How did Heroes kill Guild Wars?

The game is old but it is not dead. If you want to see a dead game, try diablo 1.

The game is not dying because of heroes. The game is dying because of a lack of new content after so many years. In fact, I really wanted to quit just before NF was released because I noticed that player numbers have plummeted even then. Many of my friends have left and it was starting to be difficult to find players in many of the outposts. I remembered that the lack of player was so bad, that in the Ring of Fire missions monks were charging 5k or more for them to join a group. Many pugs had no choice but to pay up because the monk henchies were not good enough to ensure their success. If it is not for heroes that allowed me to complete my missions and quests without finding enough human players to fill a full team, I would have stopped playing since then. Then as time goes on, I made new friends and joined new guilds and now have the option of playing with heroes and/or human players in elite areas.

Those people who claim that heroes kill the game because they reduced the number of human players who would join up are just finding an excuse. Even if there are no heroes, many players would have quit a long time ago as this is an old game and the leftover players would have no means of completing their missions/quests, without a full team, except with sucky henchies which make this game experience suck even more. In reality, Heroes saved this game.

Yes heroes did save GW, which would otherwise genuinely be dead without them.

HA was initially killed because of the 6v6 change on top of heroes. This was incredibly broken and inbalanced as having 3 heroes and just two hench was nowhere near as crippling as having 3 heroes and 4 henchmen would be, and also many people left purely because of the 6v6 change alone. H/Hing in 6v6 HA was incredibly easy and broken. Now, in 8v8, to reach the same level you would need at least two people with 3 heroes each.

Yet this is an incredibly fun and enjoyable way of playing GW, and if it had been implemented as a seperate game type it would have been highly popular. Hero battles are just pure trash in comparison to H/H HA or GVG. I dont enjoy hero battles at all, but I love to scrim with H/H even without getting any faction or points.

I know Im not the only one, customisable AI play is just plain awesome for lots of people and I have always wished for it to have more support in GW.

Yawn. You say I'm stating my opinion without backing them up, then you proceed to refute me with piss poor evidence. Thats fine dude. Whatever you want to believe. If you really have been playing this game for 4 years as you state, you would KNOW that this game has changed from mostly multiplayer to mostly singleplayer.

It didn't need saving. It was greater before heroes. You can say whatever you want about PvE (even though I disagree with you), but I KNOW 100% that heroes contributed to the death of PvP (alongside Anets inability to balance and support it). If you played PvP you would know that.

I'm pretty sure he knows, but it's not going to be for the same reasons. People are grouping less, of course, but he's not going to point his finger in the same direction as you as to why.

Edited for prettiness.

No, Pugs in GW were dead before we got NF. It was during Factions that many people such as myself stopped pugging entirely and started flooding the forums with requests for customisable henchmen because of how bad Pug grouping and playing with others was.

Prior to hard mode and PVE only skills, pugging was even worse due to the complete lack of decent player skill in PVE, with most people running crap builds like flare ellys or mending wammo tanks. These poor builds however were fine in Prophecies and all those easy peasy missions, however factions required much better player skill and skill bars, but the pug majority did not adapt to improving themselves. Many many puggers I have played with in NM have thought that losing a mission is not their or the players fault, but because the game is hard.

To me, the game was a lot easier and more enjoyable when I replaced pugs with henchmen, guildies and then heroes.

Basically, pugs killed themselves not heroes, and now Z quests are restoring pug use, but overall the average player skill now is a lot lot better then it was before heroes were introduced with NF. Players are better now because they have been H/Hing and learning how to play themselves. Now, if I were to get a pug, and someone said that they didnt use heroes because they suck more then real players, that is a big sign that this pug is going to fail =D.

They are late comers to the game and have no idea what it was like back then my guild kept me up till 4 am.We just only needed to use the odd hench but it was mostly real players as well people quested more back then not with henchies.

I have played this game ever since it started more than 4 years ago and it has always been multiplayer to me. Maybe because I actually take the effort to befriend good players.

No it wasn't greater before heroes or NF. If you compare the number of players shortly after GW was released, 4 years ago to the number of players just before NF, the number of players in many outposts have already gone down. And by the way, do you know what people attributed this to at that time? The spreading of players across 2 campaigns. Alliances didn't exist until Factions and that also caused guild members within the same alliance to team up instead of pug. If you think human monks are hard to find now, you should have seen the situation before heroes.

displaying heavy bias towards specific guilds and specific areas does not help your argument. it is a small sample size that has focused activity within a specific population. puggers take from a very large sample size, because they group with a diverse amount of people in a diverse amount of areas.


and thats your problem...your being too subjectively biased, presenting your argument from a "me" point of view. its good and all that you have always been able to find people to play with, however, with an objective outlook gw isn't quite like this.


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zquests have been criticized for simply being old content trying to be passed as new content. the relevance of this regarding this topic is that when you pug a zquest, you are very likely to pug with people who have already beaten said content. therefore, pug groups for these zqs will be more capable and more competent than the average pug group.

If that's the case, then what's the problem?
If you've been playing "from the beginning" as some of the anti-hero people are claiming here, and you still haven't been able to get into a subcommunity that allows you to play multiplayer consistently, I don't think heroes are the problem. Four years is a long time to not make connections.

You dont need a big sample size to know how easy it is to find an active guild nowadays. And despite your claim of self-objectivity and using large sample sizes, please tell us how many millions of GW players have you personally surveyed?

Do people check the guild recruitment forums? Do they PM members of this forum who are still actively playing this game and ask to join their guild? In the end, you can choose to stay alone in a deserted guild and moan or do something about it.

There is nothing wrong with pugging for zquests. Are you then saying that zquest PUGs do not count as multiplayer? Sounds like you are trying to hint at something small and specific and then generalizing it.

Thank you for saying this so I didn't have to.

All the people who I connected with have quit the game due to the game becoming a singleplayer game with heroes. Not to mention the PvP community has shrunk to microscopic sizes thanks in part to heroes and inbalance.

of course i have been able to, but we are not arguing personal matters at hand. so such attempts at personal attacks are irrelevant.



please learn how to take things into context. he was saying how pug skill level has increased, while this is mostly confined to zq pugs, not general pugs. he also stated how pug skill level increased because of h/h, and i would have to disagree with this. h/h can help you improve at the game, but it does not increase your skills in teamwork which is required for effective pugging. the main benefactor in this case is simply experience, i.e. they have already done this mission before and are only doing it again because of increased rewards that go along with the zq.

Skill level is not the biggest problem with PUGs, the biggest problem is attitude. You dont need to learn alot of teamwork skills to realize that leaving in the middle of missions is wrong, or going afk.

Besides, all the blaming on just this SINGLE factor, Heroes, you failed to realize that other factors play a bigger part in the decrease of player population in this game.

1. This is a 4+ year old game afterall and it has been lacking in fresh new content for a very long time.
2. We have now 4 campaigns and players are alot more spreaded out than during prophecies time.
3. Guilds and alliances make random pugging less necessary and offer a more reliable way to complete missions and clear elite areas.

Obviously you choose not to consider the impact of other factors and go head-on in your narrow minded view that it must be Heroes as the main culprit of a population decrease. Heroes can never account for the population decrease comparing 2005 situation to just before NF, because they didnt even exist yet.

It's called "making new friends", try it sometimes.

This is absurd. Were you their only source of multiplayer bliss?

If not, what was their reasoning? "Oh no! Some people aren't playing with other people! And despite me being able to play multiplayer with DreamWind and plenty of other people, I'm going to quit because this game is becoming a singleplayer game with heroes!"

So you are in a position to play multiplayer. Then what is the problem?

Are you and DreamWind champions of the nameless masses who aren't getting their multiplayer kicks but who aren't voicing a single word of complaint anywhere?

Really, I don't see what we're even talking about anymore. When called upon in this thread, everyone complaining about heroes turning the game into a singleplayer game does a 180 and doesn't have a problem finding partners to play multiplayer. Are you guys arguing for the sake of the argument? Does anyone have an actual problem?

My four years old huge friends list went all gray something like two years ago.

And good people who I did know that played the game prefered to solo.

please stop quoting that because it was not directed at you and has very little to do with our argument. i felt that what that person said was interesting, and so i commented on it as an aside.


if you kept up with the thread, you'd realize that i did acknowledge other factors. re-read the title of this thread, and you'll understand why i am focusing on one factor more than other factors. please do not assume that i'm only acknowledging one factor because i believe that is the one and only cause. just in case i didn't make it obvious enough, the title of the thread is called "how did heroes kill guild wars?"--i think thats a good indication of what we should be discussing in this thread. yes, you guessed it, heroes.


the problem is the state of gw. let me use an analogy of skill balance: i am personally not affected by the brokenness of skills like distortion, but that does not mean i do not want that skill balanced. if its good for the game, then im all for it and will support it.

I prefer to play solo too, much of the time. Much of the time, I tend to have to go AFK at the drop of a hat. Multiplayer isn't a good idea at such times, so I don't do it. Playing solo eliminates responsibility. I'm not a big loss to the PUG pool and never have been. It took me until Fort Ranik to realize that the game was much more relaxed playing with guildies (who I all know IRL) or henchies.

I mentioned this because many are blaming heroes for the population decrease and the game dying.

If it is not for heroes bridging this decrease in player population, many groups would find it diffcult to complete their missions just using sucky henchies and half-filled teams. If it is not for heroes supplying decent versions of the most needed professions like monks, etc, many groups would find it difficult to complete their missions. If it is not for heroes, many people in this game would not even know what a team build is, much less have the opportunity to design one. If it is not for heroes, elite areas that you can't bring henchies into, would have been very difficult to form a full team especially during odd hours.

Yes, you can say Heroes saved this game!

I play all my MMOs solo, however in persistent world games you often come across people doing the same thing as you so you group up.

In GW I meet exactly 0 people while playing PVE, and cant add anyone to my group while playing.

Guildwars lacks a social aspect due to the instanced play, it is nothing like WoW or similar MMOs where you simply bump into people while doing whatever you want and group up with them.

Also, most other MMOs dont require a party of 8 to get through the game. Guild wars is a very different and unique game when compared to traditional MMOs, and just happens to be much better suited to solo play with AI then it is to playing with others.

Same. Out of my dozens of people on Friends List, maybe 3-4 play, and every one of them is a H/H or a PvPer.

You can say a lot of things. You can say heroes saved the day, or you can say they ruined it. People here have as much proof that heroes are the bane of social play as do those saying that the pugs themselves - and the general set-up of GW - have destroyed it.

But the problem with all this (and no, this isn't just directed towards you. It's directed towards everyone currently heatedly arguing about it) is that this is all we know: Nightfall was released, Heroes were released, there are less people in outposts.

And that's about it. No one has more "evidence" than the other. Nothing is definite until we get into the minds of those millions of players mixed amongst those 6 million copies. Until then, anything is at fault.

Meanwhile, Zinger watches at the sidelines, smiling to himself, devilishly delighted that he's still got it >: )

I have lots of connections and STILL preferring only playing with one person, who happens to be my wife. We have a great time. We don't NEED to go hunting for other people. What you're saying here, is that if a person wants a more intimate experience, with just a friend or two, they're somehow not as good as you, because of all your contacts.

Quality is often better than quantity. And control over six heroes by two people, to me IS the ideal team, because we have played so much together, we barely have to think to work as a team. This is a very enjoyable way to play, even though I have friends I play with as well, when they need help.

All I know is Factions was released, and there were already less people in outposts, especially those in prophecies. Maybe it was the spreading out of people or maybe people just hate the grind that Factions introduced (lots of heated threads on that one then but now people just take grinding for granted, far have we come..) so they quit. Or maybe it was a combination of these and other factors.

I made the point that people prefer to team up with people they know for a more enjoyable and reliable gaming experience. Features like Guilds, Alliances, Friends list, other than heroes, also makes random pugging less necessary.

Random pugging is not as important as some of you seem to think. To me random pugging is just an evolutionary step towards making friends and eventually maybe even joining their guilds or they joining yours. When that happens, the need to random pug goes down.

Guilds/alliances and finding a good reliable gaming buddy should be the eventual goal that random pugging, gaming forums, and other networking serve and heroes fill up the gaps between you and your buddy without the need to risk a random pug stranger destroying your gaming experience. So I dont care if fewer people pug nowadays compared to a few years ago. That could even be a good sign that more people have found friends, that they know, to play with.

Looking at the problem of "not finding human players to party with", the solution shouldn't be more forced random pugging by nerfing heroes. The solution should be making friends online, all most people need is to find 1 or 2 good reliable gaming buddy. If you are already posting in this forum, there can be no excuse to say you dont have an opportunity to make friends online.

I'm not saying that at all. In fact, I have exactly 2 people in my friend's list. (But a guild with almost 20 RL friends though.) What I was saying is, that people who have been playing for 4 years actually looking for a multiplayer experience and can't find it, are doing something wrong and shouldn't be blaming heroes.

No argument here.

Without heroes, the game would have been dead.
People have spread out a whole lot when new chapters came out, concentrating in the new parts for a while, then disappearing again. Now there are only several hotspots left in the game, and all smaller outposts are permanently empty. If not for heroes, people would have quit. Henchmen alone just don't cut it.
Z-quests are a nice boost, but these also only create very short term hotspots. But it helps.
My 2ct.

It's good GW2 will be a persistent world. you'll meet more people.

Yesh..heroes saved da day......

The above posts about connections... ummm is this a bussiness world? or is it a dating website.. or school.. since when socializing was a MAJOR point in playing games even those online?.. If anything it was to pitch people against each other PvP much.. its just happened that in GW in order to enjoy this PvP in most modes you gota bear playing with others....Heroes were a nice answer to those people who prefer to pay the game their way.. and heroes let them do it.. without all the *itching and moaning from constant "this build is crap? WTF get out of ehre mesmer!...Yeah dont run this SF is the way to go!"... Heroes dont talk back..they just folow orders....

So Sociealizing fals second if not third in gaming..

Its Win, Evolve. Socialize....

Still got it? Nah, he is continuously refining and improving his special skill. This is Zinger at his best!

Plus I have Amnesia, which increases my Special up by two levels!

Imo never gonna happen but............... Remove all heroes and henchies and force people to play together........ playing with people is so much fun and makes people better faster !!!!!!!!

... The only problem is that those players that dont knmow how to play will be interfiering with esperienced players that want to achieve a GOAL and not teach new commers how to play their given proffesions...thats what RA AB is for -_-

Not saing no grouping with them at all but it will be rather annoying and result in more hate towards new guys that it will backfire even more then it has already done -_-

Define which people? Random strangers or friends?

If you remove all heroes and henchies, that guy who plays with his wife would have to find other friends to fill up a team or forced to invite random strangers into their team. Somehow I dont think that would give a better gaming experience for him, his wife, or anybody in general.

The problem with this forum is, there are alot of "personal agenda suggestions". If I am not sociable enough to befriend people online, I want ANet to change the entire game mechanics to force people to party me everytime.

I think you missed the point completely (again). All my friends agreed with me that Guild Wars going solo was bad. We all play different games now, with me posting here to reminsce on the past mostly. I also quit due to all the changes made to the game over time. Heroes were just one bad change out of many..

I think you also missed the point. Heroes promote a singleplayer game. That is...the community in essense died overnight when heroes were released. The majority of the community now is soloers...I can't prove that but I can make a very good educated guess at it. The population of the game died overnight, because when you play solo you are effectively not part of the original Guild Wars community or concept anymore. In PvP this is the biggest problem of all. Heroes caused a huge drop in population...so now there is less people to team with and even less people to play against.

All in all I'm saying the game changed for the worse. I'm not saying heroes caused all the problems, but I am saying they were a problem that caused some of the problems.

LoL. You got it all wrong brother. The original game had no heroes. If anything heroes were invented for those exact people you specify. Anet changed the entire game mechanics for people who were not sociable enough for the original concept of the game, even though the original concept of the game is what made Guild Wars unique and separated it from the pack. Now Guild Wars is simply mediocre in the eyes of many. Anet changed their game and people who don't like the changes left. Its as simple as that.

Based on what?

Actually you got that reversed. There is really not much socializing going on in most PUGs. Most people were just interested in completing the mission/bonus. Nobody ever asked how was your day, what your likes/dislikes are, what is your favorite color, nobody seems to be interested in anything about you except how you would help them accomplish the mission. People that make up most PUGs dont strike me to be sociable at all.

The real socializing comes when you are playing with your friends. And when you are playing with your friends, it is usually a closed group with heroes/henchies to make up a full team because you may be talking about private issues that only you and your buddy knows about.

People who play with random PUGs are not necessarily sociable because most of them dont bother to get to know the other players in their team. People who bothered to make friends and play with them (buffered with heroes/henchies) are the real sociable players.

Shortened that there for you.

Il just agree with what this person said..sums it pretty much.. Once again this all matte rof opinions .. An dopinions are like Intestines...every body has em..
Its ust the matter of EGO that makes them either bigger or smaller.. sometimes they are so big they shut the brain down and thats when you become. ALL POWERFULL and ALL KNOWING being....in your own little world... Anyway i say heroes added more ways to play the game.. Not killed,Not fixed. just another option in an option list

Not this again. Based on a lot of non-scientific evidence that is all.

That depends on your definition of sociable. Either way I'd rather be playing with 7 people rather than 2 people and 5 AI (and in the case of PvP 3 people and 4 AI vs 3 people and 4 AI). Its just the way the game was meant to be.

Awful point. You can say that about anything in the game even if it is bad for the game. We had many people saying Ursan and Soul Reaping should stay because "OMGZ IT WOULD REMOVE MY OPTIONZ AND U JUST WANTZ ME TO PLAY YOUR WAY". Get a new argument and get back to me.

That is YOU. Everybody has a choice whether to play with heroes or play with someone else. If the person didn't want to play with you and would rather play with heroes what gives you the right to forcibly remove his choice of playing with heroes over yours? I just seems so childish that you would even consider forcing people to play with you when they dont want to. I mean would you hold a girl at gun point and force her to marry you next time?

I still recommend that you learn to befriend others so that they would feel better about partying with you, rather than asking ANet to FORCE them.

It wasn't an argument for or against heroes, learn to read. I was just pointing out that you are whining because things aren't the way you would personally like them. Which, by the way, you totally are.

I don't think heroes killed the game, but for me at least, it made the game less fun. I played back when prophecies was the only game and quit before factions came out, and just started playing again a few months ago. There is a lot more to do in the game now, sure, but in my opinion, the game was more fun back then. You could easily find a human group for anything. Who cares if someone in your group made you fail, at least you weren't spending all of your GW time with yourself. I also think that heroes should be removed from all PvP (except HB of course)