An Open Letter to ANet - Part 2

Maybe they will help get GW back in order. Or at least make things a bit better.

The thing with Guild Wars was that the "average" person was happy. The game continued to grow, reaching 1 million, 2 million, and up to 4 million sales after the release of Nightfall. So all this dumbing down, concept reversal, and all this other jargon was pointless. It'd be understandable if GW was doing poorly but that certainly wasn't the case. The only people upset were a minority of players that were impatient and didn't want to learn.

Firstly, I think there was a recent announcement stating that over all campaigns that Guild Wars has just sold 5 million copies. Very far from dying.

Secondly, people are looking at the situation ANet is in as something that they put themselves into, not something tossed at them.

I also want to state that I'm still fully in agreement with Avarre's post. Sure, you don't see the general playerbase all up in arms over his listed greivances...but when has the average player ever cared?

I hear that the sky is falling also.

seriously, there is a lot of exageration in this, and for something that isn't a rant, it sounds a lot like one.

your exploiting the mob mentality that has become all to common on this forum to the point where people arn't even thinking about the problems, but blindly shouting "/signed x5000", and not even thinking over what they have read.


many things in your post are full of truth, and i agree with about 60% of it, but all these new threads restating ideas arn't needed, they just whip others into a [Frenzy].


It seems we forgot our cancel stance: clear, impartial observation

Yes, I understand the point what Gaile has stated in the past. However, the developers dealings has never come into a fan site forum and put their ideas directly to us; to which is the reasoning behind the CR team (to be politically correct). So most of the time the information is filtered through that one community representative. There is a limit to how much community interaction to which the true A-net developers can do. Since nothing is written in stone when it comes to these things, the CR person has to interpret the best they can to the rest of the community as they see fit.

As for Guild Wars 2, I believe it will be everything that Guild Wars is now, plus the other cliché fantasy MMO or standard RPG has been done in the past. Since everyone seems to want more of the same features that have been beaten to death in other games. This means the higher-level cap, persistent world, and so on. It’s not going to be anything revolutionary, it’s just going to be more of the same.

Avarre, this post stirs up so many emotions within me. First it brings up the anger I feel towards ANet, and secondly, the sorry state of the game that I love most. There IS still hope. I feel like I am living in Star Wars the way that we are rising to save what we love.

Arena-Net:

Guild Wars is NOT dead, but it is dying. In the sense of metaphors, I would say that it has Multiple Sclerosis. Guild Wars is losing control of itself. The player base is shrinking, and the doctors at ANet have completely failed to stem the bleeding, but instead have worried solely on bringing in new players and their dollars. Moving away from the metaphors, I would say that the staff at ANet has shown itself to have tunnel vision!. From a purely business standpoint, what they are doing with GW makes sense, suck it dry and then move on. Why focus on those who have already paid when you could make more money by bringing in new players? They are pursuing what they believe to be the most logical course of action. But they fail to look at the big picture, as Avarre has mentioned. Because I cannot speak for everyone I will speak for myself. My confidence in ANet has all but been killed.


Ursan was not the one that killed Guild Wars, merely the murder weapon. I would like to accuse ANet, with Ursan, in the study. (Ha ha, yes, I am a comedian). But to look at the metaphor closer, you might see what I am getting at. It was not Ursan that killed GW, it was ANet's complete and utter disregard of the MOUNTAINS of complaints that stemmed from it.

(Here begins the rant part)
You absolutely CANNOT IGNORE YOUR PLAYERS!!! We are your bread and butter, we are the ones who scratch your back. You have to remember that without us, you are nothing! To ignore us is to doom yourself. As I have said, my confidence (and therefore my money) hangs by a thread. To blatantly ignore what we tell you is NOT how you do business. You more than anyone should know that the customer is ALWAYS right. It is not your actions so much the perturbs me, but the silence that meets our complaints is even worse than coming right out and saying "to hell with you guys".
(/endrant)

Forget about Ursan, forget about the stagnation of HA, forget about all the things that are wrong with this game! Guild Wars is dying, we know this, you know this, and we can accept that fact. It is now your job to tell us why we should come to you with our money for GW2. What you have done with Guild Wars is the worst possible marketing strategy possible, as you are simply showing that you don't give a damn.

You will find that on Page 1 of this thread, right at the top, there is a legendary post, which 99% of the people in this thread agree with. To say that we, the users of Guru are not an accurate representation of the community is bullshit, and you know it. We represent the players and the money of GW, and our voice is in unison on this thread, we agree.

There is no reason whatsoever that Avarre's letter should not be nailed up on the Boardroom door of ANet. There should be an emergency staff meeting to discuss the contents, and the community reaction.

I call on every Guru user, who lives in the vacinity of Seattle to make their way to the offices of ANet, Laptops and printouts in hand, and not leave until EVERY SINGLE employee of Arena-Net has read the OP.

Regards

Cale.

P.S. Signed for sticky.

Only read half, but I must ask you to Cry Some More. There is no difference between an ursan group and the generic ob flesh aggro'er, 3 eles, 2 monks, 2 rangers groups except the ursan groups allows for more class variety and is easier to assemble. Before Ursanway every single farm area would ONLY take the generic builds that completed the farm, why? Because they wanted to get it DONE, not have fun doing it because they couldn't have fun with that crud. I agree with you about pretty much everything except picking on Ursanway. PUGS would be non-existant if it weren't for it.

LOL...you made me choke on my grilled cheese!

I'm not even sure how I'm supposed to respond to this. I thought I'd made my point clear: ANet will produce an average game if that's what sells...a game for the average player.

If you like mediocrity, well then, congratulations...there you have it.

Using your analogy: Even an average driver wants the best car.

Off Topic (reguarding the unwarrented personal attack on my character):

As for me being "leet"...I'm still laughing. I'm a teacher! I make 1/2 the salary of the average person with my degree of education. (VERY leet) I watch kids struggling with choices everyday: be a mook like most of the "average" kids or strive for excellence? The problem is the mooks are more likely rewarded than the exceptional kids by their peers...they are more accepted. So they act like mooks and throw away their talents...is average THAT great? We live in a country (USA, some of us) that thrives on mediocrity, especially in education. We put less and less resources into it and expect more. We impliment programs designed to treat every kid the same (average)...hence, No Child Left Behind, where the excellent kids have no way to express excellence and the lower performing kids are expected to keep up or the teachers are punished (by removal of federal funding)for the shortcomings of kids who don't give a shit...HA HA HA...I'm soooo leet. If leet is having higher expectations than the average dillweed, then yup, that's me!

By the way: I drive a Hyunai Accent, not because I like lower-end cars, but because it gets 40mpg.

Saying that Devs reading the forums get mixed signals.....hmmm

I'll put this out there - The GWWC and GWFC put Guild Wars in the spotlight. All the devs needed to do was read the suggestions of players like Warskull, JR, and Ensign, and balance would be achieved.

As for criticizing Avarre's tone and style in this letter...of course it's going to sound condescending; it's a lot of justified criticism.

This is not just directed at Avarre, but many people here miss the point of making a convincing argument.

In not just this but every quitting or complaining post, people actually threaten ANet, saying things like "you're going to lose money," and talk down to them, saying "I know the game better than you do."

I'm sorry, but playing a game for 3 years does not make you an expert on how it works. It makes you an expert on how to play it. While that is valuable information, it certainly doesn't make you more of an expert than the development team, no matter what you may think. Avarre's own signature suggests that unless he was part of the team that created skill balance from the ground up, he shouldn't be talking like he has all the answers and the dev team is clueless. Not that ANet should never be questioned, but opinions should be stated as opinions and not as facts.

It also doesn't matter one whit whether you quit or not because in the bigger scheme of things, that money is insignificant and even if every person who read this post quit, that would also be insignificant. If you want to threaten ANet, become a game reviewer for a prestigious site, in some capacity where your opinion has widespread credibility, and then give them a horrible review, and then get fired because it won't be objective.

I just wish people would just state their good ideas (of which there are many in this thread) in a concise and clear way, without feeling the need for the emo drama. How you say something is crucial to how people respond to it. Talking in a carrot-and-stick style like Avarre did, is talking down to someone and is a subtle insult. It's certainly not the way you would talk to a peer in a constructive discussion.

If I may ask: Which area's, or errors, do you feel are now beyond repair that could only be fixed by Anet? And why can't they be?


And I in return partially disagree. I can thumb through the pages of the Dev Tracker forum and find a wealth of information and communication. I, for one, can't say they don't listen, or that information wasn't relayed unless after every Anet meeting they make a post to discuss what they discussed.

Serious exploits have been fixed because they've listened. This whole threads is pretty much a result of listening to us. Just because a lot of what we, the community, suggest isn't implemented does not mean it isn't heard.

As a business owner myself, I for one listen to all feedback I'm given. Do I implement it all? Of course not. But just because 95% of feedback I get isn't used doesn't mean I haven't listened to it and considered it. I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility that we're heard more than we realize, but we can't expect to have transcribed meeting discussions.




But they are clinging to the memory.

Anet doesn't and shouldn't cling to a 3 year old origin. No successful franchise does. Game maker, or not, if you do not continue to move forward with new ideas, your product will never evolve. If I still offered the exact same thing 3 years ago in my business, I'd have folded long ago.

Anet has no choice in this matter. They either keep the game stagnant, generic, and nothing new; which is already 95% of the MMO market. Or they play around, try things, succeed, even fail, note impacts, lick their wounds, learn and move forward.

If players want to hold onto what was 3 years ago, as in the memory, that's fine. I hang onto my memories of my beginning here. They're lovely! But there comes a point where everyone needs to accept that Anet can't do this unless you really want this franchise to die.

Some things in the evolution of Guild Wars have been awsome. Some things have failed miserably. That is the nature of the beast. As I said to Avarre, I agree; I don't always like them. There have been a few in which I'd wear my old Riddler halloween costume (you know, the guy with all the wtf question marks on his body LOL), but I can't find fault in a game maker actually trying to discover what works and what doesn't versus the same ol' same ol'.


Irregardless of our differences though; Even if all of us don't all see eye-to-eye on everything, we all have one common bond. We always want to see our game get better. In the end I think that's what truly matters.


Anyways, I must go. I'm late. Enjoy your evening

-Sonata

You know what, Avarre? I agree with you 100%. But I think you knew that already.

Still, I don't think the situation is as dire as you make it out to be. Although I think that way because I still see GW as a casual game. In other words, it is a fun activity; something to do when I'm bored, just like any other game. I also still think I have gotten my money's worth. The state of the game is a sad one, indeed, but these changes only impact me if I take them seriously.

I realize this thread is designed to give a little kick to what little common sense is left in the devs, and by that, I think it succeeds. So, I commend you and offer my support.

So, Regina? Someone? Anyone? Answers would be nice.

/signed


asdfafdsfafsdfa

We would really like to entertain the thought that ANet knows fully with what they're doing. But with recent and past incidents (see: Dervish + Paragon class overhauls) it lends many to believe that ANet could use a bit of a boost in direction.

Catered. I think that they catered to PvP for a long time. I also think that's really hard to dispute. Roughly speaking, I divide the dev's behavior into 3 time periods: There was an initial "hands off" period where updates were few, and often PvE-motivated (protective bond, sorrow's furnace, the chicken-with-its-head-cut-off AI update). The second period was the "nerf period" where updates were almost exclusively directed at PvP balance, usually at the expense of PvE collateral damage. I'd mark the start of this period as either (1) the final update immediately prior to factions, or (2) the update that nerfed orders as a (misguided) way to address the dominance of IWAY. Go look through the update notes for this period and I think that you can't come back and tell me with a straight face that anything but a tiny minority of those changes weren't made in the name of PvP balance. Now, you may think that they got many of these changes wrong, in that they did not make PvP better, sometimes made it worse, and always served as mere bandaids that failed to address the deep-seated causes of PvP's problems, but that does not make them any less an attempt to cater to PvP. Nor can it be denied that these changes often broke builds in PvE, and the devs cared so little that they didn't test the changes in PvE and even know about the problems, often very obvious problems, until the complaining started on the forums. (The original variant on the SR timer nerf comes to mind.) We have now entered a third period, its beginning marked either by (1) Ursan, or (2) the crypic announcement that a skill balance would be rolled back "so as to minimize impact on PvE." I'll call this the "WTF" period, because I have no idea what they're doing. They seem to be doing a half-assed job of pandering to multiple conflicting positions at the same time. <Insert your own John McCain joke here.>

Avarre is not saying that I should have ever liked my PvE play getting degraded for the sake of someone else's PvP experience. (Perhaps he may think that, but he's certainly not saying it here.) He's saying that the devs don't really understand what made GW1 good; that, recently in particular, they have been doing a very bad job of preserving or recreating what made GW1 good; and that he has no faith in them to recreate what made GW1 good in GW2. With that, I agree.

Back when addressing PvP balance was given precedence to the detriment, often great detriment, of PvE, I believed that they understood what they were doing, but had misplaced priorities. I disagreed with what they did, but I could at least hope that they could be persuaded to realign their priorities and get things right. Now, I don't even have that. Even with the right priorities, they probably can't get things right, because they don't know what they're doing.

First, I agree with Avarre's vision of how PvE should have been -- how it should have been more about "skilled" foes that resembled a player team and less about stupid, stat-pumped monsters. But, that ship already sailed. I do not I want to see PvE and PvP get any closer together from their current states, because, short of completely rebuilding the PvE mobs from the ground up, nothing can be done to make PvP and PvE fit together. Total separation is a very distant second-best, but there's no hope for a-net going back and redoing PvE the right way.

Second, the SR timer nerf wasn't good for PvP either. It buggered up the attribute while totally failing at its intended purpose of stopping degenerate spirit-spam team builds. It was bad for both game aspects. Regardless of whether you put PvE or PvP first, that nerf was bad for your game aspect. The only SR nerf that was good for PvP was the no-SR-from-spirits nerf -- which has so little effect in PvE that I don't care if it's shared between the two game modes or not.

Third, since you probably haven't read any of the threads on the topic very closely, my objections to the SR timer aren't about its power level so much as the awkwardness, the randomness, the way it punishes a player for playing better, the conflicts with other mechanics (like the minion cap), and the way it completely removes any possibility of intelligent play that involves planning ahead or managing your available energy. In fact, I do support removing the timer, and then nerfing SR in another way specifically aimed at breaking Sabway.

Well, IF the devs make GW2 a great game, despite my lack of faith that they can do so, and IF they do something that shows me that they know enough not to butcher it with bad updates, then maybe I'd buy it. I'm not saying that they've lost my faith and cannot hope to restore it; I am saying that they've lost my faith, and I'm not buying a thing from them ever again unless they restore it. Two years ago, I would have bought GW2 on faith, sight unseen. Today, I won't; they'll have to "sell me" on their product all over again.

Yes we do. Most of us know exactly what we want, and tend to be pretty consistent about it. It's just that we disagree with each other.

It's up to a-net to choose a profitable target fanbase and figure out what they want. Sorting through the forum feedback for clear reasoning from people who demonstrate a thorough understanding of the game should be a key tool for doing that. But, with these latest updates, I have to conclude that either (1) they are incapable of separating the wheat from the chaff of the community feedback, or (2) they've suddenly switched to a new target fanbase that I'm so far outside of that I can't even understand what they want.

Moreover, I think you are confusing displeasure with a poor implementation of a desired change with flip-flopping and no longer desiring the change. I think that most people who wanted PvE-only skills still want PvE-only skills. And most people who wanted a PvE/PvP split still want a PvE/PvP split. We just want a-net to do it right. The problem isn't that they gave us PvE-only skills; it's that they gave us Ursan Blessing. And the problem isn't that they gave use a PvE/PvP Split; it's that they overbuffed two skills to Ursan-grade, underbuffed a bunch of super-duper-crap skills to just super-crap skills (so they still won't see use), and ignored a huge number of things that actually needed fixing. (Case in point number one: that damned timer on SR.)

Is that a typo on "etcetera" or a commentary on those nerfs? (One I would agree with I might add.)

Well, that's because the PvE-only skills still are too powerful, and the nerfs to regular skills still are too harsh. Doing the right things the wrong way is just as displeasing as doing the wrong things.

Dreamr, ANet very well might face problems with Gw2. Trash the first hard enough, show your company to be experts at making bad gameplay decisions, and people won't purchase your product. So yes, saying that they may lose out on customers is not all that much of a reach.

Ok, because I've played this game for over 4800 hours the past 37 months I thought I should post my useless opinion about this game's history and future.

I remember a lot of features and changes that had a very big impact on the game, some bigger than Ursan from my point of view. I'll list a few major ones.

The overpowered
1) The 55hp solo UW monk. Being able to solo farm UW back in the days when ectos were well over 10k was ridiculous. This was 2.5 years ago.

2) Having 25+ minions that cost 25e each. With the old soul reaping it was easy to get the 625 energy + the energy needed to keep them alive. Ofcourse, no restrictions on minion count also made this possible. This was used in 5 man Sorrow's Furnace runs, allowing groups to grind through it faster than normal 8 player groups. This was before Factions came out, so 2 years ago? I lost count.

3) The first tripple green weekend, Double party point weekend and cupcake weekend. During the first tripple green weekend, prices of hard to find green weapons like Kaolin weapons and Sunreach Shields dropped like bricks. Fireworks and cupcakes were grinded massively during festive weekends, allowing people to farm more than 500k gold in 2 days.

I only listed 3 weekends, because I didn't 'participate in' (read abused) the others. I was among the people that grinded over 500k during those weekends. Actually more like 1M a weekend. Currently, it's still possible to farm the way.

4) The 3 big consumables and Powerstone of 'Courage'. Makes Hard mode Easy mode.

The nerfs
1) Monster scatter. Ruined most farm builds, lot's of angry farmers with pitchforks and torches.

2) Soul reaping nerf, minion limit, Verata's Sacrifice nerf. Angry necromancers.

3) Some PvE skills that got nerfed, "There's Nothing to Fear", Necrosis, Seed of Life. Disappointed people.

Consequences
I've used, abused and experienced all the things mentioned above. They all affected my playing style in good and bad ways and I was able to live with it. I didn't quit, even when my Obsidian armoured necromancer suddenly because 'useless' after the minion master nerfs. I moved on, created other classes and discovered other stuff to do.

Unfortunatly for Arenanet, there are players that don't adjust. From my old 25 member guild, I'm the only one left. And that was 2 years ago. Sometimes someone showed up on my friends list, but not longer than an hour.

I'm not sure, but could it be possible that the number of players is decreasing? Maybe because of the nerfs that had a large impact on characters. Maybe Arenanet is trying to make the farmers stay, or some other community group?

PvE/PvP skill splitting
Like many people said before, it needs so much more work. I mean seriously, who uses Equinox in PvE (not counting monsters tvm). There are many decent suggestions on these forums. Unfortunatly, there are also many bad suggestions.

About the letter
I think a lot of things are extreemly exaggerated. But maybe it's a good thing to write it this way. Anyway, I'm used to games with bad support, like Diablo II.

In conclusion
The things mentioned in the letter aren't the only things that changed Guildwars and I'm sure there is more to come.

p.s.
I forgot many things, but no time to write moar:
- HoD swords price right before Factions
- Splinter Weapon

This thread needs a sticky. The OP made a post that was 100% accurate in my opinion. Hopefully this thread wont be "ignored" by the team. Excellent post, even though it was long, it summed up the state of the game since its release.

he says that Wounding Strike isn't an issue in GvG. C'mon Necrid, you're active in the June PvP thread, you know that's a ridiculous statement to make.

So in a nutshell: GW has become a horrible game, devs need to stop being lazy, improve it, and make sure GW2 doesn't go the same way. /agree

was distracted by other shit so I may have missed some things.

It isn't the core issue. Upping the recharge to 6-8s, and making the condition applying order correct would make it a bit normal, yes, but it's the stuff thats buffing WS that makes it an issue, not WS itself.

/signed. I love epic threads.

I don't hear people really complaining in-game or in general about these philosophical issues. Lots of old-timers complain on GWG forums, about everything under the sun, but basically it boils down to "things changed, I didn't like it, I'm quitting." Which is typical of every single computer game ever made. I think GW2 will stand or fail on its own merits, not because of a vast rebellion from the GW1 playerbase because ANet is so terribly bad at computer game design.

Yes, there are always improvements that can be made, and hopefully ANet will make them. But just because the discontented are outspoken doesn't mean most players are discontent.

OMG another ursan QQ thread! Very well disguised though!

But yeah, basically took everything that I've said over the past year or so in those Campfire threads and put it into a nice letter.

Hi Avarre,

I've read through your criticisms and concerns.

From what I gathered, you feel that developers should place more importance on balancing a game for existing players rather than new players, hence the criticism that making the game "too easy" is bad for players as a whole, and that GW:EN and the introduction of PvE-only skills contributed to this. Your opinion is that Guild Wars has strayed too far from its original vision and now lacks depth, which it once had. These changes have been made over a relatively long period of time and can't be addressed all at once. There are reasons behind each design decision, though some players in the community may not agree with them. As you admitted, one of the things ArenaNet needs to do is try and please everyone. With the number of different perspectives and play styles out there, this is a monumental task and we do our best.

I'm going to address the points you made under your section, "So what can you do?" because they are areas that we're currently taking action on and/or seriously exploring for the immediate future.

One of the underlying points that I'm getting from your letter is that you want more transparency. One of your points is the need for players to understand why the developers make the decisions they do. We recently started making major Dev Updates, which explain the rationale behind changes made to the game, more visible to the community at-large by including them in News Posts on the official website. Not everyone reads fan forums or wikis, and this was the reasoning behind making Dev Updates more visible by linking to them more frequently in News Posts.

We are exploring other ways in which we can communicate developer design decisions to the community. I have been discussing this issue with players, and several have suggested creating a Developer Blog, in which various staff at ArenaNet could post and give their insights into the design process, amongst other types of content. I have been soliciting and collecting feedback on what sort of content players would like to see in a Dev Blog.

Another point you made is regarding the collection and organization of community feedback. The design team does regularly consult with and solicits feedback from experienced and knowledgable players. I and other members of the team are accessible through our wiki pages and through PMs on the forums as well. I and the other members of the community team have been communicating with players through email, forum PMs, in-game, on the wiki, and in the forums at large. However these discussions are dispersed through many different mediums and there is no single, unified place where feedback is visibly given and read.

Forums can be a great place for discussion, they are not necessarily the best place for organizing feedback in such a way that people (players and devs) can easily find it, search for suggestions that are the most popular, or figure out which pieces of feedback rank highly in terms of importance to the community.

The official wiki, which is another place where we view, discuss, and solicit feedback, is a great place for documentation, but it's not conducive to discussion, search, or ranking in terms of importance/popularity.

We're currently exploring ways in which we can use technology to collect feedback in a more intelligent and visible way. If you have any suggestions, please let us know.

I can assure you that our team has a strong goal for what we want to accomplish with Guild Wars 2, and hopefully we can get this across in future communications.

Thank you.

Thrust and parry.

Dev. blog is a nice idea. Maybe live chat Q/A sessions.

Just wanted to say I agree with the basics of what Avarre is trying to say. People seem to be getting lost in the emotion of the expression from long term players. But the basic thoughts seem to be about a neglect for the long-term high end playing base (the people who actually give a game its longevity as a community) for the sake of the types of players who look for gratification and have money to spend on this aim. To put it in other words, he's basically asking the question: Why should I be a dedicated fanboi if my dedication is not rewarded? It may be easy to dedicate oneself to some noble cause, but it takes more effort to help keep a video game community alive.

So for sake of defending an opinion here, I had to find something that had some semblance of an argument against it. #174 Rift if you need to see the context of a developer oriented argument against what Avarre says (not ad hominem). I'm not disputing that game developers aren't listening to anybody, I see myself as disputing that they had their ears focused in the right place (listening to either the dedicated fan base or what I believe to be the original vision of GW when it was first released).

In the interest of self disclosure, you could not have stereotyped me any better. I might just happen to be using an old forum account after picking up the game after more than a year layoff and digging up my old password info. And my opinion serves the purpose of both finding out what has happened to the community and the type of game that Guild Wars 2 is going to be. Avarre speaks for himself and those who agree, and you speak in defense of developers like yourself.

I originally quit when someone talked me into playing another online game. My complaints about guild wars were related to players wanting to run the same builds in every zone (at the time barrage-pet was the thing and Nightfall was about to be released). And at some point, every argument in this game has been about the power of brutally efficient builds/skills (IWAY, spike, B/P, Ursan), that led to the deterioration of competition, creative thought, and discussion.

Sonata says something like this too. I'm just barely going to touch upon this one because I disagree with generalizations too much. Everyone has their own personal community between friends, coworkers, spouses, and relatives. I don't think people succeed by generalizing that their own "community" has the same needs and methods of communication. Whether this was done on either side first doesn't make it right to continue doing. I remember hearing something about there being minimal assistance with pre-testing skill changes before release (while at the same time I haven't heard of many incentives for players to assist with skill balance aside from self-interest). Sometimes several consecutive game changes (or non-changes) piss off the same people multiple times in a row while making others really happy. We go on to believe these are trends when as people describe, communication is not transparent. That's the essence of why people quit, stay, or just complain.

Unfortunately, I also happen to have first hand experience playing a main competitor's game, and I feel like the industry is leaning towards repetitive play and taking advantage of addictive tendencies in people. You would think they were getting paid by the hour instead of monthly/seasonal fees. High quality play experiences bring in and keep players. I try to play my part by expressing my opinions through the community when I can about how we cannot assume everything is being done right. It seems like the other alternative is for me to pocket the money and seek an alternate source of recreation (lose-lose for me and the game company). I'll also offer my opinions on -Sonata- #179, another post that had some effort put into it.

There were more than a few things that made sense in the Sonata post for me to be unable to say I disagree with it. But I wanted to add I do not express my opinions for the sake of the already released GW1 series; but with the belief that I will consider being a buyer of the GW2 series. My complaints take into account that I have given consideration to all of the trial and error (there really was alot of innovation involved in the original guild
wars), and I based my comments on where I believe the current trends of this game (and the industry) will lead GW2.

lol lol lol

Wise words in this whole topic rly.

BUT PLZ PEOPLE: ITS A GAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

but on the otherhand: maybe this whole stuff is needed to be discussed.

Regina why don't we ever get an answer to why Anet cannot go back and make changes to the monsters to make them less OVER 9000 powered and more along the lines of the Zaishen, at the start of HA? Is it because if they did that, there would be no challenge because NPCs can't play like real players? So you have to give them high health and damage so they're a bit of a challenge? Maybe so, but heroes do a pretty damn good job at acting like players, not perfect or flawless, but pretty good.


I think you had a very good post here Avarre along with some others in this thread.

I also want to mention that, the person who said people would just run 2 monks/ 3 eles and an obby tank..if there was no Ursan. Yes. But not if Anet fixed the mobs so that wouldn't work and I think it's possible to do so.\

I do want to add something here..What No Way Out said. For me, nothing Anet can do for Guild Wars short of adding WoW like content to it, will make me have fun with this game for an extended period of time again. I"m far too experienced in it now. But I don't think they should just give up because of that, other newer players probably don't feel that way.

I do want to add something here..What No Way Out said. For me, nothing Anet can do for Guild Wars short of adding WoW like content to it, will make me have fun with this game for an extended period of time again. I"m far too experienced in it now. But I don't think they should just give up because of that, other newer players probably don't feel that way.

Course I still agree with everything Avarre said, while feeling ^ there too. My mind just can't formulate the words at the moment.

Thank you Regina, you have put things into the light; it’s very much appreciated. I have to agree with what you have said overall, since it makes sense.

wow best thread in riverside for long...was about time that someone would sum all the problems in a polite,well written, open letter.

Avarre ftw

Oh and i agree with what you say Cale..."Just as goods as the politicians"

Edit: i saw that word in the first part: Lynch mob-> what's that?

Im sorry but does it seem to anyone else that Regina just gave a complete and utter non-answer?

"Can you tell us if you are ever going to fix this stuff?"

"Sure! Let me tell you about this new blog we are thinking about!"

Just as good as the politicians do it >.<

You have mis-interpreted the leet part, it was no way an attack on you personally. The "leet" part was in game "leet" attitude that the game should be constructed towards the "better player" rather than the average player which if I were to interpret that, you are belittling the average player the bread and butter of any game. By the way: I drive a Toyota Tacoma because I like it.

I think it's possible to fix the mobs too. In PvP you have dynamic content. That is enough to inspire a degree of creativity and change in the metagame from time to time (albeit shifts from overpowered build to another overpowered build, but I guess that's just inevitable).

In order to replicate that in the static environment of PvE, you need to take advantage of the *diversity* of content available. If the developers made high end mobs like the Zaishen, people would just run the build that rolls the Zaishen in 9 seconds. The point shouldn't be to constantly adjust mob skills - although some adjustment right now would be nice - but to have enough of a difference between different mobs that one "steamroll build" like Ursan or Ob tank/meteor shower does not work for every high end zone. That way, depending on where they are, people have to run different things, and they get their metagame shift that way.

That still results in the problem of one overpowered build or other being the status quo, but I doubt there's a way around that. Unless all skills are perfectly balanced in every situation, which would be boring and pointless, there are going to be good skills and bad skills for each circumstance, overpowered builds and underpowered builds. But at least there would be more than one, so there's be some variety.

Just throwing some stuff out there that I have seen over the years with suggestions from the community on how to improve communication:

- Polls on GW log-in screen. Fast and easy to get all the GW player's opinions, feedback, and gauge interest in new features, skill updates, etc. Works even better then gw.com in terms of reaching your audience.

- Utilize your fansites. I don't think any of us fansite owners would have a problem, in an easy and quick format, letting you know the hot topics for that week, overall opinion on updates, pros and cons of newly implemented features in a non-biased manner that would simply be gathering data. Could be legal issues there though.

- Blog is an excellent idea, except now you have the same problem of extensive discussion and opinion that's voiced in comments and only further spreads the community opinion out over multiple mediums. In terms of getting updates and a "here's what's happening at Anet" the journal you have on the Wiki is an excellent idea and very much appreciated, not the best for gathering feedback I suppose.

- Live Q&A chats through moderated IRC are something that have been begged for over the years and nothing has ever come of numerous requests from multiple people/fansites/etc. I know many games who have done these.

- GW Newsletters. In addition to being used as a marketing tool it can also update players on all things GW, changes, new articles posted on GW.com, news updates, so on and so forth.

- I have to add this, at the risk of it being seen as something other then it is... a suggestion (and other people have suggested is as well). Lift the gag order on the devs and allow them to participate in the community. Many MMOG's encourage and allow their developers to have a public voice.

There is nothing that I can say that Avarre hasn't already, so I'm just giving a big /signed in support.

Yes, and this is a trend with the Community Relations nowdays, all of the reasonable discussion and transparency has been taken away with the CM change, sadly.

My heart is just about crying.

Guild Wars is certainly not the same game that it was when it was released. In fact, I bet that if you were to expand pre-Searing to the size of post-Searing Ascalon, complete with about the same number of quests, missions, and the ability to go to level 20, veterans of the game would say that they've never felt so nostalgic about the game.

That's not to say that they haven't made some great changes to the game. I have my own things about the game that I enjoy, such as the various festival arena that they've developed. Their core game, however, has changed so much from its original design that I don't feel too attached to the game anymore. I used to always look at the threads of people saying, "I got bored in GW, what should I go do?" People would reply, "go play another game," and I would chuckle and say that there's plenty left to do for me in GW. Unfortunately as of late, I've found myself less interested in doing things in Guild Wars, because I don't feel the sense of adventure that I used to feel.

I'd say that the most confident reason for me right now to wanting GW2 is to see what reward I will get for how I've done in GW. Past that, I can't say for sure that I will enjoy the game or that I will continue playing past picking up my rewards. Sure, not much has been released on GW2, and my perception may change when that time comes. Right now, however, I am on the tightrope of whether to continue with this game, or jump off and go elsewhere.

I recognize that this isn't in Sardelac anymore, and the only reason I say it must have been there is because of all the signatures on the front page. Regardless, I will say /signed to the OP, because I believe that a lot of what he says is true. ANet needs to decide what direction it wants to go with GW2, it needs to tell us what that direction is, and it needs to convince us that, this time, it will stay the course.

Edit:

You may have just missed the problem.

That's pretty much it. QFT.

PS: Long time no see, Cale!

IMO these 3 things should be/have been implemented. these are the quickest and easiest tools for player feedback and information dispersal at any online gaming company's disposal.

for the record, (not that my opinion matters) i think splitting the skills into PvE/PvP versions may have been a bad idea. i always thought of the GW PvE area as a sort of introduction into the mechanics of the game which prepares players for PvP. devising a build in PvE, especially one that works in HM and elite areas, should be the test area for taking that same build into PvP. with the division of skills, now, that theory is no longer viable. a build that one might use in PvE will now have drastically different effects and consequences in PvP. PvE is now no longer an introduction into PvP, as i believe it was originally meant to be. PvE only skills in general killed this method of introduction into PvP.

i am mainly a PvE player, but i firmly believe that all skills should have the PvP effects at all times so that players don't have to dramatically change anything about their build in order to be effective in both areas of the game. i also beleive there should be no such thing as PvE only skills.

just a couple of my thoughts.

Thank you, Avarre, for your post. While a tad long, and sometimes a bit "I know better than you" in tone, it does express quite eloquently the desire for ANet to improve their product. Whether it be GW1 or GW2 doesn't matter - simply that they listen to the people playing their game.

I bought GW Nightfall as my first serious foray into on-line RPGing. (I had tried WoW, but didn't like the toons, nor the skills, really. EVE on-line? Looks great, but I didn't want to pay $15/month, almost $200/year, to mine ore. Anyway...) I liked the look of GW. I liked having heroes. And then I discovered that I could link campaigns, and that GW gad these cool characters called Ritualists - so I bought Factions. Again, a lot I liked, and so is started looking at fan sites and wiki, and discovered builds! OMG - tons of builds that began to show me what to look for, what skills to bother buying, etc. I started to learn more, with the idea of maybe, one day, entering PvP. (Still don't - but that's because I'm not good at hitting keys and setting up my UI for that.) As I learned, I saw that most builds had skills from Prophecies, so I finally bought that! And found out just how bad henchmen could be - lol.

In any event, as I grew as a GW player, I began to get how skills worked together well, and how things became imbalanced as new skills were introduced. For some, NF started the downward spiral, or even just Heroes (which was one of the main things I liked about GWs, actually). Then came GW:EN, and I saw a rapid decline in people's attitudes and participation. I resisted GW:EN until about a month ago because I really wanted the extra heroes. (Plus Jora and Livia are hot!) But, the skills had become ridiculously over-powered, and the mobs, too. (Ursan aside.) I saw how, taking a toon from Prophecies, even at lvl 10, and into EotN, was worlds different - and made the rest of Tyria a joke - too easy once I had my lvl20 Heroes and some imba EotN skills!

So, I hear how Avarre and others are saying: "we loved this game! We want to continue to like this game, and you are actively killing it. Please listen to us!"

Please listen to us.

/signed