Curse

Muse of Shadows · May 02, 2006, 11:03 AM // 11:03

I already posted on this subject once, but the only replies I got during the short time before it died out where telling me they didn't understand, how easy the game was, ect... This time I will try to explain the green items and my idea for improvment more effectivly, and hope to hear responces to the acual idea, not telling me anything unrelated to the topic.

If you choose to post on this thread, please follow the these guidlines. Agreement, constructive criticism, and reasons why it will not work are welcome. Do not post anything along the lines of "it will not work", "it is a stupid idea", or anything off the topic.

SOME SPOILERS ARE INCLUDED IN THE FOLLOWING

The green items I am talking about are those that you obtain at the end of the game. The first time you beat the game with a character, that character will recieve an item called Amulet of the Mists. This item can be exchanged to one of the collectors there for a green item. Please note you can get only ONE amulet for each character that has beaten the Factions campain.

The green items available to choose from are:
Ironwing Longbow
Ironwing Flatbow
Shiro's Blades
Ceremonial Daggers
Shiro's Sword
Dragoncrest Axe
Gavel of the Nephilim
Exalted Aegis (two available, one strength requirement, one tactics requirement)
Wayward Wand (one for each atribute of all spellcasting classes)
Straw Effigy (one for each atribute of all spellcasting classes)

I have seen many responces demoting the value of these items, all focused around the fact that you will recieve one once you complete the campain. However, if anything, that requirement should increase the value of these items. They are designed as a reward for completing the game, and all have unique skins, most of which are based on the winners of a the Guild Wars art contest (I believe the most recent).

This means that these items cannot be farmed. The Factions campain is far more difficult than anything done in the Prophecies campain. The large majority of responces I get to this are "it is doable with henchmen". Yes, this is true, everything in Factions can be done with henchmen. So can everything excluding the Last Day Dawns and Titan Source quests in the Prophecies campain. Does that make those final missions and quests easy? For me and many people, yes they are easy. However, for the majority of Guild Wars players, those missions and quests are very difficult, if not impossable.

Another responce I have seen is that the barrage/pet cookie-cutter build will be able to easly do the missions. That may be true, but from what I have seen, although it will make the missions very easy in comparison to what they previously where, I still doubt that any group of random players will be able to do so, which is exactly what makes that build popular - anyone can do it.

I have completed the game, and although dissapointed in the 3-minute final mission (on a bad day, can often get in 1.5-2.5 minutes, Shiro Tagachi was extreamly easy to beat), this game is far more difficult than anything in the Prophecies campain.

Because of the above reasons, and the fact that the game cannot be effectivly ran (it requires aprox. 20+ hours of hard gameplay to finish), these items will remain in limited supply and possessing one, unless you purchased from someone who needed money, will be a true reward for finishing this game. Even so, the items are still simply greens. This is what I have been thinking about, and what this thread is based on. A way to improve these items so they dont feal like anything you can get from Sorrows Furnace, many of the boss's in Factions, or the Tomb of Primievil Kings.

My idea for this is to make these items customisable, instead of having fixed modifiers and upgrades. I would personaly like ArenaNet to start with changing these items color to red, teal, I dont realy care, just something new. Now, when you choose one of these items, what you are doing are choosing the item skin, what type of item it is, and its fixed modifiers (damage, damage modifier [+15% in a stance for example], armor bonus, energy bonus, and requirement). Once you have chosen your base item, you will be given the option of placing upgrades on it. These should include any upgrade that can normaly spawn on an item drop in the game. For shields, focus items, and wands, these should be anything you wish, meaning you can have a +5 energy above 50% wand with +15 energy, energy regeneration -1, or anything else, once again as long as it is possable to spawn as an item drop.

Now, once chosen the modifiers/upgrades on the item will not be changeable, exept by a specific NPC, a crafter most likely, that will be placed only in the area after the final mission (I forgot the name). This crafter should be able to change any of the modifiers you have on your item, for a price of 10,000 gold per modifier changed. There are several reasons for this. One is to provide another gold sink, something that even with the new guild services, is still somewhat lacking. Second will be to limit how often you can change what your item does.

For those of you who think having a crafter for this being to easy, please remember that the area you obtain the items, and where this crafter is located, can only be accessed through succesfuly defeating Shiro Tagachi in the last mission. This is not a town or outpost, it is a PvE area. Once you leave it, you must beat the last mission again to regain access.

Once again I will mention that you can only obtain one of these items per character, and only after that character beats the Factions campain.

On a final note, I was most deffently dissapointed in the final mission, where you fight Shiro. If it takes your group more than three minutes to finish this mission, something is most deffently rong. Most groups will be able to easly defeat him in two to two and a half minutes. Not only is this mission extreamly short, it is the easiest in the game, excluding possably the two missions on Shing Ji Island (hope I spelled it correctly), as I have not done those missions yet.

Here, I would ask ArenaNet to make the fight both longer, and matching the difficulty of the rest of the game, if not improving on it.

Once again, your thoughts and ideas are welcome. Please do not post anything off topic or anything with little to no thought behind it ("this is stupid").

Blitzy · May 02, 2006, 12:51 PM // 12:51

I'm guessing the final mission's short so that people can get back to the area without much hassle. Fine by me.

Ira Blinks · May 02, 2006, 01:03 PM // 13:03

they still going to be as common as glittering dust. As you have said you can make a new char and beat the game in two days. And in the end those items never leave this game, so they will keep accumulating pretty fast.
I really have to say that im very disappointed with ANet actions towards max/green items. Instead providing us with decent market tools, they simply killed market completely. So instead of green/max/perfect mod items being something unusual and rare it works the other way around...

yesitsrob · May 02, 2006, 01:30 PM // 13:30

my opinion on the greens, the warrior weapons in particular is that they are ideal, they have what is probably the best modifier in 15^50 - they have the best mod with the vampiric, and they have the +30hp, which is arguably the other best mod.

While I think it would be nice to have the ability to customize them a little more, I don't think it's that necesarry, I'm happy for them to just add more greens over time ^^

fiery · May 02, 2006, 01:31 PM // 13:31

If your thread tends to die, this is considered a double post and is thus spam. Better to revive a thread than make another.

DarkZeal · May 02, 2006, 04:07 PM // 16:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ira Blinks

they still going to be as common as glittering dust. As you have said you can make a new char and beat the game in two days. And in the end those items never leave this game, so they will keep accumulating pretty fast.
I really have to say that im very disappointed with ANet actions towards max/green items. Instead providing us with decent market tools, they simply killed market completely. So instead of green/max/perfect mod items being something unusual and rare it works the other way around...

Actually the weapons can be customized, but the focus and shields will stay forever : (

Soccer55 · May 02, 2006, 04:23 PM // 16:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by yesitsrob

my opinion on the greens, the warrior weapons in particular is that they are ideal, they have what is probably the best modifier in 15^50 - they have the best mod with the vampiric, and they have the +30hp, which is arguably the other best mod.

My only complaint about the end of game greens is that we already have a green 15^50 vamp of fortitude sword (Victo's Blade). So why not make Shiro's Sword zealous instead of vamp or something like that? I don't believe that there is a green 15^50 zealous of fortitude sword.

I like the idea of complete customization of the weapon though. Even if ANet locked the weapon skin and let us just choose the modifiers, it would be awesome.

-Tom

plasmasword · May 02, 2006, 05:31 PM // 17:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by fiery

If your thread tends to die, this is considered a double post and is thus spam. Better to revive a thread than make another.

And this is called spam since your post has nothing to do with the topic.

Back on topic, I like your idea of customizing end game greens that way you can beat the game and get the weapon you always wanted with a neat skin. I also like that anet made the special crafters in a pve area you can only get to by beating the mission, this way its not as easy as running to a crafter 30 seconds outside of town and making huge profit (the parchment crafter outside sanctum for example).

Viruzzz · May 02, 2006, 07:08 PM // 19:08

first of all i don't see a reason to give you an option to chose the modifiers. it just wouldn't feel right.

besides. its Shiro's Blade, theres suposed to be only one, not a 1000 different variations of it. it should be special, and not just the skin.

Alleji · May 02, 2006, 07:13 PM // 19:13

Why don't they have staffs...? :/

Eet GnomeSmasher · May 02, 2006, 07:19 PM // 19:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ira Blinks

So instead of green/max/perfect mod items being something unusual and rare it works the other way around...

Why should those things be rare? Isnt this supposed to be a non item heavy dependant game and skill>time? Perfect and max stat items should never be rare and hard to get in this game.

Sidra · May 02, 2006, 07:25 PM // 19:25

I will say, no. No reason at all to have this done. It actually seems almost aproductive, rather than better as you seem to put it, Muse. The greens are like this because thats how the dev.s chose to make the greens. If you aren't happy with them, tough. Nobody said you had to get one, and if you do, they're sellable for outrageous prices, so you can be happy either way.

Ira Blinks · May 02, 2006, 08:00 PM // 20:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Eet GnomeSmasher

Why should those things be rare? Isnt this supposed to be a non item heavy dependant game and skill>time? Perfect and max stat items should never be rare and hard to get in this game.

so you saying that gold items exists only to salvage mods from them and purple/blue to redeem for gold at nearest merchant? Why have ANYTHING worth trying to get then? Why not just give everyone items they want from the start like at pvp character creation?
Im sorry, but you play different game from what I do. When I get fow armor or rare skin weapon or perfect mod I want it to mean something. Otherwise why even bother to waste time on this game if you can get everything perfect from the start? PvP? I'm sorry, but when I want to PvP i play Call of Duty or CS, at least there my victory actually depends on my skill and not yet another obvious exploit which will take ANet another 4 months to fix.
This game got very little to do with skill, but at least it had some decent fetish...

Count to Potato · May 02, 2006, 08:01 PM // 20:01

Staffs would be awsome, im just gonna get axe, its all i need really, maybe the swords and the shield

Eet GnomeSmasher · May 02, 2006, 10:39 PM // 22:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ira Blinks

so you saying that gold items exists only to salvage mods from them and purple/blue to redeem for gold at nearest merchant? Why have ANYTHING worth trying to get then? Why not just give everyone items they want from the start like at pvp character creation?

Yay for exagerration. I never said to just give stuff to people. But you saying that perfect mods should be rare is ridiculous. This game isnt about the grind.

And who said that gold items should only exist to salvage mods from? If they were truly perfect why would I salvage it? You make no sense.

guffey · May 02, 2006, 11:02 PM // 23:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ira Blinks

so you saying that gold items exists only to salvage mods from them and purple/blue to redeem for gold at nearest merchant? Why have ANYTHING worth trying to get then? Why not just give everyone items they want from the start like at pvp character creation?
Im sorry, but you play different game from what I do. When I get fow armor or rare skin weapon or perfect mod I want it to mean something. Otherwise why even bother to waste time on this game if you can get everything perfect from the start? PvP? I'm sorry, but when I want to PvP i play Call of Duty or CS, at least there my victory actually depends on my skill and not yet another obvious exploit which will take ANet another 4 months to fix.
This game got very little to do with skill, but at least it had some decent fetish...

i agree 100% with u except when i pvp i go play Americas Army. The only reason i got this game was to satisfy my RPG lust without having to pay monthly payments. i would play oblivion but i like this setup with actuall missions and not just do anything u want.

Tuoba Hturt Eht · May 02, 2006, 11:09 PM // 23:09

/signed for customisable ubar item

Ira Blinks · May 02, 2006, 11:28 PM // 23:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by Eet GnomeSmasher

Yay for exagerration. I never said to just give stuff to people. But you saying that perfect mods should be rare is ridiculous.

I fail to see the difference. You want perfect item? - Take zero cost one from collector and apply mods you want or buy the green (people already spamming WTS amulet of the mists in Kaineng - just wait, month from now they will be as common as SF greens).
And why is it ridicilous? Perfect things are supposed to be rare, thats why they perfect and not the other way around.

Quote:

This game isnt about the grind.

define grind?
Even if trying to find perfect item would be a grind, is getting all the perfect stuff off the start and then having nothing to do but dance naked in towns is better?

Quote:

And who said that gold items should only exist to salvage mods from? If they were truly perfect why would I salvage it? You make no sense.

Most of them arent perfect, but since it is dead easy to get item with a base mod you want from collector, then finding gold with perfect mods is pretty much the same as getting perfect item.
I don know if there is a collector with "+15% always" items (stopped checking them first day) but items with 15%^50 used to be very valuable and now they are useless, because you can get any base mod you want for negligible fraction of the cost of gold item with perfect base mod.

This is my problem with Factions - once all missions are done, there is nothing left to do. No goal, no sense of achivement. Everyone has everything perfect, everyone has everything "rare".

K.Ichigo · May 03, 2006, 12:02 AM // 00:02

This is a very PvP oriented game. You should've known that.

-Loki- · May 03, 2006, 01:11 AM // 01:11

One thing that WILL drive the prices up is the fact that each character can get them only once. Only the first time you beat Shiro. Therefore, there will be very, very few in peoples inventories.