Curse

jimmyboveto · May 27, 2008, 11:02 PM // 23:02

It is MUCH easier to just buff skills to make things easier then it is to add more end game content. That being said, GW is also free to play, so we shouldn't expect huge content updates anyways

Rocky Raccoon · May 27, 2008, 11:06 PM // 23:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bryant Again

I may've forgot the emphasis on WoW's most polished content: Raids. The reason that raids are so important is because they're laregly challenging and require a lot of time, and are arguably the most "epic" content in the game - and they are *very* hard to get into, requiring a lot of time, a lot of effort, and a lot of teamwork.

It is that very thing that a lot of people who play GW don't want. It is nice to jump and jump out of the game whenever you want. Many people do not want to invest that type of time in a game.

Burst Cancel · May 27, 2008, 11:14 PM // 23:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by zwei2stein

I think issue are not inexperienced people. It is experienced people who are bad players (majority).

With WoW you can eventually reach any content. Carrot always seems somehow close. You CAN kill Illidian if you play a bit more. You CAN do any imba dungeon if you out level it. Hell, you wait for next expansion and and you get better items from quests than from any raid you could do before and you get 10 levels so you can kick some Onyxia ass with 5 people..

In GW's you cant do it. One your character is maxed you cant just outwait or outlevel or play harder. You have to get better as player. That is hard. It requires learning, swallowing ego, listening to more experienced people, stop acting childish and all that stuff. In GW you have people who played for years and would be unable to clear UW without imba skills. In WoW same people would clear UW equivalent sooner or later. GWs version of those people would never, ever clear it.

But they fell damn well entitled to be able to do so, even if they have whole lot of content they never touched they want to do elite stuff because after 2+ years they feel elite. I have seem people to follow this train to eventually quit of gw to never return because "only no life kids can do highend stuff in gw" (they cant be any wronger, but thats what you get if rest of game can be well conquered with heal other spamming monks in your backline ... people dont have to improve so they fail at challenge, which make them quit because noone plays to fail ... so they added easymode stuff).

I told one very bad explayer who quit for lotro to never return about Ursan ... once he learned there is skill that allows him to do anything regardless of skill he bought GWEN and farmed to r10. He is happy because he can now attain all those HM titles and stuff. I am not so happy because i created another ursanwayer x.x however it illustrated perfectly what dumbing down PvE is supposed to do: sell more GW. Any anti ursan rant can be considered GWEN advertisement.

/thread

WoW and GW aren't directly comparable, which is why the OP is confused. The fee structure is different and the design philosophy is different.

Consider this: most players fail at games, have always failed, and will always fail. Now ask yourself - how do you sell a game to these people? Do you think people like being frustrated by failure - and more importantly, do you think they would pay money to experience that frustration?

Red Sand · May 27, 2008, 11:39 PM // 23:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bryant Again

Why does ANet has to cater to the inexperienced and not Blizzard?

I've been gaming for a while, I played MUDs and Diablo before I finally played Everquest. I gave up EQ, refused WoW, tried LoTRO, and came to GW.

Part of the issue with why WoW hasn't change their game to get new blood is because their player base does it for them. The players "sell" WoW to their friends.

I have several friends (Ex-EQ'rs) who when I tell them I am playing GW, they tell me I should play WoW, it's so great. I let them know I'm not interested in playing catch up (grinding up to level 80, been there, got T-Shirt in EQ) and they tell me they can level me up in no time so I can play with them. I have to go through this every three to four months.

I find it ironic that I have had to choose between playing a game I like, or playing a different game with my friends that I've known for over ten years. It was a hard choice, but not playing WoW didn't mean we stopped being friends.

Guild Wars players don't sell GW. Period. I never met anyone who played this game "seriously" in real life, or who told me I "had to try it." I meet WoW addicts all the time, they try to get you hooked cause they know that if they get you, in the game and on their server, eventually you'll be able to help them get their next fix, a shiny bauble on their toon.

So since GW players don't sell GW, Anet has to figure out some other way to bring new blood in, and keep them.

More later.

Maca · May 27, 2008, 11:39 PM // 23:39

Just answer to op, cant read the whole thread ( sorry if this have been said): Blizzard wants /needs to keep people playing ( paying) and making things easier wouldnt go be so good for them, since players ( myself included) would stop sooner if the game is easier than it is now. This way you have to get to lvl 70 1st, than you have to go through painful process of getting pugs to do raids and get good gear, than you have to find a good rading guild and go trhough even more painful process of getting into that guild and than start playing and seeing whole end game things, which most of the players dont do ever, but they still play in hope it will happen so they countine playing and thus paying. Guild Wars has whole different concept, it's a game that you pay once and that's all, so ofc its more newb friendly. I don't know why they brought Ursan to the game, I dont know why they did many things they did, but I do understand why its so different than WOW , common sense should tell you that.

Sirius-NZ · May 28, 2008, 02:47 AM // 02:47

Maybe ArenaNet just secretly wants to give their players what they want, even if that involves taking on elite content without having to learn any great deal of tactics and co-ordination.

Shayne Hawke · May 28, 2008, 03:11 AM // 03:11

12$$$$$$$$$$.

I could have just summed it up with that, but for moderators' sake, I'll put my opinion into words:

New players = new cash. Old players = old, used-up cash.
New players = income. Old players = exist.

The only thing I can hope for with GW2 is that ANet gives the oldest players super big bonuses for playing GW the longest, like giant fireworks, or spiffy decorative armor, or cool looking player models - basically anything that wouldn't affect gameplay at all. Old players are here on GW because they like it here, or they would have gone somewhere else, and many old players seem to be looking forward to GW2.

So ANet doesn't really have to do anything for them until it's released.

Dallcingi · May 28, 2008, 03:32 AM // 03:32

This is simple:
WoW is doing so good simply cause it has Blizzard in its name.
Plus monthly fees of course.

MarlinBackna · May 28, 2008, 04:36 AM // 04:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by Red Sand

I've been gaming for a while, I played MUDs and Diablo before I finally played Everquest. I gave up EQ, refused WoW, tried LoTRO, and came to GW.

Part of the issue with why WoW hasn't change their game to get new blood is because their player base does it for them. The players "sell" WoW to their friends.

I have several friends (Ex-EQ'rs) who when I tell them I am playing GW, they tell me I should play WoW, it's so great. I let them know I'm not interested in playing catch up (grinding up to level 80, been there, got T-Shirt in EQ) and they tell me they can level me up in no time so I can play with them. I have to go through this every three to four months.

I find it ironic that I have had to choose between playing a game I like, or playing a different game with my friends that I've known for over ten years. It was a hard choice, but not playing WoW didn't mean we stopped being friends.

Guild Wars players don't sell GW. Period. I never met anyone who played this game "seriously" in real life, or who told me I "had to try it." I meet WoW addicts all the time, they try to get you hooked cause they know that if they get you, in the game and on their server, eventually you'll be able to help them get their next fix, a shiny bauble on their toon.

So since GW players don't sell GW, Anet has to figure out some other way to bring new blood in, and keep them.

More later.

I agree with some parts and disagree with some parts of this, but overall a great post.

I agree that WoW players need other players to do well in the game. I don't need other players in GW to do well in the game. However, a point to add is that for both games I have found, they are much more fun and fulfilling if you play with RL friends. I tried WoW on a free server, and it was okay, but I would not have played unless some of my friends started playing too. I also enjoyed GW a lot more when my roommate played with me, but he stopped a while ago.... although I do have access to his account, so I pretty much have a second account (he doesn't mind

).
WoW is also very addicting. GW isn't....at first. Another one of my friends tried playing GW, and ended up not really enjoying it, but he definitely enjoyed WoW a lot more.
But, all good things come to an end, right? Imagine how many of the 400,000 AoC players divorced WoW last week...or how many GW players....I think the strong sales of AoC indicate that people are moving on.

Laylat · May 28, 2008, 06:29 AM // 06:29

While I agree that the introduction of PvE only skills was to spark more interest in the game (spice), reduce gameplay difficulty, and thus attract more people into buying it, I don't think it was brought about the right way. As mentioned before, normal mode has become incrediably easy while hard mode has become the new normal mode.

In my opinion, hard mode was a very good option for those who were looking for more challenges. However, ANet destroyed it by introducing skills that would essentially convert hard mode into normal mode. If ANet wanted to sell more copies, but retain hard mode quality, an easy option would be to disallow PvE only skills in hard mode. [Please don't give me the "Hard mode was easy even before EotN PvE skill."]

So, why did ANet introduce skills to allow the game to be easy? To make it more attractive for new comers --> to make money. Hopefully, this money, as well the the various testing done through skill updates, will be used to make Guild Wars 2 a much better game to play for both casual and non-casual alike. I think concludes my answer to the opening post's question.

ilipol · May 28, 2008, 06:29 AM // 06:29

Yes, yes, we know, Blizzard is a much better company than Anet, WoW rules, GW is for noobs...

Ok they should make it hard enough for only 3 people to be able to play, all areas rest of us stay in the noob isle, yada yada...

If you find the game to easy go play naked or something.

Zebideedee · May 28, 2008, 06:32 AM // 06:32

Quote:

In GW's you cant do it. One your character is maxed you cant just outwait or outlevel or play harder. You have to get better as player. That is hard. It requires learning, swallowing ego, listening to more experienced people, stop acting childish and all that stuff

Can someone phone me and let me know when they stop altering skills, especially after others have benefited from them for so long, maybe then I'll start taking GW seriously again, my number is 0800 - don't bother

I originally enjoyed GW because it was a non grinding game, now, from what I heard, mad grinders get benefits in GW 2 over casual gamers, if they want titles, give 'em titles, don't penalise the general public for having a life

Red Sonya · May 28, 2008, 06:34 AM // 06:34

I disagree with Red Sand here. It's not the players that don't sell GW it's Anet who didn't continue to allow GW to evolve. It ends at level 20 max, it ends at a 15^50 weapon max, it ends at vanity and no value other than vanity armor. Therefore all GW is is some hacking and slashing in a shoe box instead of a great world. It's over before it begins really. The content is small especially Factions and Nightfall and GWEN compared to Prophecies they didn't even take the time to give us at least equal what they delivered in Prophecies, but, they sure as heck charged you the same amounts. Even the mere expansion was nearly the full price of a retail version. So, no I won't blame the GW players for not selling GW, the game just didn't sell itself and sold everyone pretty short in the long run. The only salvation for the minimum leveling and the no evolving of characters or items and really lack of a lot of content is the PVP portion. The PVP is still fun, but, for a PVE player the end comes pretty fast unless you just like repeating the same zones and areas for nothing of value or you're into grinding for silly titles of no value, even the PVE only skills are of little value since there's really nothing to be had or that is better than someone else has. A game without futher goals is a dead game in the long run.

Lykan · May 28, 2008, 07:11 AM // 07:11

I really dont like how the game has been dumbed down a lot since GW:EN, Anet are trying their hardest to make it easy for new players because all the newbies see all the good stuff other characters have achievd in 3yrs and they want it too but they cant be bothered to put the effort in so they would more than likely give up and quit, so instead of letting these newer players quit the game, instead in comes the easy button [Ursan Blessing].

Longasc · May 28, 2008, 07:32 AM // 07:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bryant Again

Assembling a raid? You don't pug them, do you?? I will add that I'm in a *very* laidback guild: things are done on a "who needs this?" basis, we've not been a huge fan of DKP.

Glad to see the discussion isn't as heated as I feared. I hope I don't come off as a prick to anyone here...?

I dunno how your guild works, but the guilds I was in had core teams for 10 man instances like Karazhan, but to get together 28 and make a good team for the Black Temple usually took quite some time. We had to rely on friends from other guilds to complete the raid.

The other problem was when the raid had enough of a certain class or was already full. The more casual you are, the less likely you are to get a spot. I could not compete for a warlock slot in a filled raid when the others have 500+ more spelldamage on their gear.

If you are on a friendly guild people give you better gear and do not roll on it, if they have already better stuff, sure. Unfortunately you sometimes have to roll vs the guild external reinforcements!

@Prick: No, you aren't. I would say ANet are the pricks, whatever maybe economical reasons they have to dumb down the game, for the game itself they are bad and for sure will not pay off in the long run either.

upier · May 28, 2008, 07:35 AM // 07:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bryant Again

They are announcing Wrath of the Lich King, though, which is also announcing "hey all of your gear is about to be obsolete in a couple months". Granted, they have removed attunements from a lot of the dungeons, but I don't see people "rushing in" to see them, not to mention the Sunwell raid.

There is a difference between starting to look for better gear and starting anew with a new character in a new game.
GW has an expiry date. WoW doesn't have it yet.

Inger · May 28, 2008, 08:07 AM // 08:07

Well you could say that while they're catering to the "inexperienced" most of these "inexperienced" players don't even realize it.

I know several of my own guildies, they play almost everyday and are quite interested in end game game content, they've beaten all the campaigns. However they have no idea about updates/nerfs from anet. They don't read the update notes nor do they go on GWG or GWO. If it weren't for me and the other ppl in my guild, these few would have no idea what lootscaling is, or that pvp and pve suddenly became seperated.

It could be said some "inexperienced" players even play less than the ppl i'm mentioning in my guild. Thus they might even have less experience with the game and thus notice the changes even less.

Basically I'm saying, anet might be catering to them by making the game easier... but they most likely don't even realize it.

mazey vorstagg · May 28, 2008, 08:23 AM // 08:23

Quote:

It's a good idea, when you're not max level. While "outleveling" can be used in the context of being under max level, that strategy is no longer applicable once you reach the max level raids. At that point, you can only complete the dungeons through 1. Skill, and 2. Gear (which is obtained through skill).

Hmmm, I'd have to disagree a little bit here. Once you hit max level, sure you can't get new talents and spells but you gear takes over as a side form of leveling. My capabilities as a Moonkin are measured by spell damage and hit rating not by my level. And really the high end raids arn't so much about skill as maxing dps, listening to the leader and luck.

However you are right in the way that really knowing your class affords you those moments of loveliness when the healer goes down and you manage to pop rebirth, put restoration on all party members cast cyclone on the offending mob and then turn back to moonkin form as the party survives! I think when you do that without thinking or panicing that is a signed that you're experienced (but not skilled) at wow.

PvP is much more about skill as you're dealing with the unexpected all the time. But in pve it's about reflexes, coolness and listening to instructions. The mobs don't do anything unexpected.

------

On topic:
Basically this is the reason I'm kinda done with GW and play WoW. Wow is constantly expanding in terms of content and it's big enough to make leveling another char different each time. Whereas GW doesn't expand much (because it's non-fee-paying) and even if they released another Sorrow's Furnace every month people would still complete it so fast that there'd be 3 weeks of waiting for the next update. Also, what would they put in that dungeon, better gear, new skins?

A lot of people have completed and are happy with their characters 'look' and the economy is a nasty place for new skins to be released into. They shake it up every time. So, skins are out. Better gear is out too. Simply there is none, GW caps off and without adjusting the caps majorly then there is no where to go.

Also a dramatic increase in gear quality (for example a sword that does 15-25 damage) would become a market disaster because everyone would own the same sword. THE max damage sword. because in GW at lvl 20 everyone is equal and therefore could have the same chance to get it. There's no difficulty.

The problem at the core of GW is the level cap. Although it is a brilliant selling point and balancing idea it starts to break the game down at a time like now, where people want new content but there's nothing to put into it. No reason to do anything because the only thing you can get out of it is exploration or a new skin...

That's the answer I think. In WoW you can improve your character though gear, gems, skins and titles. In GW you can only improve your char through new skins and titles. So in wow you can differ the content through gear requirements and thus have levels of difficulty. Whereas in Guild Wars you can't, there's nothing to determine the bad players from the good and no way to make the hard areas impossible at low experience levels but doable at high ones.

So, with no areas that can be balanced for different player groups Anet must cater for the masses. Which I suspect is teenagers. Mostly 10-16 year olds play this game and that's who they're selling too and that's why this game gets easier and easier.

In brief, because this post is very long-winded:

No way to differentiate between experienced players and not, either through gear or level
Therefore game areas are designed for the whole game population
Therefore they must be doable for people with bad skill and bad skills
Therefore they are very easy to those with coordination and good skillbars
Therefore us Guruers (who are largely quite good at this game) feel it's too easy

---------

I just want to add one more thing:

[skill]ursan blessing[/skill]
Does anyone think that Anet didn't realise they were adding an easy button into their game when they did this? There's three blessings, it wasn't like ursan was stood out to be individual or gained at the end of a hard quest or area, it just happened. Given that it's pve I suspect it didn't get much testing at all and was simply released without anyone trying it in an elite area with a full team using it. No one at anet would have said "hang on guys, this is way too easy".
Then the public discovered it and suddenly it became easy mode. Now Anet're too far in, they can't change it without massive whining from the community.
-----

sorry, one more thing :P

Quote:

So in other words, why hasn't WoW "opened up" their raids to be accessed by more people? How have they been able to keep this content so rarely seen and yet still be successful?

I think this is the key. WoW has the eternal carrot. "come on, play for another month and you might be able to beat Lady Vasjh...". People join and keep playing because there's this big pot of gold/epic lore/good feeling at the end. A boss to beat which you'll never actually do.

Whereas GW says, you can have it all! Go get it, and people do. Then there's nothing else left for them. There's no famous dungeon/big boss/races for world kills. The VIP high end makes wow epic and it makes wow famous.

zwei2stein · May 28, 2008, 08:50 AM // 08:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by mazey vorstagg

In brief, because this post is very long-winded:

No way to differentiate between experienced players and not, either through gear or level
Therefore game areas are designed for the whole game population
Therefore they must be doable for people with bad skill and bad skills
Therefore they are very easy to those with coordination and good skillbars
Therefore us Guruers (who are largely quite good at this game) feel it's too easy

I have to disagree.

Experienced players are differentiated by skills they equip and gear they equip, attribute spreads, etc. Difference is noticeable easily enough in terms of success of these people compared to bad players. If anyone pings less than 480 health and 60ish energy, you have pretty good idea where he stands on "experienced (as in good) player scale"

They got areas geared for them that were not supposed to be doable by ordinary Joe. That was kinda obvious to anyone when as aataxe can wipe full maxed group entering UW if they don't know what they are doing. Ordinary players got whole rest of PvE.

Then we got HM which is to good players what NM is to bad players - decent challenge. A casual gameplay for good players i dare to say.

Gameplay can be well split on hardcore vs casual players and it worked for while before gwen was released.

Quote:

Originally Posted by mazey vorstagg

[skill]ursan blessing[/skill]

If i give anet credit and assume U was unforeseen coincidence, there are some questions:

a) Why didn't they look for degenerate gameplay elements in playtesting? My first notion when i saw all PvE skills was: how would they perform in full group situation?

b) Is skillballancer blind? Ursan works because it borrows heavily from duality concept: each character brings tons of offence, defense and is buffed to heaven. Anyone familiar with warriors and paragons should immediately see how powerful this is (unspikable tank dishing out DPS ... armor ignoring dps that is immune to all shutdown ...)

Aeon221 · May 28, 2008, 09:30 AM // 09:30

Couple of things:

1) WoW heavily nerfed the 1-60 content after TBC. Almost all elite monsters were removed from the main world, and most of the pre-TBC instances were also heavily nerfed.

2) WoW MASSIVELY improved the gear available in pre-TBC areas.

3) WoW lowered the time it took to level from 1-60 by orders of magnitude.

So, monsters were made easier, gear was made better, and levelling was made quicker.

BUT ZOMG IT ARE GUILD WARS TAHT NURFS FOR TEH NEWBIEZ.

Oh, and a word about raiding in WoW.

If you think any skill is involved, you need to get your head checked. If you're a dpser, you bind your damage macro to your mousewheel and you roll it while watching where you stand. If you're a tank, you spam all your handy aggro grabbing skills and hold onto the targets. If you're a healer, you've got tons more options wrt heals, and they're much more powerful. And if anything does break aggro? Distract it, poly it, banish it, stun it, you pick. Crowd control makes the game loltarded easy. Skill doesn't even come close to entering into the equation, especially when you can set macros LEGALLY WITHIN THE GAME that remember your targets for you and cast the appropriate skills on them with the push of a button. I kid you not.

Oh, and let's not forget that in WoW, enchants and hots can't be stripped. Okay, they can, but only by one class and incredibly rarely in pve. As in, I've never had it happen to me rarely in pve.

And you people think that WoW is harder? Are you on crack?

But hey, let's talk about pvp now. WoW's pvp is so bad that they hadn't even evolved the concept of spikes until just recently. Vent is a rarity, and almost nobody bothers with the in game voicechat. And the speed of combat is so slow that you could probably take a nap mid match while being attacked and still have time to come back and start fighting again. Oh, and did I mention healing? Healing that was balanced against monsters three levels higher than the player and with massively buffed damage? Yeah, exactly.

The whole game is easy easy easy. They hand you super weapons and tell you to go beat up rats with them. If anyone is pandering to the terminally retarded, it's WoW, not GW.