GW's future....

I understand, and hope that you will realize that this is only my opinionated reply to your statements.
Actually, they don't necessarily. Looking at it from a wholly economic, rather than consumer rights, perspective, one must realize that in order to compete with MMORPGs, which hold a susbtantial share of GW's market, A.Net can devote no more resources to the development of their expansions than a typical MMORPG game holding company would devote to the development of new game content (how often does game content change in most MMORPGs? These days, I'd say about a year. That's ($15 x 12 months =) $180 in subscription fees, plus the cost of the game ($60) and possibly, depending on the game, the cost for the expansion ($30). That means that a typical MMORPG game holding company could make $270 a year from a single user. In comparison, A.Net is working with two expansions a year at $50 a piece. $100 a year tops. (Yes, I know that very little of that is even A.Net profit, but it's still a useful indirect comparison). So A.Net conceivably has a revenue stream of less than half that of its competitors, while they are expected to devote to at least as much return revenue on development.) I know that GW isn't technically an MMORPG, of course, but let's not kid ourselves ... they're in the same market.

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And I am oh so thankful for that. The depth of strategy available in the professions already available was more than enough for me. I would personally rather see GW devote its next few expansions to signifcantly boosting the current professions, rather than adding more, which would only create job overlap and eventual balance failure.

Some of the skill "clones" are actually quite useful. Churning Earth, for example, only appears similar to Eruption when you read the skills ... in practice, it's a whole other ball game. Some skills that really are direct copies also work extraordinarily well when paired together. Certainly, there are limits inherant in the design (what's a good game w/o limits?). However, I could think of any number of ways to use existing skill concepts in different ways. What about skills that lowered attributes? Skills that change the keyboard operations for your character (like a confusion skill?). Nothing like this has been implemented yet, but could be without interfering with balance or game structure concerns. Truly, the limitations are fewer than one might think.

Very true, but I imagine that game balancing will occur often through updates. The minion mancer nerf was likely one result of this, perhaps to keep ritualists or Cantha necros from manifesting larger or more powerful armies than Prophecy necros (by limiting them all to a certain number when Factions necros otherwise could have sustained more).

Once again, A.net can retroactively change the chapters themselves. Notice the new elementalist armors available to prophecy characters or the new skill descriptions on Prophecy skills describing their interactions with spirits, among other things? New chapters won't date the old, and old chapters won't inhibit the new, provided that A.net stays aware.

That's definately not a game issue so much as a gamer issue. I like collecting useful items and skills myself, but some will have to get that 15k armor. What's wrong with GW catering to that crowd if their experience doesn't hurt me as a gamer? Nothing, really.

Using item and skill combinations to screw over fellow players = competition. PvP is a big part of this game. In a way, the whole point of the game is to arrange certain resources so that you can defeat others who arrange certain resources. I'm okay with that. As for exploits and bugs (real ones, not just good skill combos ...), yes they will have to be addressed as they come up. All games have similar issues, and some are never resolved.

By sentence: 1) Good for you! 2 and 3) It's not a money sink. The quests give you money, and enough quests merit skills. I really, really like it myself, and I'm not a rich player by any means. I'd rather complete a mission and know that I could use the proceeds to buy armor or skills or weapons or ... well whatever, really, than undertake a quest solely for XP like some of the old Prophecy quests. 4, 5 and 6) Are you sure you don't need those points to be the best ranger you could be? You see, the best characters should have multiple sub-jobs so that they can take on any number of different opponents depending on your team configuration. (It's called utility). A water/curse E/N that can change to a heal party/ward E/Mo is far more useful a person to have around than either one by itself. (Hopefully some day A.net will let you switch in any town rather than the desert locations). If you have so many skill points, try applying them to a new second profession for an alternate build. As you can tell, I'm happy that there is massive XP to provide new skill points. I'll need them for my next secondary profession.

I'd say that A.Net could justify it by continuing to provide the game. (See the economic argument above). Honestly, I think that if you like the game as it is now, the expansions will just provide more of that, with different options. If you're looking for a truly new game every time you buy an expansion, you'll be dissapointed. Personally, I like Guild Wars, and want to see more of it. My only hope for the next expansion is that it goes through a better story and programming quality control regime.

Here's something to think about.

Think about the game from the viewpoint of someone that starts playing in Factions. They can't complain about how much better Chapter 1 was because they were never in it. They won't notice the multiple skills because they only see one half of it (the original purpose of the duplicate skills, in addition to basically having a free echo of that skill - get creative ffs).

You can compare this game to M:tG in another way. They release countless new sets, and while some incredibly dedicated players will play every set ever released, most will just stick with the Type 2 sets. The same thing could happen with Guild Wars if they do it right. New players can constantly come in and start fresh on a later chapter, and if they want every possible edge over their opponent, they can buy the previous chapters. If GW wants their games to REALLY last they could set up some 'type 2' tournaments, where only skills from later chapters are accepted.

Of course this is another one of my posts that is mainly PVP related, because those are the players that Guild Wars is aimed towards.

As long as we're talking about GW's future, I'm worried about the future of Factions. Gyala Hatchery had, as of 11pm on a Friday, exactly 5 people in its sole district. The Eternal Grove had 6. Imperial Sanctum was empty (except for me). Faction farming hotspots such as Altrumm Ruins, Brauer Academy and Breaker Hollow each have about a dozen people or so. To compare: ToPK had several B/P teams forming, and ToA had at least two relatively full districts (we had favor).

I can see two reasons for the lack of people in the interesting missions in GWF:

• They have all finished the PvE campaign already, a mere week after release, and aren't bothering with bringing any other character through it.
• They are all stuck in Kaineng City.

Neither reason bodes well for the game. The former means that that game had too little content to be worth it, and the latter means that the players Guild Wars has retained are too clueless to finish the game. (It is fairly safe to say that a majority of the good players in the game have moved on to other games.)

PvP is in an even weirder state. Alliance Battles are now less fun than stabbing yourself in the eye with a pointed stick. Assassins seem to be only good as a second profession for the shadow stepping skills. Ritualists are (as predicted) overpowered in some areas and useless in others. Competitive Missions are, as mentioned already, ghost towns.

My diagnosis: GWF has bombed. Hard.

In addition to the reasons for a lack of people in interesting missions... So either everyone is done, or no one is... there's no middle?

Look around at missions and outposts, you'll find your customers.

And there really isn't much wrong with existing PVP. Assassins are finding use in top guilds (Bloodlight) which will make more and more people find a use for them. No one is at competetive missions yet, so they can't be argued over atm. Ladder is still exciting to follow, and HA is still just as fun as ever. Alliance battles can easily be fixed with a couple of minor tweaks (random entering, and some sort of a punishment for leaving).

My diagnosis: Week long attention spans won't enjoy any game. Give it time. Things didn't start out perfect for Chapter One you know.

well, in my opinion, GW:F got a hell of new good concept..that mission are no longer linear like in GW:P..for me, GW:P are more balanced than GW:F..however, the replayability is low for GW:P comparing to GW:F..at least in GW:F, there are things like challenge mission, factions farming, etc, etc..that lead ppl who finish the game to play more..however, i just hope that fort aspenwood will not be random while alliance will be not team based..

in the future chapter, i really hope that anet can add additional content to the existing tyria..i mean the map of tyria is so big and we only explore a part of it..there are a lot of empty spaces in the map that can be converted into additional content..

hence, for me, GW:F is an innovative game but the idea behind the game is poorly implemented..not to mention the bugs that spoilt the game..

besides, personally, for me, i can get acquainted with the accelereated pace of GW:F well because i have played GW:P for some time..but i just afraid that the game might be difficult to attract new players due to the learning curve has been increased comparing to the previous chapter..vizunah may be a hell to the newbies if they cannot play well...

i just hope that in the future, the future chapter will be able to let the new players to get into the game eventually like what GW:P does and yet retain and improve on the content of GW:F...not to mention a more stable future chapter on GW as well..

well, i really have to say kudos to the graphics and environment of GW:F..they really do a good job on the environment..but it is the gameplay that they need to fix..as well as the background music..

for the new classes, initally, i heard a lot of ppl complain of assassin as weak tanker..but over the time, the situation change..with its combo, assassin can be deadly..

in a nutshell, i still think that GW:F is a great game..cheers.=D

Customers?

I think a.net pretty much shot themselves in the foot when they designed the skill system for this game, since it keeps them away from raising the max level cap.
Think about it, say they'll raise the level cap to 30 in the next chapter, what's gonna happen to our current skills? will our max attribute get raised to like 24?
That will just bring back the massly overpowered skills like prot bond etc', they simply can't do that.

And even if they do find a way to raise level cap without affecting skills - there's the whole issue of how much XP to set it at. current level 20 is 140k xp, say they make level 30 at 300k XP, now how many current GW players have waay more than that? personally my most played char has 3mil XP. I'll just get an auto-bump to level 30 o_O there's no fun in that..
But if they set it at something more reasonable to CURRENT players - like 5mil XP for level 30, then the new customers will take forever to reach that 5mil mark.. that creates an imbalance.

Like the OP said, the amount of things to do in this game are fairly limited, due to the game's base design, the only thing they can do now is add more maps, more quests, and more gold sinks.

I was excited with GW:Factions, i even pre ordered it and payed extra 30$ for express shipping, but i just feel conned.. the content they added just doesn't justify "A List" prices.


~My 2 cents

Sorry, meant look around at ALL of them. A large portion of them are still in the PVP side of things, and a large portion still like trading in the main cities.

The beginning few outposts have 20+ districts... Thats a fairly good indicator of where the general populous is.

But its late, I don't want to post anything that I won't remember tomorrow.

I enjoy factions quite a bit, it is less content but I find it more enjoyable then prophecies, and with titles,challenge missions,competitive missions, alliance battles,and elite missions I think I will get even more time out of this game.

As for the basic design premises it is what hooked me to buy the game in the first place and Anet not continuing them would make me quit the game not buy it. It might be limiting but so far Anet has been doing well and I think they will find a way to continue it.

I'm not going to argue, although I appreciate your effort to rationally respond, instead of being a twit like some.

I'm not looking for a "new" game - I'm looking for a better one. I've played GW to death. ANet advertised "150 new skills", I just didn't realize they meant "150 differently named skills, some of which may match other skills within the same profession".

Expansions cost 30 bucks, not 50.

Diablo 2 (and LOD expansion) is still running strong, what, 10 years after the original was released? Blizzard isn't looking for additional money via new chapters every six months, or a subscription fee. Yet, Battle.net is almost a carbon copy of GW (or technically vice versus) - it's all instanced, with prettier lobbies. In fact, Blizzard still patches the game on occasion. And Blizzard's LOD expansion rocked hardcore and was worth every single penny.

I constantly use D2 and Blizzard as examples, but quite frankly, besides the fact that ANet has many former blizzard employees, D2 and GW are incredibly similar in gameplay.

WoW won't kill GW - Diablo 3 will.

Yeah I actually like having the option to farm if I am done with the game. In Factions most farming is pretty much dead. And yes I know Guild Wars wasn't meant to be a game where people farm, but in ANY RPG where monsters drop stuff there will be farming. And if I want a chance for a cool skin I have to have control of a certain area, but I don't pvp a lot, so that will never happen. *sigh*

Considering this is the first 'add-on' they've done, I think that odds are futures ones would go much more smoothly.

However, considering as new ones come out old ones will get cheaper, and probably sold as a bundle, they should find a way to give existing players some sort of discount if you, say, already have 3 'chapters'. I.E. If you already have Guild Wars Prophecies, Factions and Ooga-Booga (working title for 3rd chapter ), if you order Guild Wars Flim-Flam (working title for 4th chapter ) through us you get a discount of xx%

Because if they don't do something like that, you know there will be old, dedicated players complaining that they had to pay all that cash for each individual set whereas some new guy just bought a pack of the chapters for half of what the oldbie paid.

mimi miyagi typed what i was too lazy to, nad he/she's 100% correct, GW ch1 was soo fun, i mean i could play it for another 6 months.... BUT, ch2 makes me want to stop playing, not play more lol, the game's story is just total crap IMO, i remeber writing that in 3rd grade lol..

also, as mimi said... teh day D3 comes out.. GG GW

but... forsome reason tehres something that makes me unable to stop GW lol, so i will be buying future chapters UNTIL D3, or SC2

Oh god. Please rebuild Ascalon. That place is too depressing.

GWF as a money sink? Well that is one way to look at it. All glitz and glamour, little on the substance and function. Of course it's a joke -.- (or is it)

New? Maybe not, but it surely wasn't as blatantly obvious, due to the fact they weren't as (!)(((MIND-NUMBING)))(!). Here is a question: Did ANET seriously think these kind of missions would be anywhere near the sense of "FUN"? Entertaining? Original? Or did they put them in there to aggravate us further? Did they expect us to read the stories about how supplies were short and spread about many NPCs? There are so many negative things on this release that created a perfect storm that I don't know if GW can ride out.

You know what, in a sense I would like to hear a response to these many complaints. An acknowledgement. A certifiable answer that future releases will be more along the lines of Factions and we were just spoiled with GWP, a one-hit wonder, as someone has said so cleverly. Yes I know it has only been 10 days, and we should wait and see. Actions speak louder than words. Yada yada. I will sit by, and patiently watch. Either they can rise above it all, or spectacularly cave. It will be interesting either way, no less.

A few nights ago, I arrived at the Seabord mission. Had problems getting into a group, not because I'm a mesmer, but because there were only about twenty people there, most afk. Then last night, I arrived in another town and was the only person in the only district. Zoomed out and took a screenshot of my lonely mesmer standing near the line of henchies. I'm at the point where I have to gather 10,000 faction, and I know a lot of people have made it there and beyond, so yeah, it does make me wonder if people will blow through the game once and then abandon it. Might be hard to group in a few weeks. They better fix the damn henchies because they may be the only option for those who are still playing.

Yes, but it wasn't as obvious in Prophecies. There was a thread here a few months ago asking people which Prophecies quests they hated. The most common response were those like Minaar's Worry, where you had to fight your way through an area to complete a goal, then zone to get to the quest-giver, who would then give you another quest that would require you to go back and fight through the same area you just fought through. There were a couple of those in Prophecies and people hated them. Along comes Factions, and tons of quests are like that. I thought perhaps it was only the city, but now that I've been exploring the points beyond that a bit, I find the same thing. Last night: did a quest, returned to quest-giver, oh, here's another quest, requiring you to go back to exactly where you just came from. WTF? Who thought that would be fun?

I agree with most of the stuff in the post. I don't feel that I should have spend $50 on it, but I do feel $25-30 would have been fine.

Lets think about it another way. Every 6 months we get a new chapter that costs $50. Guild Wars cost $50, so divide that by 6, and we were paying around $8 a month for this game. Then we buy Factions, and it is the same way price wise. But thinking of it yet another way, what if you only play Factions for 3 months then wait for the next chapter? because you finished all the Factions content and are tired of it. Then you paid about $16 a month for it.

I am really considering going over to WoW, $15 a month for that doesn't seem so bad anymore. Sure, after six months you will have paid about double GW, but the content keeps a coming in that game.

In GW 1, the UW was the place to farm ecto, and they made favor, so only certain areas could go and farm it. We have alliances in GW 2, and only certain ones can take over towns. I am really dissapointed about how the rich keep getting richer.

I also feel extremely cheated that I would have been better of if I hadn't merged my GW 1 and GW 2 accounts.

BUT, Sorrows Furnace and other places were add ons to GW 1, there will probably be some for GW 2 also.



And with all of us disliking Factions, have any of us reccommended that our guidlies sink $50 into it? I know I haven't. What happens if not many Prophecies players come over to Factions, and Factions dies?> -- I would actually be sort of happy, it would teach Anet a lesson.

I really only play GW for the PvE, not really into PvP (though not dissing it for all those that like it ) I certainly won't be buying any further chapters if they reduce or remove the PvE content. I loved the first game and haven't really got far enough into factions to comment on that yet, only to say that I think the rapid levelling is to allow you to play the majority of your game with characters from Tyria as well if you want to as the two games merge pretty early on. I'm enjoying it so far, and hope that they continue to cater for both PvE and PvP players.

I am sorry to say that i agree with the OP entirely on all subjects stated. Faction was a real dissappointment and if things dont improve in C3, dont expect us to shell out 50 bucks to line your pockets.I got the CE for Factions because i played GWP and loved it hence preordered to support ANET and to get the perks as well.

It saddens me as i flip through the art book to see so much detail in artwork and the Lore had went into the work of Factions yet its not clearly represented in the game when i was playing it.

About Locked gates, its fine if we were just doing the main missions once maybe but understand that many delicated players may have full PvE slots and some even double accounts on them. Having them drag through the main quest 6 or 12 times isnt really very smart...FFS i cant even zone into the same towns as my party if i dont have the same quest with them.

The seer amount of frustration at times really makes the beauty of lore and story(still weak) of the game hard to notice (when i was travelling in the slums i just wanted to get out of there yet theres many nice details all around the place to explore), seriously get a clue and play the game yourself without your GM hacks for once and see what we are talking about here.

I buy a game to play and have fun, but it seems that isnt what this game is about or heading towards any more sadly.


-dissappointed fan

Man, these threads come up monthly. I can at least see the reasons for making one now that Factions is out, but still... Nobody ever gets tired of beating on "how boring" the game gets or how they're "losing faith in ANet", or my favorite, that they'll "go play WoW"...

There's a reason GW isn't pay-to-play. There's not enough content to warrant it. You can, if you feel so inclined, beat the game in 10-15 hours, a comparable length to most single-player games; and funnily enough, even a crappy 15 hour one-off shooter or adventure game costs $50. Playing that way, you'd be missing out on tons of stuff, but you wouldn't know it unless you'd played the game before, and in that case, you'd have way more time logged anyways.

There's no reason for you to keep playing after 12+ months. Burnout's bascially inevitable if you don't take a break. If you're not having fun, don't play it. A very simple concept. Come back later, if you want to. It's okay. Really.