What are your intentions ANet?

If anyone from ANet ever reads this, I'd really like to know what their future intentions for Guild Wars are. It seems Guild Wars just took a HUGE turn for the worse. ANet says they want to discourage grinding, and yet they reduce drops from all monsters SIGNIFICANTLY, thusly making heavy grinding the ONLY viable way to get better weapons, etc, while taking out more than half the fun of the game for PvE players. This isn't all they have done to hinder the PvE experience. Now all those rare materials and dyes you worked so hard for are worth absolutely nothing, unless you wish to spend hours spamming the trade channels which only multiplies the grind. And since the NPCs will no longer pay fair prices for materials, dyes, or runes, EVERYONE is spamming the trade channels in a vain attempt to sell their items.

Now here's to a blind hope that this is all in preparation for something BETTER that's in the works. I'll try to remain hopeful for as long as I can, but you'd think that if they were doing this in order to augment some new system, they would WAIT until that system was ready before unleashing the communist hounds and utterly destroying the in-game economy, or ruining PvE by making it impossible to make money or find good items for your characters to use.

I await your response, ANet.

Sincerely,
Wolfgang Dietrich

/Agreed
I would like to know your intentions also. I will buy the next expansion but unless a serious fix is put inplace and you explain what possible solutions you are coming up with and fix your coustermer service so that I don't get an automated responce to a valid question I won't be back anymore.

(It is sad though that I forsaw this, read some of my very old economic threads on here, but no one took me seriously and put their trust in ANet to fix the economy)

"EVERYONE is spamming the trade channels"

Don't forget the LOCAL Channel as well.

I spam the emote channels by jumping 200 times waiting for a group in HoH.
Also whenever I goto Ascalon, and I see another warrior I say hows your weapon, then I use my spam on him.

Do we need heavy farmers? Everquest-like farmers? Do we need you to inflate the prices? Do we need you to brag about equipment and camp/exploit spots on the map over and over and over? No.

Guess what, reading the game's box you'll find interesting statements and I'd bet one of them goes like "you don't have to FARM YOUR FRIGGIN WAY TO PWN ALL THE SUXORZZZ AND BECOME 1337 AND SHOW EVERYONE HOW USELESS YOUR LIFE CAN BE".

Maybe not the exact words but something like that. I'm pretty sure.

If they really want to remove the grind and need to farm, they are doing it the wrong way. What they should do is INCREASE drop rates so everyone can get what they want and at the same time reduce prices.

That would also remove the market for botters..

According to ANet we shouldn't have to farm period, but now that drops have been reduced, heavy farmers and botters are going to have an even greater advantage than before.

/AGREED

Go ANet Go... And go home farmers

You're missing the point buddy, for a lot of us there's nothing left to do in the game BUT farm. I've had my share of PvP...(what little there is), and beaten the game plenty of times, now I just need to master my beloved characters. Oh shit, that's right, I don't have the money to improve my weapones, get my last superior vigor, or anything a simple droknar runner can do.

I don't think you're quite getting the point. This last update is only ENCOURAGING farming/botting even further. If you started a new character now after this most recent update, you would not find 1 rare item between pre-searing and hell's precipace through normal play.

And how could I possibly inflate prices if I can't even afford enough steel for 1.5k platemail. God forbid I actually go kill stuff in order to obtain new armor, but ANet doesn't want us doing that unless we're willing to commit hours upon hours into doing so.

I quote the box that each of you received when you bought the game:

Your Skill Will Be Your Legend

You'll prove your worth with every battle as skill, not hours played, decides your fate. Whether battling horrific monsters or competing at the highest levels of tournament play, it will always be your skill that earns you victory or defeat.

I am no fan of farming and, at least according to this definition, farming is an exploit:

ex·ploit (ksploit, k-sploit)

tr.v. ex·ploit·ed, ex·ploit·ing, ex·ploits (k-sploit, ksploit)

1. To employ to the greatest possible advantage: exploit one's talents.
2. To make use of selfishly or unethically: a country that exploited peasant labor. See Synonyms at manipulate.
3. To advertise; promote.

Farming is a form of exploitation. ANet has said over and over that the game is not dependent on items and that they will actively work to close loopholes, so-called farming areas and work to close down bot activity.

If it means that you have to do without uber and "leet" items, so be it. Employ your skill---like you're supposed to after all.

So what if you CAN'T find a rare or unique item? Big deal! You can salvage upgrade items out of the things you do find and what's to say that you can't beat the game without them in the first place?

As to prices? *shrugs* No one's forcing you to buy anything. And getting the best armors and such SHOULD be hard. But if you're not out there buying uber items and black dye, creating your own weapons is easy and gold collection happens. By the time you reach Droknar's you should have plenty of gold.

Right, lord knows if you didn't need runes, weapon upgrades or anything else you had to buy they wouldn't have put FACTION for PvP characters. Why the hell do you think they did that? Because they needed a way to get them.

ANet has also say that farming is fine and allowed so long as it isn't botted.

/agrees.

They should not focus on nerfing all the farming spots, as they are now. Instead, they should be making it such that there is no need for farming, not making it impossible, by increasing the frequency of drops.

Failing that, they should leave the drops the same, but put very hard monsters in the popular farming spots that makes it more of a challenge, rather than a waste of time.

The fact that there are many threads like this suggest something is wrong, and that the devs should take note.

I'm not even a farmer (Rangers tend to suck at that) but I still fail to see how farming is unethical. It requires effort, skill, and time. And I also fail to see how you can justify completely destroying the in-game economy.

Either way, this update screws new players, and gives botters more bang for their buck. Like mentioned previously, in order to combat farming, they should be giving MORE drops through normal play. If people didn't have to farm to be able to buy decent armor, I'm sure a much smaller number of people would be farming in the first place.

Also, I've yet to find a so called "uber" or "leet" weapon, and I've "beaten the game" twice now. My problem is.. what comes after beating the game? Since "farming" is so "unethical," what are we supposed to do to get the esteemed FoW armor? Tell me please.

Yes. That was my point. How could you possibly inflate prices NOW if you can't even afford enough steel for your 1.5k platemail? You can't. And it's good.

Besides, you'll read everywhere that nerfing drops has DAMAGED botters, it didn't encourage them.

What in the world are you after? 15k armor in every color maybe?

It's just not that hard to get anything in this game. I've never farmed and I've sold 1 single item for 5k and that's it. I've got 2 characters done and a third getting closer.

Now you can GvG and unlock any item for PvP as well.

There's just no need to have more gold in this game and I'm glad they're toning it down. I've given away at least a dozen, probably closer to 3 dozen max dmg gold weapons. I've got what I think is the best monk wand with 3 different ankh's, one 20/20 with dmg, one with armor and HP and one with more energy but a negative energy regen that I almost never use.

I can understand the PvP players that don't GvG being a bit upset but I can't understand PvE being upset about this. What area in PvE do you need the gold for? I've never gotten less than 1k worth of merchant stuff from UW.

I'm not that bright, if it's so easy for me then how is it so difficult for you that you're thinking of quitting over it?

What, you want 100k on 4 different characters and 10 sigils each?

I'm glad for the changes they made. Now if they'll just focus on getting the free areas out, hopefully with even more challenging enemies, and more casters included.

Then what is the point on having such a variety of different rares available? And to those who buy the game after these updates, how can they compete (in PVP) with those who do have nice rares? Using your skill has its limits.

I agree that the drops are really sucky right now (see FoW and UW) but I don't agree with the approach everyone wants to take. If we have insane drops ratios then those who bot will still become filthy rich by just selling their now over abundant stock to simple merchants and noobs who A.) don't change thier price and can offer over 300 for a crappy item, B.) Don't really know any better and/or can't help it. Though they would make less money farmers and bots will still prosper more than Average Joe. I guess its just unavoidable. Though this is only my opinion, so give me enough to shake my idea and I will change it, but right now the fixes aproach seems questionable.

(This is a Quickly Though Up Idea)If you really want to be able to farm then Anet should make some specific farming areas where at the end of your farming experience you get to keep only X of the items you actually farmed, ratios would change if it were a material (so material will be say 5X). Guess what this idea will totally f*** over bots and they will gain nothing more than Average Joe. To enter the areas the game could demand money or certain things, perhaps a redoable FUN quest that alters due to class and gets harder (to a point) the more you do it. (but not items as we know what can happen with this).

So thats a quick idea but I like so comment on it. As for not getting more than one rare from pre to hell's, that doesn't matter because on your journey you will run into hundreds of upgrades and many will be good or on par with any rare you may get. This will ultimatly allow you to have A personally customized super weapon, or atleast something you can be happy with.