth, I love Gwen so far, and all the "clean up" stuff I need to do gives me varity I need, income (towards armor, weapon unlocks).

I'm a very non-competion person by nature, and the pvp that I enjoy is AvA or AB - I play serious but also for the "fun" factor, if we lose, oh well. The Hall of Monuments is the only thing that is motivating me for "prestage" armor or doing challenge missions, and getting more titles, the 11 "ultimate" weapons, not "keeping up with the jones" aka trying to out do other players.

I'm not saying my way is the only way to play the game, but other stating it is "unfun, needless grind" is others saying the way of saying = the game should be played this way.

By playing through Nightfall, in my experience, you are able to get to about Sunspear General (7) and Brave Lightbringer (3) without grinding (less if your character is foreign to Elona). How is that different from EotN, where playing through it gets you around rank 3 in all the titles without grinding? If you want a high/maxed title--any title, from any campaign--you have to grind for it, that has not changed and it shouldn't, else they would be meaningless.

The fact that you don't "need" Elite armor to play has never changed. And to compensate, the armors I've seen cost 5k less per piece and have comparatively reasonable material costs.

They aren't über items. They're max items that look sexy. That, too, has always been the case.

I think you're intentionally ignoring the complaint. I'm not talking about maxing MY titles. I don't WANT to max my titles. I don't care about titles at all.

What I care about is that the majority of the time you'll spend in GW:EN will be devoted to them, unless you intend to only play GW:EN for an extremely short amount of time.

Prophecies was HUGE. It had a large story arc, a huge continent, and tons of quests. You never lacked for something to do even if you played a single character for a year. Factions was a horrible game - largely becuase of the same things that make GW:EN so poor. Nightfall was a good chapter that expanded on the grind a bit, but didn't FORCE it on you. I didn't have to grind at all to advance in Nightfall. Doing the quests and picking up the bonuses while I moved from outpost to outpost normally was sufficient to progress through the majority of the content of the game.

GW:EN, however, is a very small plot of land, has very few quests even compared to the relatively short Factions campaign, and focuses almost exclusively on farming rep with various races to get stupid trinkets.

THAT is the problem. They released a $40 expansion with most of the "content" being devoted to farming rep points. I don't care about maxing titles, I don't care if there are titles to max. I'm upset about GW:EN because that's the majority of the "new content" that was included with it, rather than the new content being actual content. All I got for my $40 was a few heroes with terrible AI, a small plot of land, a couple dungeons, some new weapon skins, a few recycled monsters from past games, and a few new skills.

GW:EN is only worth $40 if you think killing things to get rep is fun. I don't. That's why I chose to play Guild Wars in the first place.

Actually, GWEN focuses on dungeons - a point which all sides of the grind camps and item skin camps seem to have missed.

You can get a lot out of GWEN with minimal grinding. Furthermore, if you really don't care about items (as some of you have said), then the fact that the crafters won't talk to you below a certain rank doesn't affect you at all. As I've stated several times before, linking PvE skill effectiveness to title rank was a mistake on principle, but I don't think a few extra points of damage or a few seconds more duration is actually significant enough to warrant the amount of crying it has generated.

The one concession I will make is that some classes are more affected than others. To date, monks haven't gotten any amazing PvE skills, so I'm plainly unaffected by what rank I have except that Heart of the Norn might give me +7 more HP, or Rebel Yell might give me a bit more armor. I'd imagine that physical classes will have more issues because they picked up several rather incredible skills. But again, I'd urge you to take a look at the actual numerical difference between, say, rank 5 and rank 8 (since 9&10 are supposedly unavailable). I can't remember a single case where the difference was so large as to be significantly and genuinely imbalancing.

Killing things to get rep?

Sorry but did you miss the dozens of quests, 18 dungeons and the mini games which give reputation points?

Ive been playing GWEN for 3 whole days and im onto rank 4 on most races, starting from rank 0; purely from doing quests and dungeons once.

Now that leaves a grand total of (wait for it) 10k towards rank 5. I still have quests and ALOT of dungeons left to do. Now are you going to seriously suggest to me that its going to be an astouding stretch to make that 10k from those dungeons and using bounties as I do?

People really are being pathetic to suggest that it requires grind to reach rank 5 and get access to armor and weapons. You can tell its the people who either havent played the game properly or havent even tried.

You can reach rank 5 or get VERY close by just doing the storyline and the quests and dungeons and mini games and bounties as you explore.

It is not grind to earn points from playing the storyline.



Although i do agree GWEN was too expensive for what we got.

Good grief....

Where were these complaints when Factions came out? We're people so sick of the city, they didn't mind grinding the 10k points to move on? Do they not mind grinding 10k more points to visit the other side?

And, if they actually sold their points for Amber or Jade, did they complain about grinding 10k points again for a new character?

Guild Wars has always had Grind, whether you define Grind as clearing an area for a reward, or getting Faction to move on in the campaign, or going on infusion runs!

In many ways, GWEN actually has less real grind than Factions or Nightfall, because you do not need title tracks to move on. If you want to max out your skills (why? they are effective at rank 1), or get armor (prestige like FoW or Elite Canthan, Luxon, Sunspear), fine. Grind.

If you want to just play the game, you can do that too! GWEN satisfies the needs of both the casual and hardcore player. Now, all we need is some real end game armor, and everyone will be happy.