An examination of PUG and Hero/Hench gameplay.

So who appointed you supreme interpreter of how other people should play their games?

If I couldn't solo, which I couldn't without heroes & hench, I simply wouldn't play. Period.

If there Isn't AI in GW2, There must be a mass number of people willing to go afk every 5 minutes so I can play, or I just won't buy.

im having my ass handed to me using stupid hench(having 2 bring 2 heros just to shutdown 1 boss in hm ftw >.< , Remove hero limit!

...that the henchies were complaining about this thread. They are out there busting their buns and taking all our loot becoming the richest in the game from those of us that hero/hench the game. I figure if "someone" is going to be stealing my drops and gold it should be one of my design.

That being said I would like to have 7 heroes because it really would help out on testing team builds (without the use of PvE only skills) and testing concept builds out without the need for another human player or another account. I believe that it can spawn some creative thinking for team builds beyond those of "myway" or "sabway" or "racway" or any other person's builds. You can tailor the way you play to the way you want to play. You can live and die by your ideas and maybe... just maybe... come up with something fun.

Why should you, if you wanted, run 3 of one profession and then have to rely on what the developers think is a good build on the henchies and fill out the team with said henchies? Face it, the developers and skill balancers are sometimes out of touch with their own game. The change to Master of Magic is case and point. They changed the skill and now has made doing Kourna easy because the scribes use it and now their fire magic is 12 (even in hard mode). What about the henchie monks in EotN who used to have LoD and had to be changed because LoD was balanced for PvP? It still hasn't gotten back to the glory days of when LoD was actually useful in a team build (without some boost).

I've been doing Ring of Fire and lol-ing at how hench monks in prophecies apparently don't carry any form of condition or hex removal. Great builds, ArenaNet! (sarcasm) Y'know, I bet we could come up with better ones if you let us. I'd run the monk builds on my heroes, but - oh dear - then I have to rely on the hench for damage, and the warriors carry stuff like Charge instead of D-slash or Earth Shaker. (And let's not even go into the Firestorm elementalist henchman.)

Don't get me wrong, the missions are still doable, but it's immensely irritating that the difficulty comes from my own team instead of the mission itself.

While trying to H/H Hell's Precipice, I honestly COULDN'T with henchmen, I had to get a guild ursan group with cons to get thru that crap, i ran nearly every build imaginable, the henchies are useless HM, the only henchmen I can deal with is herta for her wards in NF/EotN

This also is a great point. I often browse the forums when I feel like it, or leave my computer to get some food or read a book. Apparently I'm "leeching." Olias never complains to me about that, but humans seem to get all angry about it.

I don't think anyone can claim what the majority of players do or do not want. Based purely on sales versus forum members the majority of players aren't on the forum. Any expression here is your own opinion. It would be handy if we could present arguments for or against raising the hero cap, rather than going on about what the majority want and how Anet are failing.

Un-nerf ursan, allow 7 heroes with PvE skills (with an imbagon and Sabway) and you'll smash through everything and it will probably be a lot of fun. Being a god is a laugh, at first anyway. If all you want to do is play the game, skill balancing, nerfs and caps are just an annoyance. They may keep the game fresh to some degree, but what update has significantly increased your level of fun?

It seems to me the hero cap is all about the economy. Ursan was fine until we had a team of them destroying areas and devaluing ectoes. SF wasn’t altered to make the game more fun or challenging, it’s all about the farming.

Remove the hero cap and what will be the result? More elite area items flooding the market. Something you bought for 100K + buckets of ectoes is now worth nothing. There’s no waiting for guildies or PuGs. Just load up your heroes and off you go. And you, and everyone else, can do it over and over all day long. The end effect being everyone can afford great looking things. I’m not into e-peening, so that seems like a good idea to me. It might stop people farming and actually get back into playing the game, helping new guildies and randoms. Who knows?

There seems to be two facets to this whole argument. Remove the hero cap would probably make the game more convenient, and for me, more fun. I can’t think of an argument that would suggest removing the cap would make the game less fun. It would, however, destroy the ingame economy. Think about why you’re in elite areas. What exactly are you doing there? Sightseeing? Growing as a person? Farming? Then think about the effect allowing everyone with heroes and complete 7 hero team Wiki builds would have on the items from those areas.

Pretty much all non-elite areas can be done with H/H. Every area can be vanquished with H/H. Almost every HM mission can be completed for masters (with some obvious exceptions, like THK, unless you can carry two torches in opposite directions). For just playing the game, H/H is adequate. It’s only for elite areas and farming that you can’t use the current H/H. Upping the hero cap would make farming pointless, as the items you farmed would be worthless.

Again, just my opinion. Feel free to attack the argument.

I'd just like to reply to the only argument that A-Net has brought up:
"It discourages socializing."

1) People want 7 heroes because they want to do stuff that is hard. In those types of serious challenges, nobody socializes, they just focus on playing and maybe cheer if they're doing a good job. Nobody would start discussing the next political election nor talk about their day, they would play because they all want to finish the respective objective and never have to do it again. If they wanted to socialize, they'd do so in their Guild Hall, in an outpost, or with other PuG's.

2) Some people like to experiment with team builds and it's awkward to ask for one or more of your friends to give up their own time so that you may exercise your neurons and "experiment" with something they might not like.

3) 1 human and 7 heroes is not in any way overpowered. 8 humans can be more coodinated, can use PvE skills (especially the EoTN ones which are quite overpowered), and can use the same builds in different ways to counter different enemies and adapt to the current situation. If someone is having a tough time with something, they will want to join a human group... not make up a team with 7 heroes.

4) People who are the most likely to use 7 heroes do not want to improve their social skills. It's just like PvE players who will never get seriously in PvP, it's a matter of personal preference. I would like it if A-Net stopped forcing their beliefs on their fans, and just let us play it however we want to play.

Agreed. I think I'll fall short on requesting 7 heroes everywhere. Incentive to party with people is a good thing. I'm sure there are good people out there that you would like to be in your guild if only you met them - why not give them a chance every so often?

On the other hand, incentive is one thing, being forced is another. It WOULD be nice to be able to go into elite areas (UW and FoW especially) with a full party when its convenient for you to do so. It doesn't have to be seven heroes - henchmen with decent builds will do, and might even be better for the game by leaving a greater incentive to team up... but it would still leave the option to try it alone if, for whatever reason, it isn't convenient to try to get a team.

Regarding the three weekends:

On the hero weekend, I'd probably take the advantage to go through the UW and FoW a few times.

On the hench weekend... I might find areas where henchmen are worthwhile and MM are poor options to play in, treat it like the no-AI weekend, or play my necromancer in EOTN or some other area with decent henchmen (.

On the no-AI weekend, I'd see it as an opportunity to do missions and quests that do have a significant benefit from having more people along, such as taking down Cyndr.

I'd probably have the most activity on the first weekend... but being able to bring henchmen into the UW and FoW would have the same effect. Of the other two, my relative activity would probably depend on the ability to find good groups - I'd imagine, though, the proportion might be higher from other people who normally H/H deciding that they might as well give it a try than it would be normally.

(Come to think of it, one thing that may prove to be an amusing test-of-concept: Put the Enchanted Snowmen and Mad King's Guards in the appropriate outposts during their respective holidays, and allow them to be brought into the elite areas (in enough numbers to fill out a party), possibly with reduced or removed costs to enter. It wouldn't exactly result in the most balanced parties, but I think it would be fun...)

/AGREE

Would be nice to finish some Elite missions with characters that others think arent needed for this mission.

Wait, why the hell haven't I signed this yet?

/signed

I play with people when I want to.
I play with heroes when I want to.
If I can't play in an area the way (and when) I want to - I won't play that area.

Edit:
No need to give heroes PvE only skills. If you can, great - if not - I couldn't care less.

Not totaly agree with this.

How often do you get nice, good, very good drops with a full H/H team.

Wel to mine opinion , not that often.
So that wouldnt be any differnt with 7 hero's
However Guild Pugs that are farming can bring down an economy very fast.
I know guilds that are saving stacks of ectos and high lvl Nightfall items just
for fun and to overload traders.

When those people/guilds want they can drop every value to a point that
would crash the economy for sure.

And that wil never happen with Hero teams.

There is a massive thread that debates many of the points you've raised...feel free to post in it!