Things that brought me to GW, and concerns about GW2

First off yes, it's very early to be concerned about GW2. However, the concerns I'm going to discuss here are very fundamental to the underlying design of the game and have already been mentioned in dev reviews, so I don't think I'm too far out of line.

Anyway, things that brought me to GW:

1) Instancing. I don't play "true" MMO's because I don't like other people being able to interfere with my game. I don't have that much time to play, it's not worth my while to waste it dealing with loot thieves, kill thieves, or just general nuisances of various sorts. I also hate the respawn that tends to accompany persistent explorable areas.

2) Henchmen, heroes, and soloability. I have a few friends that play the game, and enjoy playing with them, but frequently we aren't able to coordinate game time. If a game doesn't have a strong SP component it isn't worth my while. I enjoy being able to play this game seamlessly with friends or with AI help. One of my few real aggravations with the game is that pesky 3 hero limit, but that's already been done to death in other threads.

3) No fee. I don't believe in paying for a game over and over again, so I like the structure NCsoft and Anet are using here.

4) The skill system. The collection and combination of skills keeps me coming back more than any other element of the game design. If it weren't for the 8 skill limit, and the thought that has to go into builds (both for myself and heroes) I wouldn't still be playing.

What's all this got to do with GW2? Well, we already know from dev discussion that 1) will be significantly reduced and 2) will not be present in the design. 4) is up in the air. I'm not going to stand here and scream about the fact that GW2 will be terrible, but I do want to voice my personal concern that, with 2 of the main things that brought me to Guild Wars in the first place gone, GW2's design seems to be headed in a direction away from myself and customers like me. I don't buy games because of the name on the box, I buy them because they suit my playing preferences. I'd like to see the Guild Wars franchise keep some of these crucial elements that make it unique from other online RPG's, and consequently the only one I own and play.

Mild concurrence, here. I both like and dislike instancing, so I am somewhat intrigued by what it will be like without it. It may be worse for some of the reasons you listed and others you didn't. But I hope that it will be able to add a good element to the game. Maybe they can prevent loot stealing the same way it is done now, by reserving drops. I don't know how currency drops would be handled, though.

Without instancing, you would think that heroes and hanchmen would not be needed. I disagree. I would rather there be heroes and henchmen in case you find abandoned areas (such as Jade Quarry is now). Throughout the GW world I have found numerous places where I could not find a group because the outpost or mission staging area was empty. If that happens to certain areas in GW2, it would cause serious problems with the absence of H&H.

I very much agree concerning point 4. I love the challenge the skill system presents. In my other favorite games (FF series), every skill you own is available to you (as long as you are the right class). Once you get all the right skills, you do not have to do any sort of preparation before adventuring. It doesn't matter what you encounter, you have all the rights buffs and skills. With GW, you have to scout out the area to know whether your build will work. That makes it fun and challenging. The requirement of thinking use to be a major selling point of RPGs back in the days of the original Dragon Warrior and Final fantasy games. Now, thought isn't such a big deal anymore, graphis and scenery are. GW still retains that level of thought necesity. It would be a shame to see that lost. If they don't include the 8-skill set limit design, hopefully they will create something equally challenging.

All that is left is to wait and see.

Mind if I break up your post, Vinraith?

I'd imagine a lot of the quests being like how they are in GWEN right now: talk to the guy, he takes you to another area where you're alone and you can do the quest. That's one solution to people stealing your kills. Aside from that, Guild Wars has had many quests in the game that are more complex than your average "Kill X amount of monsters", so I'm not entirely sure how that'll work unless they have GW2 as it is now - with outposts and everything else an instance.

From what I know, it's been said in GW2 that you'll be able to do a mission alone, or with friends. The sounds of that make it seem like GW2's encounters will be based on party size. Then again it's been a long time since I've read the article in PC Gamer.

Guild Wars would not have the loyal following it does now if it had a fee. I don't think this'll change with GW2.

This isn't so much as a concern but more as something I'm very interested in hearing more about. It's said that the combat system will be more involving, and that skills will have multiple effects depending on what you do (example: There could be a sword skill that when used will simply attack the enemy, but when you jump and use it it'll do like a jump attack). So that's got me pretty hyped.

Again, most of this stuff is what I remember from way back when, so please prove me if I'm wrong.

Yeah, I'm with you on the instancing. 100% instancing is the reason I tried GW after refusing all other MMO's, and removing it is the biggest thing I'm worried about in GW2.

Didn't they say that most of GW2 would be soloable? I'm guessing the idea is with a high level cap, areas designed for a group of 8 level 30 characters could instead be played solo with a level 50 character, for example.

They said something to that effect, yes, but I can't figure out how it's possible (I'm not saying it's ISN"T, mind you). If it works as you say, what about the places that are designed for the "end game" and require 8 max level characters?

But strict soloability aside, I really enjoy constructing complementary party skill bars with heroes. The skill system itself loses some depth for me if I've just got a lone character (or a character and companion) rather than a troop of 3 heroes with me to design builds for.

Like I've stated, the game sounds like it all either be soloable or be able to be played with friends. Kind of like what Hellgate is advertising. It might be a new route for MMOs.

Various info from lots of different interviews

They said there will be more persistent but they are stilling havint Instanced / Persistant. There will be no "monster" camping.

No idea...

They stated gw2 will have no fee's

It may be not 8 skills but they did say there going to have a "set" limit of stuff you take out with you.

I agree. I have enough trouble with griefers, scammers, riders, mappers, etc. in a game where they are supposedly voluntarily committing themselves to play for the team's best possible outcome. This is one reason I hardly ever PvP and virtually always play solo.

If they Eliminate the savage grind fests for gold, titles, items, armor, etc. I would have a lot more fun playing - and helping others play.

I also do not play games I have to pay for repeatedly. The net-pusher for Evercrack, World of Warcrack, etc. simply cannot have my business.

It could be a move away from AI on hero/hench because of the incredible headache we as players have been about their horrible support. The AI has improved 1,000% since I first started playing 2 years ago. However, the medium still forces rather simple AI. Skills still seem more to act at random instead of reasonably, hero energy mgt simply cannot be intelligent, and skill stringing by a hero is virtually non-existant.

As to changes in the skills - maybe they will set it so you can use a controller (hand-held) which would turn me off completely - but make games much easier to pander to the cable TV/game-box crowd.

Still too earlier to complain about GW2. A lot of the stuff you are saying is just based on assumptions. People just think because GW2 will have some non-instanced stuff and a high level cap that it must mean it will be exactly like WoW. GW2 will still be a different game. They will keep what they like about GW1, and get rid of what they don't. Don't expect GW2 to be exactly like GW1 or exactly like WoW. I expect more of a hybrid that will fix a lot of the existing problems.

I see no complaining in this thread.

I agree, which is why I'm not complaining. I don't see anyone else doing so either, and dearly hope that the level of discourse in this thread will remain at the high level it's maintained thus far. I don't want any complaining about a game we know so little about in this thread, that'd be pointless.

Nope, because all I'm doing is stating what I like about the design of GW1, and what I've heard about the design of GW2. I'm not making judgements, it's too soon for that, but considering how early it is I figure it's the perfect time to comment on fundamental design (which can't be changed later) and what I see as the biggest strengths of the original game.

GW2 is still a hazy concept a long way off. Just wait and see. We may like what they do, or we may not. Time will tell.

I love GWs the way it is now and I know alot of people do as well. Anet can be very suprising with their work and I believe GW2 is worth the shot. There are so many things they can do to prevent KS and Loot stealing like other games do, say you hit a monster, it is already assigned to you and if someone outside your party kills it, they get no exp. and the same goes for loot, it can be assiged to you or a party member but not anyone outside the party until it idles for x amount of time. (some games give it up to 5 minutes before it idles).

It is also of my concern how it will be with GW2 but I have faith in Anet and the Dev. Team. They have done a wonderful job with GW and they keep on coming with more. Even if alot of people are not satisfied wih chages, I believe GW has been very unique in many things, lets just hope they keep that up.

The Dev. Team is A++, keep it coming guys.

nothing worse than having 9 parties full of 12 humans=98 peopple

killing mallyx and winning team gets loots=waste of time grind

There are a few things that already appear to be... if not set in stone, at least set in clay. For instance, the lack of emphasis on levelling seems to have been removed (for PvE, at least). And for the other things... we can either wait or see and get what we get, or we can provide some input to the devs of what we'd want to see and thus have a chance of actually getting it.

Going through the OP's points:

1) Instancing. What I think I'd be hoping for is for the 'persistent' areas to be completely optional - or, better yet, for each area to have the option to enter the persistent incarnation or an instance (say, through an option similar to the Hard Mode/Normal Mode toggle we have now).

2) From what's been said so far, the professions are going to be balanced with the intention of allowing solo play without NPCs. I'd have to say that I'll miss the freedom of being able to construct a semi-customised party that will (hopefully) work together with the various elements like a well-oiled machine - but on the other hand, it does mean less NPCs that can do something stupid that results in getting you killed. Although... I'd love to know how this is going to work if they introduce anything like the Offering to Melandru that has to be carried in your hands and breaks if you put it down...

3) ANet has been pretty firm about rejecting the idea of a subscription fee for GW2. So I think we're safe on this one.

4) This is certainly an important one in my mind that I don't think we've heard anything about either way (unless it's in that article of PCGamer). The creation of builds was certainly a welcome change in my mind for a couple of reasons. First, it makes the gameplay simpler - instead of having to look for some obscure, rarely-used skill when you realise the time is right to use it, you either do without it or it's sitting there on your bar saying "use me". Second, it adds replayability to a character - instead of being the same set of skills all the time, you can figure out different sets of skills that work together in interesting ways. Third, it allows the game to have more skills in total rather than being limited by the point where it becomes ridiculous to add more abilities that have to be chosen from in the field.

I could certainly see a place for some option to switch one skill out for another or gain temporary use of a skill (like the skill gems in the alpha...) when you realise that you really do need some skill to leave behind, and the number of skills on the bar could potentially be changed without ruining the system, but I'd certainly rather keep the system as it is than go back to "all skills available all the time... if only you can actually find the skill you want when you want it".

I'm one (of the few) who believes that henchmen and heroes are not the bees knees and we should really be open to game designs that do without hench. To be clear, I wish we could use more than one character from our account simultaneously, with one of them being main and the rest being in hench mode. (Think Namco's Tales series.)

I also would like the game to react intelligently to my team composition. If I enter an instance with a physical damage team, the instance should present me with more SS, BV and blind. If I use mainly spells, I should see more Backfires and Power *. And so on. The game knows my build, so why does it always present me with moronic challenges. I am tired of mowing through hordes of level 28 foes like putty because I have their counterbuild. If the game is intelligent enough, a one-on-one or two-on-two instance can be just as fun and challenging as the 12-on-8 and 24-on-8 "elite" areas we have now.

The point about the superiority of GW's skill system also doesn't sit right with me. GW currently has very low demands of skill execution. There are almost no formation requirements because most skills simply care about range. Imagine having skills that require a pincer formation to excute properly, or skills that actually reward intelligent use of 3-D positioning such as jumping in the air before releasing the ashes of Lingwah to summon a floating spirit of Pain.

That's more an issue of having more conditions on how (some) skills work (does +X damage if flanking the target, for instance) than of changing the skillbar system we have now.

WoW is soloable. If you spend your entire time killing mobs that are usually alone, you can solo all you want. Can't go on raids or some parts of the map, but yeah, soloable. If that's GW2's idea of soloable, they know where they can shove it.

Subscription based games encourage people to play for years by constantly leading them with higher and higher bars to achieve, and making them repeatedly do certain actions, like grinding.

GW1 has capped the max level and max gear, grinding and titles are largely optional, or give a small competitive advantage. Because they have no incentive to bore their customers with grinding, or to create an arms race.

GW2 is announced to be subscription-free, but they have also announced a high level cap/unlimited level, and not a lot about gear "tiers".

How they will marry the two ideas together is the question. A high level cap will also make leveling alternate characters a hard thing, something I am glad GW1 does not have.

GW2 will be a major improvement than what we have now. Persistent world which means it will improve the social aspect of the game. I do like instancing for some things but overall most gamers prefer a persistent world i believe.

We really don't know how the other stuff is oging to work yet so way too early to comment. For now I'll just keep enjoying what we have until we get closer to GW2.

Agreed. Instancing does have its perks, but it completely shuts off any sociality: Once you're out of the outpost, it's only you and whoever's on your guild and friendlist. And again, it's been stated that there will be persistancy, but it didn't say where or how.

Walk into any city in GW, turn on "local" and "emote," and explain to me how beinng forced to interact with that in the game world is a "major improvement."

I much prefer a model where I get to take who I choose and ONLY who I choose into the game world and can simply ignore everyone else. Again, if it weren't for whole-world instancing I'd never have bought GW1, and without it I have serious qualms about 2.

Then i guess we won't be seeing you there as its been stated that all but storyline missions will be persistant world in GW2

cya

Holy snaps source??

Jeff strain interview way back when... oh, and Izzy IRC conversation

Oooh, I never had the time to watch the rest of that. Sounds pretty cool.

yeah and with map travel and instatravel in group to a full persistant world, theres no more waiting for someone to get back to a town or outpost to team up with them and trek out together

and the buddy system (same as City of Heroes Mentoring) will enable lower levels to join teams with higher levels to do things...

and i'm especially pleased that although persistent, I won't need to worry about being ganked by idiot players when waiting for a boss spawn, or when treking to places i need to go before I can start map travelling... but then once there, map travel FTW!

Yeah, i'm really looking forward to GW2, i'm looking forward to having Guild wars with a better, more expanded game engine and more to do... I'm even looking forward to the character developement

In all honesty, the only things I'm concerned about GW2 are:

1. The animation. Best I've ever seen in an RPG (next to KotOR, of course), and I hope it's as kick ass as it was in the original.

2. System Requirements. Not much else to say there : (

I too joined GW's for the same reasons as you, jumping ship from WoW as a matter of fact. I don't believe GW2 will be a WoW clone but I think there's plenty of wow/typical mmo-esque touches to it.
I liked instancing but I've made no friends from GW's whereas I did make a few from WoW. The reason being that instancing means I'll likely never see someone I meet ever again unless I spend all day in a closed environment like RA/TA/HA. I'm all for a mixed instanced/persistent world.

I love the soloability in GW's especially if it means not wiping at the hands of incompetent pugs. Many may say this kills the human aspect of the game but I look at it like this: I play games to have fun, wiping due to incompetence is not fun. Then the pug bickering over who's fault it was, is not fun. The monk ragequitting and then being forced to spend another 40minutes looking for a group? Most certainly not fun. Henchies and heroes lets me play the game and - wait for it - have fun. When i feel like playing with people I either go PvP or load up my 360 and log onto XBL. I think Anet will turn down the solo game a fair bit but I don't think it'll be the case where you must group with people to do anything.

Fees? Not gonna happen, they already said so

Skills: I fully agree and share with your concerns. I love making builds, maybe its the inner MTG player but its to me the best part of Guild Wars. "Deck" building and testing
I dunno what I'll do if they get rid of it in GW2 and have a system like WoW.
I'd probably skip the game entirely I think
Guild Wars skills system = strategic planning. Please don't kill the thinking Anet!

GW PvE world has two major groups. The first sees the game as an MMO that one can use the hench/hero to fill parties out and maybe solo an area or two if you feel like it. The second sees it as a Single Player game that one or two people can take the place of hench/heroes and you can PUG if you feel like it. The two groups do not mingle very well.

Initially the Dev team is in the first group, and from posts I believe they are still there - that is their "vision" for the game (and why we will not get 7 hero slots). Many of us (myself for one and I suspect you also) fit into the second. As far as I can see there are quite a few games out there in the first class and GW is the only decent one in the second - thus many of us in the second class flock here.

I fear that Anet wants to see us move into the first - I've played MMO's and dislike them greatly, monthly fee or not. They tried to bridge the two groups in this game and somewhat failed (at the least, like most compromises they just made each side angry), I think they will continue to try and continue to fail, the two groups have too much difference in views to play the same game. In the same way they have learned they have to separate PvE and PvP these two groups will not mix either.

IMO opinion as a game that caters to the first group the only real thing they have going for them is no monthly fee, WoW and others will eat their lunches and take their women. In the latter group there is no competition and none scheduled for the future either plus it is where they have made most of their sales. At some point this will be an issue.

In the end I'll wait to see what GW2 offers before complaining. Until then I will re-iterate the above and hope the devs think on it. While their vision has a great deal to do with the success our desire to purchase the game does also. If I'm in the minority then I would agree - ignore me, I just do not think that I am in the minority on this, especially given the requests for 7 heroes. If they try and ride both groups like they currently do I'll be mostly satisfied and still play/purchase the game. I'm just somewhat apprehensive that they are going to try and force grouping based on interviews. I have some amount of faith that they will not break the basic ideas of GW in GW2.

I agree with you Vinratih, in eevery single word.

The reasons cos Im actually playing GW over other games are hinted to vanish in GW2 (instancing, heroes/henchmen, low level cap, optional grind). If I wanted a more "social", persistent, non-instaced game I would be at WoW, like many of my netpals.

Thats sad news to me...thats why im not investing too much in HoM. I dont know if I will be at GW2.

I believe this is a wrong business decision. ANet found its own place on the gaming market for being *AS IT IS*. Changing its ways will make it *just another* MMO, always shadowed by WoW, L2 and other heavyweights. If that is what they want...good luck ANet, do GW2 without me, cos I will stick here untill the servers are closed..

thats my .02

Yes, the way the game was is why many people have played it as long as they have. Unfortunately, that business plan failed; this is why we have Guild Wars 2 instead of Guild Wars Utopia. Guild Wars 2 is going to be drastically different in a few key categories because, frankly, the original system did not make enough money. I really don't think making the changes they're suggesting will give them any hope of competing with upcoming titles and beyond, but meh, it's their game.

I hadn't thought of it that way, but this is a very insightful analysis. I pretty much agree with everything you've said here, and I too would naturally count myself in the second group. It appears, as you say, that Anet is still suffering from the delusion that they can force us into the first group, or that they can get by without us, one of the two. I wish Anet all the luck in the world, they've provided a profoundly enjoyable game here, but I am the kind of player that I am and if my needs aren't met in a new title it's a given I'm not going to purchase that game. Slapping the "Guild Wars" name on it but removing everything that made Guild Wars unique among online RPG's isn't a very sound business strategy, to my thinking. I hope that, early press aside, that's not really what they're going to do. There's plenty of time for change.

I guess that I might be the only one here worried about gameplay and whether or not they will continue to use their god awful mob building skillz.

If its current Guild Wars without instancing, then you might as well call it Guild Wars 1.5. I don't think that is something that I'm gonna pay for. If they want to evolve Guild Wars then fine. Evolve it for the better. But I can't pretend that the current Guild Wars doesn't have flaws and moving into a supposedly "new" Guild Wars with the same flaws is not appealing at all.

Another thing that I always see is the constant comparison to WoW. I doubt that many know why WoW became the top dog. And to watch Developers try to figure that out has been sort of entertaining and annoying at the same time. The answer is simple, but they all fall back on the excuse that their audience is "different". If that is the case then sure, those developers deserve their 100,000 subscriptions. But those aiming higher should simply make the game more accessible. And not just technically, Guild Wars has that down pretty much since the game can run on integrated graphics. But the gameplay should be the same.

Currently the gameplay starts of sort of well for new people but can turn ugly quickly. And if they ran to lvl 20 quickly then they have not learned much. Which is one of the reasons why being in PuGs can be so painful. Once you get into lvl 20 lands the difficulty becomes unstable. Instead of a constant ramp up, difficulty becomes distorted. Traditional leveling made that ramp obvious. But since traditional leveling is pretty much minimal, cap breaking monsters had to be developed. Those monsters just made the difficulty ramp even more unstable. Due to constant PvP balancing of the skills, it got worse until the demand for PvE skills was issued(something that a lot of other MMOs had already). I'm afraid that if GW2 doesn't bring better accessibility, everyone would just end up in the same game with new backgrounds.

Agree, disagree, ignore me, don't care. Just my .02.

This man spouts wonderful, delicious truth like a chocolate fountain at a wedding. Nice work.

Hah, signed.

Well, one bright light in the thing is that they are still trying to do what they originally tried to do. That is - if you create a game that *any* part can be soloed all of it will be solod. They are still looking to create an MMO that you can solo when you feel like it, reality is I always feel like it. Persistent worlds will not really change this.

I also note that the heroes were added so they aren't really against us solo players. Personally I think they originally wanted us to be in the first class I described but aren't stupid about their player base. Much of what see now is looking at compromises between the two groups - but my favorite definition of a compromise is a solution that makes neither side happy.

I was also apprehensive about GWEN, usually when they laud "level 20 content" they remove the hench, I was quite happy there. Heck, we can even take them into this expansions "elite" dungeon so I don't really expect them too, but some of what they say worries me. I generally think they will do our type of player OK but will continue to try some type of compromise.

Anet is one of NCsofts largest money makers - in terms of profit GW has been more than successful building on casual game play, not making enough money has never been stated. In fact, it is considered GW biggest success.

What failed is continually adding new classes and new skills with all standalone campaigns - it made balance for *both* PvE and PvP near impossible. It also caused much of the jumping around in difficulty that many complain about (have to have noob isle yet most of the campaign has to be for level 20+'s). Not to mention the "every six months" thing was a bit unrealistic over a long period of time. They are moving to a more traditional expansion type of release schedule.

Personally if their level of profit is a failure I would love to fail that much at every venture I started on.

No, you aren't. However there has been nothing said about that in interviews so no reason to think it will go either way. Not to mention that I have enjoyed over 2 years of those god awful mobs and can live with more of that (even if I would prefer something better).

Plus, as I mentioned, a large part of your complaints falls more to how they had to try and balance the campaigns as standalones - that was *explicitly* mentioned as a failure and something they intend to fix. If they will fix it in a way that you like is another question.

My main worry is with the skill system (in the PvP context), and whether or not the additional layer of complexity introduced by things like jumping makes the game more interesting than the current 8 skill system. For example, does executing a jumping or crounding attack do anything functionally valueble, like allowing you to avoid a block, or increase the chance of critical, or cripple etc. If this is the case then it sounds great, because you get a lot more diversity out of the same number of skills, or even a smaller number. It sounds like, from the little I've seen, that there is going to be less work done by the skill itself and more work done by the player using the skill to get the desired effect. So instead of hit one skill like crippling slash which has the effect of applying 2 conditons built into the skill, you have a more basic skill which can apply multiple effects depending on how it is used. This sounds like it would add more skill to the game, and less mindless mashing of buttons.

Anyway...i'm getting way too carried away with speculation.

My main reason for playing (and enjoying) GW is that I can be healed.

Hench/hero - it doesnt matter, I can g out and do quests missions etc and not worry too much about my health.

I get the feeling this is not going to be the case for gw2 - I do hope I'm wrong, but GW is the only game I have found that has this capability - I;m not the world's best gamer, but I do enjoy the game - and that is one of the primary reasons for playing gw.

So, pleaseAnet, let us be healed

There's absolutely nothing stopping you from not buying GW2 and just playing Guild Wars with your friends after GW2 releases, as they have said they will keep the Guild Wars servers running.