The majority of the community sucks (or does it?)

[DreamWind]

Originally Posted by Improvavel

That isn't my post. That is quoted directly from GWs official site (link is there before the wall of text and apologize if the post wasn't explicit and mislead you; fixed it now). If you want to tell the designers and owners of the game what their game is, is up to you.

I don't have to tell them, they have already told us in the exact quote you posted. They basically confirm what I have been saying about Guild Wars all along...

Originally Posted by Improvavel

MMORPGs require you to play with other people.

GW is very similar to MMORPG without being one. If you look at it is a game that needs to be played online. Can be played solo or with other people in cooperation, or can be played player vs player.

Ok here is the definition of an MMO:

A massively multiplayer online game (also called MMOG or simply MMO) is a video game which is capable of supporting hundreds or thousands of players simultaneously. By necessity, they are played on the Internet, and feature at least one persistent world.

How does GW not fit this again?

Originally Posted by Improvavel

I would clearly say that they recognize a Competitive Area and a Cooperative area. I would also say they linked the Competition to PvP.

I wouldn't. I think it is clear that the part that really jumps out of that quote is this:

Success in Guild Wars is always the result of player skill
Success in Guild Wars is always the result of player skill
Success in Guild Wars is always the result of player skill

You can spin the rest of the quote all you want, but the fact of the matter is this was a BIG selling point when this game was released (see Prophecies box). Saying otherwise is something I bet nobody including Anet will agree with you on.

[Improvavel]

Originally Posted by DreamWind

A massively multiplayer online game (also called MMOG or simply MMO) is a video game which is capable of supporting hundreds or thousands of players simultaneously. By necessity, they are played on the Internet, and feature at least one persistent world.

How does GW not fit this again?

If you want me to nitpick and fight a semantics war, I don't see hundreds of thousands players in a persistent world. But I guess you call Diablo II a MMO.

I wouldn't. I think it is clear that the part that really jumps out of that quote is this:

Success in Guild Wars is always the result of player skill
Success in Guild Wars is always the result of player skill
Success in Guild Wars is always the result of player skill

If you are telling me someone that is more skillful is worse, when using PvE-only skills and consumables, than someone less skillful, I tell you that you are wrong.

A more skillful player will always be better at GW.
And if you are telling me that a less skillful player will be better because he can use consumables and PvE-skills or has higher rank on those skills, I can also say that a lvl 20 character played by an idiot will have a better chance to survive against a level 26 mob than a lvl 1 played by the best player.

You can spin the rest of the quote all you want, but the fact of the matter is this was a BIG selling point when this game was released (see Prophecies box). Saying otherwise is something I bet nobody including Anet will agree with you on.

Although I've already explained you that they were talking about normalization of levels and items, I will also like to say that I've a nice chunk of land in the dark side of the moon for sale and everyone that is cool and smart already bought nearby properties. So be fast!

[Red Sonya]

I always disliked randomness in drops. I would prefer if mobs only dropped materials or collector/bounty items, and all the upgrades/inscriptions/skins could be bought/crafted at fixed prices.

Definitely not me as this just SOCIALIZES the game when everything can be had by everyone and as GW is now so EASILY as well. I would much prefer NO DROP NO TRADE items myself for the elite or semi elite items as this would me only those who really worked for them and put the effort into getting them would get them. This also prevents over farming or really most farming as with NO DROP NO TRADE there's no reason to keep doing redundant things over an over again for the loot, but, could be done for experience titles and rank. A player could still salvage the items resources, but, they would still be no drop no trade and he could only use them on other items he/she has aquired to buff them up.

[DreamWind]

Originally Posted by Improvavel

If you want me to nitpick and fight a semantics war, I don't see hundreds of thousands players in a persistent world. But I guess you call Diablo II a MMO.

I don't know why I'm still in this thread. I thought I was supposed to quit a while back. /facepalm

Originally Posted by Improvavel

A more skillful player will always be better at GW.

Unless they aren't using PvE skills and consumables.

Originally Posted by Improvavel

I can also say that a lvl 20 character played by an idiot will have a better chance to survive against a level 26 mob than a lvl 1 played by the best player.

Uh...what is your point?

Originally Posted by Improvavel

Although I've already explained you that they were talking about normalization of levels and items.

Proof?

You posted an official Anet quote saying that GW is Skill>time, competitive, and an MMO. You now say that GW either isn't or shouldn't be any of those. You also ignore about 50% of Bryant's points. I understand your position, but I don't see how you can stick to it given all the evidence to the contrary.

[Improvavel]

Originally Posted by DreamWind

Unless they aren't using PvE skills and consumables.

Player skill is compared under the same circumstances.

Uh...what is your point?

Player skill is compared under the same circumstances.

Makes no sense to compare a level 1 player to a level 20 player. It makes no sense comparing a player using consumables to other not using consumables.

"Hey that guy walks faster than the other, he is using a sweet the other isn't, he must be better!" Makes perfect sense...

Proof?

PvP levels and items are normalized. PvE levels and items are normalized. Of course they were talking about something else.

Experience is acquired with time. Natural skill can only carry you so far. Experience can only carry you so far.

If you want to contest the above statment be my guest.

You posted an official Anet quote saying that GW is Skill>time, competitive, and an MMO.

That same quote also states it isn't exactly a MMO, it is cooperative and "Engaging in combat is always the player's choice, however; there is no player-killing in cooperative areas of the world".

combat - Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 :

158 Moby Thesaurus words for "combat":
Kilkenny cats, action, aerial combat, affray, all-out war,
altercation, antagonize, appeal to arms, argument, armed combat,
armed conflict, armored combat, attack, battle, battle royal,
beat against, beat up against, belligerence, belligerency,
bickering, bloodshed, box, brawl, breast the wave, broil, brush,
buck, buffet, buffet the waves, bullfight, cat-and-dog life, clash,
clash of arms, close, close with, cockfight, collide,
come to blows,compete with, conflict, confrontation, contend,
contend against, contention, contentiousness, contest,
contestation, controversy, cut and thrust, debate, defy,
difference, disagreement, disputation, dispute, do battle,
dogfight, duel, embroilment, encounter, engagement, enmity,
exchange blows, exchange of blows, fence, feud, fight,
fight a duel, fight against, fighting, fire fight, fray,
give and take, give satisfaction, grapple, grapple with,
ground combat, hand-to-hand combat, hand-to-hand fight,
hostilities, hostility, hot war, house-to-house combat,
join battle with, jostle, joust, la guerre, labor against,
litigation, logomachy, might of arms, military operations,
militate against, mix it up, naval combat, offer resistance,
open hostilities, open war, oppose, opposition, paper war,
passage of arms, pitched battle, polemic, quarrel, quarreling,
quarrelsomeness, rassle, reluct, reluctate, repel, resort to arms,
riot, rival, rumble, run a tilt, running fight, scramble,
scrapping, scrimmage, scuffle, shooting war, shoving match,
skirmish, spar, squabbling, stand-up fight, state of war,
stem the tide, street fight, strife, strive, strive against,
struggle, struggle against, take on, tauromachy, the sword,
thrust and parry, tilt, total war, tourney, traverse, tug-of-war,
tussle, vendetta, vie with, wage war, war, war of words, warfare,
warmaking, warring, wartime, withstand, words, wrangling,
wrestle

You now say that GW either isn't or shouldn't be any of those.

I say GW is, in one hand, a PvP competition (in the areas called PvP areas) based on skill and not on time attaining levels (you can create PvP characters that are max level) and/or equipment (you start with max armor and max damage weapons, although you have to unlock upgrades/inscriptions/runes, which new PvP'ers will contest the way require to obtain them), and, in the other hand a game that can be played alone or can be played in a cooperative way (in the areas called PvE areas), where skill is of much less importance and has very small relevance on beating the game content, given the nature of a static AI.

You also ignore about 50% of Bryant's points. I understand your position, but I don't see how you can stick to it given all the evidence to the contrary.

The evidence given is a complaint on why PvE isn't what some people believes it should be.

People can disregard reality and complaint that the reality doesn't fit their view or they can accept reality as it is (I guess you can try to change it, but that doesn't means the reality isn't the way it was supposed to be).

In my opinion, makes much more sense to believe that game reflects the state it was supposed to be, PvE being what RPGs are, a place where you collect stuff, call it items or call it titles, based not on perfect skill system, but on a mixture of some skill and time played; and PvP being a system where both sides have the same resources, and fight among each other, with the fights being decided on both raw skill and accumulated experience.

Bad design choices and/or bad ways to implement those aside, that is what the game looks like.

Or you can say the game is all wrong, Anet are pansies that created GW by mere luck and have no clue what makes a game attractive.

You choose whatever it makes you feel better.

I choose to see the reality.

[Improvavel]

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

It' s about time this Fail thread gets closed and burried deep in the archives. Sorry Frill, but you opened pandora's box here.

I'm sorry if I derailed, unintentionally, this thread, but as Gun Pierson stated, it annoys me the way people like to blame PvE/others on the failures of one of the most promising and innovative games out there.

It also pisses me off the fact that people can't accept that other people don't share the same objectives in this game, and wish to force them on the same objectives or to rank people in places that aren't supposed to be competitive.

There is space for everyone in this game, well some people could get lost (its not a mention to anyone on this thread), and in an online community there can be different interests coexisting. Skillful game has a space, called PvP, and more relaxed, less based skillful play has its own space in PvE. Some people (the heresy) even enjoy and have fun on both.

[Bryant Again]

Originally Posted by Improvavel

Titles aren't awards - they are content. In other games content is leveling up and getting stronger items. In GWs a big part of the content is getting the titles.

wat. Text under your name is "content"?

Unless you're referring to the boost you get for upping titles in PvE skills...which is a reward for your time invested into the game. There you have it: You're playing for rewards, not for the lulz. Apparently not all rewards are without meaning, no?

Titles don't have any impact on your gameplay besides making it easier (a very, very huge problem) and - just like rare weapons - e-peen. Other than that both hold the same amount of substance.

But you're still ignoring the underlying issue: there are still SOOOOOOO many multitudes of better ways of implementing methods that make it easier to get those rewards via not degrading the intelligence of the playerbase.

Aside from that, I paid just as much as you for this game. You're just as entitled to "seeing your content" as much as I'm entitled to seeing it stay as is.

Originally Posted by Improvavel

In a game like Starcraft you play against the insane AI or not if you wish too. If beating the campaign against a harder AI unlocks some interesting video the normal one doesn't, then its content. The people not wanting to beat the harder AI and still want to see the video, have cheats.

More and more devs are encouraging you to get better at the game, and that's a good thing!!! Remember how I talked about Mass Effect not giving you the hardest difficulty achievements if you change the difficulty to anything lower even once in your gameplay? How Rock Band 2 locks you from earning achievements if you put on the cheats that make it so you can't lose? How Fallout 3 gives you less experience on a difficult setting, and more if on a harder?

What good developers are doing these days is still providing the game for those who wish to play it. But are still holding on reserve the rewards for those who actually are knowledgeable with the game.

What ANet did wrong was kowtow those who didn't have the experience and who didn't want to be experienced. They provided content that rewarded those who were willing to go through with it and who had extensive play in the game. Then the minority of people who weren't terribly good cried and cried and cried and ANet gave them PvE skills, consumables, and other facets to make it easier.

If you're an average player, you're not really going to care about those long term "rewards", you just want to play the game. That was one mistake ANet realized with Ursan: all of these changes are 1. the wrong way to appeal to the casual player and those with little time (that's what easier difficulties is for: they see the main-juice of the game, not the "goodies"), and 2. they are FAR more beneficial to those who don't want to put in the effort for those harder areas. Your defense for the imbalances in this thread are no less different than those for Ursan. If all those arguments actually held merit, if "don't like don't use" was really a solid point, Anet wouldn't have touched Ursan. Instead they did quite the opposite: they mutilated it.

That's how every solid game has progressed: provide with an easy mode of access and slowly progressing into more difficult gameplay, rewarding those who reach their peak - NOT with loot, not with a title, but by making all of their hard work gratifying. Developers understand the meaning of maintaining a well-defined and challenging progression. Unfortunately, ANet isn't one of those at this point.

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

Because you and Bryant have an opinion doesn't mean you're right. What evidence? I'll give some evidence: Anet decided this is the way GW is going and they think it's the best for their pocket, the game and the majority of the playerbase. Try beat that. GW sales are still strong after almost 4 years and people are still playing this 'multiplayer' game.

That's why WoW has such a madly popular playerbase.

No matter how totally %@%#ed up the endgame gets, no matter how wildly unbalanced arenas are, it's always going to be the people completely, horribly oblivious of the endgame that makes the sales: the casuals. Numbers don't equate anything to quality, just look at the Wii.

All we're saying is that the skill threshold has been needlessly lowered, and how this will have a lasting effect and those who wish to delve further into the game and into other parts of the game.

[boko]

Originally Posted by Improvavel

People can disregard reality and complaint that the reality doesn't fit their view or they can accept reality as it is (I guess you can try to change it, but that doesn't means the reality isn't the way it was supposed to be).

In my opinion, makes much more sense to believe that game reflects the state it was supposed to be, PvE being what RPGs are, a place where you collect stuff, call it items or call it titles, based not on perfect skill system, but on a mixture of some skill and time played; and PvP being a system where both sides have the same resources, and fight among each other, with the fights being decided on both raw skill and accumulated experience.

Bad design choices and/or bad ways to implement those aside, that is what the game looks like.

Or you can say the game is all wrong, Anet are pansies that created GW by mere luck and have no clue what makes a game attractive.

You choose whatever it makes you feel better.

I choose to see the reality.

Or another reality is that the game turned out to be completely different from what it was when it started...


When GW started, it was a gem that everyone fell in love with. It was something completely original which stood on its own ground but which spinned out of control with the continous tweaks, "fixes", add-ons and expansions.

The problem is that although the original idea was fabulous and the idea of new content every 6 months sounded awesome..., the fact is that GW slipped out of Anet's hands...

The more expansions which was supposed to reinvent the game, created more broken mechanics that were abused... and divided the community...in other words, created more problems that they had anticipated...

The supposedly new genre CORPG in fact, turned out to be a wannabe MMO with the addition of grind and titles...

In desperate attempts, ANet tried to fix all the problems, but in the end, all they managed is to provide "band-aids" which do not fix the problem at all...e.g creation of PvE skills and Consumables in a game where skill was supposed to be key leaving us with a game where you can basically c+ space through the game; a badly implemented search system ; GvGs and HA where bots (aka Heroes) exists...

In the end, Anet give up under the colossal work they have to do to actually fix the game, and decide to stop all chapter releases and start working on GW2... since that is the only option they have left to return GW to its glory...

And since, most players already realised this, most left leaving the present GW with title-grinders and some few patches of population and and loads of leechers seeking titles...

[Bryant Again]

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

Absolutely but Anet needs to pay the bills too.

So does every other renowned game company, but we don't see them copping out to the lowest denominator (well, save for Nintendo, maybe).

There were multiple paths they could've taken to please both crowds, but they didn't take a single one.

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

I think that effect is overestimated. Even if you beat HM without all the tools available, another ballgame starts when you enter serious PvP. It basically comes down to unlearn what you have learned and learn new other skills teached by a PvP guild that wants to take you under their wings. That's where the skill and multiplayer aspect of this game come to mind.

It's not like when those tools (cons etc) would be removed from the game tomorrow, that the playerbase would be good in a few months. In the first years, the mainstream of pugs and people in general played bad too, compared to talented players or organised guilds.

Of course the playerbase wouldn't be "good" in a few months, but it would be vastly improved and have a wider knowledge of what works and what doesn't.

As is, consets and PvE skills don't just make you go through the game easier. They nearly completely fill up the gaps in your template that would normally be a gaping flaw in your build. When you don't see those flaws, when you see success no matter what you do, you don't learn anything. You don't learn which skill is better than what, which skill is bad for each situation, and etc.

As is there's very little consequence if you remove the skill descriptions from PvE: as long as players know what consumables are and where to get the PvE skills (and even a lot of suck, funnily enough) you don't really have to care what your build is at all.

If we balanced PvE skills and made the bonuses gained from consets much more restrictive it would give players much more of an idea of what's running in their build, leading to a much easier transition to PvP.

[Fril Estelin]

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

It's about time this Fail thread gets closed and burried deep in the archives. Sorry Frill, but you opened pandora's box here and it stinks.

I must have been absolutely terrible at explaining my point. I think people simply saw the thread title of the discussion, not the OP, and they must have thought "let's go at another discussion on player skills". The OP clearly said it was about the "teaching" (which may have been more appropriately named "guiding", I guess most people have bad memories of school/uni teachers) side of the argument, but a few people decided that it's not what they wanted to discuss, and I felt it was ok for while. I didn't open pandora's box, it was thrown into this thread at one point.

For me, it's just a sad and depressing acknowledgement that the issue of "teaching" does not matter to most. Not to say that some are not trying, but rather with the thought that if all the energy of posters in this thread was focused more on teaching stuff about the game (rather than making an argument on the situation), it'd be amazing. But it is not.

[Bryant Again]

A lot of players are stubborn, but appealing to them is just going to make the game worse further down the road. For many, "learning the hard way" is probably the best method, but that's only because they bring it on themselves.

As is there's very little we can do besides on a personal basis: be helpful towards other players, let them know when they mess up (important: follow up on what they can do to not do it again) - in general, the only thing we can do is be as helpful as they can.

The best thing I could suggest would be to implement a resource in-game that goes to the wiki. Fortunately, that's already been done. It's quite easily one of the best things ANet's done to their game. The only way they could make it better would be if it was in-game.

[Fril Estelin]

Originally Posted by Bryant Again

A lot of players are stubborn, but appealing to them is just going to make the game worse further down the road. For many, "learning the hard way" is probably the best method, but that's only because they bring it on themselves.

You're the victim of your own prejudices. It may well be the experience you gained from helping players, but put it on bad luck because there are plenty of people eager to learn (and as a teacher of Maths, I know this lesson quite painfully, believe me).

I know how valuable learning from failing is, and I think it's even healthier in the modern society mindset we have, but the tradeoff between failing and having fun is different in a game (and I guess it's different from even what you consider since you're playing a lot of games).

As is there's very little we can do besides on a personal basis: be helpful towards other players, let them know when they mess up (important: follow up on what they can do to not do it again) - in general, the only thing we can do is be as helpful as they can.

What about spend your time in Q&A? Or distill your knowledge of the game in any other parts of the forum? Or write a guide, tutorial, or whatever that could help on one part of the game? (I'll post on Guru an early draft of the idea I mentioned before, I hope you'll contribute )

Think about it for a few minutes: all this time you and other have spent here, arguing for the sake of words and "truth" (which is here totally immaterial and quite subjective anyway), couldn't you have spent it to address the problem of player skills, rather than merely point to it with precise argument?

I'm not saying you should, contrarily to what a few said earlier, but I'm genuinely asking the question: isn't a little bit "our" fault if skill is not passed from "older" generation of GW players to "newer" ones? (it's not really about old and new, but I hope you get the point) If we'd want a GW community with the average skill being 10 to 20% higher, can't we do anything about it?

[Bryant Again]

Originally Posted by Fril Estelin

You're the victim of your own prejudices. It may well be the experience you gained from helping players, but put it on bad luck because there are plenty of people eager to learn (and as a teacher of Maths, I know this lesson quite painfully, believe me).

I know how valuable learning from failing is, and I think it's even healthier in the modern society mindset we have, but the tradeoff between failing and having fun is different in a game (and I guess it's different from even what you consider since you're playing a lot of games).

I'm not saying it's the only way. There are just as many out there who do feel bad when they mess up or when they anger the team, and if they want to get better at the game there's nothing that's going to stop me from helping them with that.

But those who aren't good at the game, stubborn, and *don't* want to improve are always going to be in a game, and it's the developer's job to identify those players and ignore them. It may seem nasty since many believe that developer's are supposed to listen to all players, but not all players have the best interests for the game.

Originally Posted by Fril Estelin

What about spend your time in Q&A? Or distill your knowledge of the game in any other parts of the forum? Or write a guide, tutorial, or whatever that could help on one part of the game? (I'll post on Guru an early draft of the idea I mentioned before, I hope you'll contribute )

Think about it for a few minutes: all this time you and other have spent here, arguing for the sake of words and "truth" (which is here totally immaterial and quite subjective anyway), couldn't you have spent it to address the problem of player skills, rather than merely point to it with precise argument?

I'm not saying you should, contrarily to what a few said earlier, but I'm genuinely asking the question: isn't a little bit "our" fault if skill is not passed from "older" generation of GW players to "newer" ones? (it's not really about old and new, but I hope you get the point) If we'd want a GW community with the average skill being 10 to 20% higher, can't we do anything about it?

I've thought about it. Then I thought about those who may not ever see a forum. It's those people where an online guide would be useless for, and that's why I go the other path of helping those in-game.

It's simply a crossroad: you can either invest your time helping those on a forum, or going out and helping those in the game world. We need people on both sides. I'm just more into doing the latter path.

[Fril Estelin]

Originally Posted by Bryant Again

But those who aren't good at the game, stubborn, and *don't* want to improve are always going to be in a game, and it's the developer's job to identify those players and ignore them. It may seem nasty since many believe that developer's are supposed to listen to all players, but not all players have the best interests for the game.

The example of the "noobs" (and they do exist) is often quoted to point to the fact that very little can be done about them. But that's completely missing the point of guiding: you can only guide people who will accept to be guided. In other words, the whole point of this thread is about these guys, not the ones that will not learn. So these noobs should not be mentioned, they're not part of the equation and I seriously don't care about them (it may be rude but I'm not willing to do in-game education, as probably most people do). If you consider we're talking about people willing to learn, the thread makes sense.

I've thought about it. Then I thought about those who may not ever see a forum. It's those people where an online guide would be useless for, and that's why I go the other path of helping those in-game.

You've been in enough gaming communities to know that improving what you can is the only way, it's not about reaching a maximum number of people. If your guide/ideas are really good, they'll spread like fire, so to say. Ultimately, a guide, such as the wiki or PvX, should be here to support the activities of "guides" who help people in-game, not as substitutes for them (apart from boring information such as where to cap elite skills, title information, etc.). As I mentioned before, in PvX for example, there should be a huge section on "build use", because this is the part more related to "skill".

It's like books, they don't teach you (except those few ones that are dedicated entirely to this task), they're only here to help you understand better what the teacher says, by exploring content in a different way or focusing on an aspect he's only mentioning quickly. (I've had such a case 3 weeks ago, I referred one of my student to a specific part of the coursebook, he came back to thank me for that because he understood everything perfectly).

The "book" (or GW tutorial) is also a tool for self-teaching and ultimately begin to move from being helped by someone in-game to learn by yourself, by starting to understand the game as a mechanics, rather than the fun of playing (which is the important thing here of course!)

EDIT: this is what I'm talking about!

[zwei2stein]

Originally Posted by Improvavel

...

158 Moby Thesaurus words for "combat":
Kilkenny cats, action, aerial combat, affray, all-out war,
altercation, antagonize, appeal to arms, argument, armed combat,
armed conflict, armored combat, attack, battle, battle royal,
beat against, beat up against, belligerence, belligerency,
bickering, bloodshed, box, brawl, breast the wave, broil, brush,
buck, buffet, buffet the waves, bullfight, cat-and-dog life, clash,
clash of arms, close, close with, cockfight, collide,
come to blows,compete with, conflict, confrontation, contend,
contend against, contention, contentiousness, contest,
contestation, controversy, cut and thrust, debate, defy,
difference, disagreement, disputation, dispute, do battle,
dogfight, duel, embroilment, encounter, engagement, enmity,
exchange blows, exchange of blows, fence, feud, fight,
fight a duel, fight against, fighting, fire fight, fray,
give and take, give satisfaction, grapple, grapple with,
ground combat, hand-to-hand combat, hand-to-hand fight,
hostilities, hostility, hot war, house-to-house combat,
join battle with, jostle, joust, la guerre, labor against,
litigation, logomachy, might of arms, military operations,
militate against, mix it up, naval combat, offer resistance,
open hostilities, open war, oppose, opposition, paper war,
passage of arms, pitched battle, polemic, quarrel, quarreling,
quarrelsomeness, rassle, reluct, reluctate, repel, resort to arms,
riot, rival, rumble, run a tilt, running fight, scramble,
scrapping, scrimmage, scuffle, shooting war, shoving match,
skirmish, spar, squabbling, stand-up fight, state of war,
stem the tide, street fight, strife, strive, strive against,
struggle, struggle against, take on, tauromachy, the sword,
thrust and parry, tilt, total war, tourney, traverse, tug-of-war,
tussle, vendetta, vie with, wage war, war, war of words, warfare,
warmaking, warring, wartime, withstand, words, wrangling,
wrestle

I hereby submit to you that GW "combat" means that people were supposed to flame each other at forums.

Devs succeeded.

[Red Sonya]

Numbers don't equate anything to quality,

Sorry, but, I disagree with you here. That is merely your opinion and not the mass majority opinion. The Wii is a fine console and has brought to the gamer(s) exactly what they wanted, real live action play. People that use that phrase "numbers don't equate to quality" are just jealous of the facts. They are jealous WOW and the Wii are what the majority like and prefer. There just isn't any evidence of proof that numbers don't equate to some quality. 10 million people don't eat at McDonalds everyday because the food suks. Just because YOU don't play something or participate in something doesn't mean it's not HIGH QUALITY. WOW is the best mmorpg out there, the NUMBERS say so. Blizzards bank account says so as well.

[Bryant Again]

Originally Posted by Red Sonya

Sorry, but, I disagree with you here...

And I rightfully respect that, but I find it curious that you're claiming all those games for the Wii are "good". I'll have to dig up my recent GI for the site, but it listed that the Wii has the worst good-bad game ratio, *and* it also has a crapload of games; a crapload of, well, crap.

Sure it's great if you want something simple, but if you want a game that, ya know, goes a bit beyond that? You're gonna find very very few on the Wii. The more serious gamer has gotten very shafted with the Wii.

I'm not denying Blizzard's game isn't good - hell I've played it since release - but there are a SHIT ton of problems endgame and there always has been.

But just like Guild Wars, the casual player doesn't know about all this, nor might they even reach it. The casual is just concerned with what he's doing right then, there, and now. That's one of the big advantages in why Guild Wars has been so successful: simple to pick up, easy to get drawn in...but that's not all that makes a good game.

As a side note: in regards to fast food being "high quality", you might want to pick this up. I'm hoping things have changed by then.

[qvtkc]

Originally Posted by Improvavel

@ qvtkc - You want continued challenge - play PvP. Its the only place where you will find continued challenge, since while you learn and improve so will the opposition. Challenge in a PvE game only lasts til u beat the game once. After that is always the same.

Not really, there are tons of games that you can beat on the hardest difficulty and still be challenged by. Examples such as Contra, Quake, I Wanna Be The Guy, Gears of War. Yeah I know that having played through IWBTG means it gets a lot easier, yet you need such manual dexterity and timing that having done it once doesn't mean you can do it again.

I remember Ursan Blessing days. Running at breakneck speed through DoA spamming 1121132114112 like some idiot, clearing the hardest area in the game with barely as much effort as a level 20 would need in pre-searing, to get a shiny shield as reward. Yeah it looks great but to be honest, the gloom shield that I bought from a friend of mine is far more meaningful to me.

Fortunately they nerfed UB, but it's still the same more or less, if something is too hard, just plop some PvE skills onto your bar, grab some meth - sorry, I meant essence of celerity - from your local asuran dealer, crack open a summoning stone for good measure and whatever thing was hard (hard because you insisted on playing it in HM) melts away like a popsicle in death valley.

[Fril Estelin]

Originally Posted by Bryant Again

And I rightfully respect that, but I find it curious that you're claiming all those games for the Wii are "good". I'll have to dig up my recent GI for the site, but it listed that the Wii has the worst good-bad game ratio, *and* it also has a crapload of games; a crapload of, well, crap.

Sure it's great if you want something simple, but if you want a game that, ya know, goes a bit beyond that? You're gonna find very very few on the Wii. The more serious gamer has gotten very shafted with the Wii.

I don't know many Wii games, but I find this console absolutely amazing, in terms of the new gaming paradigm it provides. I guess many (most?) games do not require any "skill" and thus make them worthless to "hardcore" gamers. And I also know how Nintendo and the gaming industry exploits people's naivity, as Blizzard does to make people dependent on their WoW "addiction" (which does not mean it's not fun!). Nevertheless, they are absolutely brilliant in terms of fun, they are beyond the fun you can get from multiplayer PC experience, such as MMOs. Of course that's also a generalisation, to each its own.

(there's an interesting point about the "serious gamer" aspect, as games are about fun and it's not considered "serious" in terms of productivity, you can't sell these skills to an employer unless he's got a direct relationship to games, although you find very creative minds in "serious gamers" but they also have other problems)

Ok we're definitely completely off-topic now!

[Rocky Raccoon]

The only thing this thread shows me is that certain people only want things their own way and can't accept that is not the ways things are. We have a wall of text the basically belittles and insults a majority of the people who play the game. So what if the game is to easy for some of you, make it harder by trying to play through using only 4 skills instead of 8. Don't use all the new skills and consumables, if you are that good you won't need them. Not all people want to invest all their time in a game, but still would like to be able to progress to harder areas, let them do so as by any means they want. How does this hurt you? People find fun in different ways, some like the challenge to be hard, others just want to be able to progress without that great challenge. The game is what is it is and not likely to change much with GW2 in the works, so you either have to accept it and continue to play or move on to a bigger challenge.
I myself have never purchased a consumable and the ones I possess like cupcakes, etc I may have used once or twice, but if that is what people like to do I say go for it and have fun.