Curse

Essence Snow · Feb 01, 2012, 05:01 PM // 17:01

As we are seeing GW2 getting closer and closer and GW1 winding down, what do you feel have been the Good, the Bad, and/or the Ugly additions to GW and why?

For me:

The Good:
1)Wik spawns~the diverse builds of these foes made them enjoyable to fight against
2)Flux~changing up pvp every month with minimal effort=win...wish they had something along the same lines in pve
3)Zaishen Challenges~added motivation to play, which inturn lead to more grouping
4)7 heros~allowing ppl to play with builds of 7 heros allowed more build creativity and ofc the bonus of making areas like doa/uw/fow/deep/urgoz more accessible
5)Dungeons~adding to replayable end game content is always a bonus
6)Skill splits~pvp and pve are almost 2 completely different games thus splitting skills works the best for both formats
7)HoM~in general it gave players something to strive for, which inturn increase activity
8)HM changes~long needed update to level out the playing field
9)Zaishen Menagerie~enjoyable with no drawbacks

The Bad:
1)WiK dialogs~the seemingly endless dialogs that were endured to progress through wik were brutal
2)HotN dialogs~same as above, with no skip function, they were painfull
3)WoC missions~they seemed to be based on numbers rather than anything else
4)Zboxes~lead to countless complaints/farming/bots/etc issues in pvp
5)UW anti sc/farming additions~these barely hindered speed clears and farming while at the same time crippled most all other play styles
6)Embark~layout seemed to complicate and overextended for seomthing that was meant to be convienent

The Ugly:
1)Maintainble spell imunity~SF/Ob Flesh/old SB have absolutely molded end game content
2)Nerfs/buffs that effect both pve/pvp~changing skills based on one format that effects the other has historically been ugly
3)Lack of scheduled updates~skill updates, map rotations, quest/mission releases
4)Unresolved bugs~even after years some bugs go unchanged

While these lists are no where near complete as there are too many to lists, but these are some of them that come to mind right off the bat.

Mig Coconut · Feb 01, 2012, 07:53 PM // 19:53

The good:
1) Saving/sharing bars.
2) Drop down menu for changing your secondary.
3) PvP equipment change screen.
4) Heros/7heroes.
5) Speed clears. Gave a completely different perspective on the game and could often be very fun. The downsides are the very specific builds required and some overpowered combinations (ebon escape+i am unstoppable+you move like a dwarf+porogon makes most dungeons and the deep/urgoz boring).
6) "Balanced" hard mode quests/missions. WiK and WoC are both excellent in terms of enemy variance and skill usage.

The bad:
1) Most secondary class skills are used for gimicks, defense, or energy purposes. The latter two should have been incorporated into the class to begin with. While secondaries have given a wide range of build availability with some interesting combinations (ex shock on a war), they are overall a failure.
2) As expansions came out, each classes' defining characteristics became less and less. Play style wise, there is frontline (war and dervish), ranger, assassin, caster, and monk (for pvp only, in pve monk blurs with the casters). Largely, skills decide classes and not the other way around (N/Rt and E/Mo healers are good examples).
3) Farming. Straight-up farming enemies, such as raptors, rather than missions/elite areas is poorly supported and balanced. The traveler's weekly trophy request could have kept things interesting, but as SoS is the only general farm build it's rather tedious.

The ugly:
1) Reliance on GW wiki. If I want to cap an elite skill or know the damage breakpoints on a skill, the easiest and quickest way to acquire this information is through the wiki. This is poor design; I shouldn't have to leave the game at all. They could have, say, made a note on your world map about the boss and elite skill if you kill him while exploring. That way, exploration would be encouraged and rewarded.
2) Poorly designed elite areas. Elite areas are static and most are based on a few gimicks that, while designing builds for it is fun, leave little else left to do once you get a working build (Kanaxai and Dhuum are good examples of gimick bosses). They also take forever for a non-sc team to complete; no area should take over an hour. At the very least, break them up into segments like DoA or Slavers. UW is probably the worst offender, with annoying and hard quests (4H, UWG) and boring enemies (there is generally 3-4 types of enemy per section).
3) Limited release items. Unfair and only available to only the super rich or lucky. If you want to keep them in the game, at least make them untradable.
4) Super rare random drops. This can be from a chest (like a silverwing bow) or an enemy (like a nice dual mod echovald). Things are MUCH better balanced around set drops for area completion, DoA gems being the best example. Then, skillful players can, rightly, earn rewards the fastest.
5) Lack of auction house. Self-explanatory.
6) Consets and pcons. On the low end, provide an annoying additional cost to an elite area. On the high end, provide a barrier to the best builds (ex R/A t1 and t2 underworld). Their core idea - using money to buy a temporarly boosted character - is also counter to Anet's given goal of lack of time sink required.
7) Grind titles. Very annoying to get high pve ranks on multiple characters to access the good levels of pve skills. They should have allowed us to "merge" invididual character's reputation points once they beat EotN. The luxon/kurzick titles are outright ridiculously tedious to achieve. Other titles, while still stupid (ex lucky) are mostly inconsequential to character effectiveness so I don't mind them.
8) Inflexibility in build. A "core" mechanic that is ultimately degenerative. All your build and team choice is decided before you leave (meaning long and complicated team forming times) and you have no way to change skill choice mid-mission. Would diversion be good to have vs the monk spamming boss you've found? Yes but too bad; you should have anticipated him beforehand. This has lead to very boring team setups that are designed to handle everything, both to counter team setup time and prevent critical missing skills. This, to an extent, would have happened anyway, but with this setup risk and odd build choices are actively discouraged.

justin1010 · Feb 01, 2012, 08:33 PM // 20:33

Some pretty good points given so far. For me, as I am just getting back into the game after a two year hiatus I would say that the introduction of seven heroes is one of the best things Anet has done. Sure it discourages grouping with others, but considering how small the player population has become, it only makes sense. Plus, it gives people the opportunity to play higher end Pvp without the limitations of henchman and struggling to find others with similar goals. I was one of those who did much of my vanquishing and other HM titles with henchman before 7 heroes was introduced but I am definitely not against letting others do those titles with a full hero team. Besides, having more goals to fulfill will still allow me go take advantage of it. Anyway I'm typing all this on my iPhone and so I won't elaborate on my take on the other good and the bad. Perhaps later when I'm on my computer

Edit:

some more good:
- Splitting of PVE and PVP skills (well a good chunk of them anyway)
- The recent improvement of profession viability in PVE, particularly the Mesmer and the Ele
- The introduction of Imperial faction
- New content in the form of GWB, even though I never really figured out how to begin the Hearts of the North stuff
- Making certain titles easier to max (see Ugly)

Bad:
- The prevalence of certain OP skills that make using other skills seem pointless
- So many skills to begin with. I think Anet should have limited the introduction of new skills in Factions and Nightfall as to allow for better balance.
- Elite areas that are only doable with very limited numbers of builds/profession combinations. Kind of defeats the purpose of skill and creativity in making one's build.

Ugly:
- Easily the overly grindy nature of certain titles. Some are fine, but others are just completely rediculous (one example is the alcohol title before its conversion to the point system a la sweet tooth).

StormDragonZ · Feb 01, 2012, 08:57 PM // 20:57

Good: The use of 7 Heroes. I enjoy working with others, but when it comes to vanquishing locations, I just cannot fathom wanting to work with other people. It's more of my own thing and how I play, but I like to ENJOY the game.

Bad: Following up in my last statement, the notion that people have to finish things very quickly, or rush stuff just to get items and shiny stuff. More importantly, the implication of such shiny and rare things. If you can't be helpful, the stuff you wear and use sure wont be any better.

Ugly: The possible idea that gimmicks or "you must use this or kick" are not only needed, but required, to complete the most difficult of locations. If I'm playing my Mesmer, I get kicked out of groups because I'm not using Panic or Ineptitude. What annoys me is no one thinks about what is better to use, but the fact something does what it does. Would you really want to bring Ineptitude to an area majorly filled with casters?

Concise: It's good to use seven heroes. It's bad to see people quit groups if you can't beat something in four minutes. It's ugly that gimmick teams are the only means to actually play something.

Cuilan · Feb 01, 2012, 10:21 PM // 22:21

Good:
PUGs and friends list - gave much more fun and help than any guild I've been in
War in Kryta - entertaining foes, grouping, and memorable moments
Mesmer update - no more rage and bitterness over people playing a mesmer, but the elementalist and dervish ones are fun too
Zaishen quests - extra rewards and full grouping
Bad:
Winds of Change - I found nobody to do the quests with and it looks like the rest of the game doesn't care much for it either
Speed Clears - are still too far effective than something fairly balanced
Ugly:
Guilds - how tribal they are

Lanier · Feb 01, 2012, 11:21 PM // 23:21

Good:
1. 7 hero update (probably the best)
2. Recieving 2 additional large-scale standalone campaigns
3. Skill updates back when they were regular and monthly
4. My awesome guild (check us out at www.thepinkanimalclan.com!)
5. Skill splitting for PvE/PvP
6. The Deep and Urgoz
7. Dungeons

Bad:
1. The current skill balancing policy. Having massive updates after massive periods of time is stupid when you could do smaller updates in smaller periods of time.
2. The unwillingness of Anet to nerf the clearly OP skills (or their inability to effectively nerf skills when they attempt to do so - as they have done with SoS)
3. Lack of staff that has been devoted to GW1 updates, and as a result, the lack of skill updates. I miss my monthly skill updates...
4. The Luxon/Kurzick faction update that gave rise to the faction speedclears and restored life to JQ/FA while signaling the beginning of the end for AB.
5. Imbalance in the usefulness of various skill types (ex: degen vs. direct damage, hexes and conditions vs. direct damage, etc.)

Ugly:
1. Maintainable spell immunity
2. Speed clears and the unwillingness for Anet to nerf them
3. The addition of cons
4. Elitist attitudes and the fact that most elitists actually try to justify their attitude.

Horace Slughorn · Feb 02, 2012, 02:34 AM // 02:34

in no particular order

Good:
1-Eye of the north
2-Consumables
3-Xunlai tournament house
4-Observe mode
5-Guilds and Alliances (not really an update, but being in a guild has kept me playing these many years)
6-The big update to kurz/luxon faction
7-Ignore list
8-Hard mode
9-End chests in elite areas
10-War supplies (love those!)
11-7 hero update (though a bit later than I would have liked)
12-Nick
13-Snowball ATs (wish I had discovered these sooner)
14-Splitting stack sizes
15-Account-wide treasure/wisdom

Bad:
1-The warning that tells you how long you've been playing

emm i'll finish this later lol

Zylo16 · Feb 02, 2012, 02:35 AM // 02:35

Good:
1. WiK
2. zaishen Quests
3. UY Rework
4. Dungeons
5. HoM
6. zaishen Chest
7. Dhuum

Bad:
1. Strongboxes
2. zaishen title as a PVP title
3. Inscribable Weapons
4. 7-H Update
5. WoC Part 1 + 2 (can't judge part 3 yet..)
6. Changing HA from 6 to 8

dawnmist · Feb 02, 2012, 05:57 AM // 05:57

Just wanted to add a few HUGE Good (IMHO)....

Good:
* Not having the servers shut off for 3 hours a week for weekly maintenance (in my prime time too!)
* Not having to wait for huge patches to download just to apply a skill/map fix

That those were not "standard" came as a huge shock to me going from GW1 to anything else

.

Shayne Hawke · Feb 02, 2012, 06:41 AM // 06:41

The Good:

Festival Hat Trader - Goes mostly without saying. It was nice to finally have an NPC in the game that could store those limited time items and make more of them in the future, so that inventories didn't have to be cluttered by holding onto so many hats at once.
Skill/Equipment Templates - A very much appreciated convenience for allowing players to quickly save and share builds with each other, and swap between many different builds for personal use.
(7) Heroes - Because nobody ever really liked using henchmen. Now, we can actually play with teammates who have the skill bars that we demand that they have and are available any time we want.
Account Security: Character Name - Just a little bit of an extra security measure, but can prevent some rather horrendous things from happening.
Account Security: Account Snapshots - This should have been added years ago. Now if my account gets broken into, I can feel somewhat secure that I'll get it back just the way I left it? That goes a long way for peace of mind.
Hall of Monuments - It's nice to have a bridge between GW and GW2. Additionally, the cinematic replay features available through here are a wonderful convenience, one which might have been nice to have for any other mission or story line in the game.
Festival Arenas - I would be lying to say that my most entertaining experiences from GW didn't come from either Snowball, Dragon Arena, Rollerbeetle Racing, or Costume Brawl. Dragon's Nest can RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GO off though.
Competitive PvP in '05-'07 - I know next to nothing about PvP back in the day, because it wasn't something I cared about back then. However, between the community that was a part of it, the competition that resulted from it, and the support from ANet both financially and through giving a damn about balance, it sounds like it was probably the best period for the PvP scene in GW history.
Microtransactions - Though I don't believe I've spent any money on GW since purchasing the expansion, I feel like all of the services offered through the GW store via microtransactions, particularly the extra storage slots, extra character slots, and makeover credits, have provided a service to players previously lacking and in high demand.
Changes to LDoA and Survivor - LDoA was a clever achievement before it became a title, and afterwards just started looking ridiculous. The changes overall to LDoA to make players be more engaged in their entire progression through the title was a good move, as well as the adjustment to Survivor so that it doesn't become just a one-time deal.
Nicholas Sanford, the Traveler - This was a good way of introducing something else into pre-Searing, and to give players and post-Searing a bit less static of a collector.
Unkillable NPCs in EotN - There was no worse feeling on missions like Thunderhead Keep where Jalis gets mowed down before you even make it to the keep, or in Arborstone when Mhenlo falls to his knees. Making these characters come back after they go down took a great deal of frustration out of doing missions.
Zaishen Challenges - Gave players a good source of motivation to go and try playing different things each day.
War in Kryta (Mobs) - At least, we are given a set of mobs which are extremely diverse in the different skill bars they bring out, use two professions, and force players to play against bars found in one metagame or another of PvE. These were some truly fearsome foes in PvE. The whole experience of WiK, both in and out of game, was great, but I'd say that these mobs were the highlight.
Automated Tournament System - To pull much of the weight off of ANet having to organize each and every tournament that occurs in the game, the ATS was conceived. This allowed tournaments to occur regularly and in a timely fashion, and opened the door for the implementation of tournaments for Snowball.
Inscriptions - Among other changes to equipment, inscriptions made it a very simple process to track down what was the best available enhancement for each weapon or armor piece, and then locate, salvage, and/or buy those enhancements. This cut down on the cost in both time and cash significantly, making the acquisition of maxed out equipment very quick and unproblematic.
Recent Support, and Support Forum - The addition of the Support forum offers an additional venue through which players can voice technical issues with the game. It appears to be successful, with many issues brought up there being addressed in a timely fashion, and being solved shortly thereafter if at all possible.

The Bad:

Codex Arena - An honest attempt at giving players what they had been asking for: a decent sealed-deck format. However, it ultimately fell short of what it had hoped to achieve.
Zaishen Tournament House - Gave players an easy opportunity to get something for what was essentially nothing. While perhaps coming with the intention of involving more people into what the PvP scene was at the time, the golden era of the PvP scene had already passed by that point. Players such as I could make gains off of the ZTH without even paying attention to the PvP scene, but simply by plugging in the guesses that other people who actually cared about the format were presuming would be best. Its removal was a plus, but its existence was a stain.
The Evolution of Titles - There was nothing wrong with the titles that were originally introduced with their debut and how they were used. However, once we hit Nightfall and started tying skills and effects to titles, a whole new breed of elitism hit GW, which snowballed into what it is today.
Competitive PvP after '07 - While providing people with a means to participate in tournaments on a monthly basis, it seemed that a lot of the support from both the community and ANet had waned after '07. Having first been a game in which PvP was meant to be the end of the line for everyone, it is disappointing that ANet did not continue to give what could look like their full attention to the decline of PvP.
PvE/PvP Skill Splits - This was the move that opened the door for skills and builds to be buffed without much greater consequence in PvE. Such has led to the dominance of such notorious builds and teams as those revolving around Shadow Form, Discord, and Spirit Bond.

The Ugly:

The Treatment of Hero Battles - Hero Battles, now removed from the game with no hope of return, was a unique format with much promise at its introduction. While providing another challenge to the developers of balancing PvP skills in another arena, they seemed to be up to it for the sake of this new form of PvP. Its condition eventually deteriorated in ways that many could tell you about more than I, while ANet stood by either unable to do anything about the issues, or unwilling to address them. While it was perhaps a good move to remove the arena versus letting it continue to collapse, it couldn't have been as good a move as actually confronting the arena's issues.
The Treatment of Botting (and Security) - There was a time way back when the community was abuzz with the issue of botting. For quite some time, ANet offered the community no response, only coming out much later to say they they addressed the issue. Even so, there are many players still today who claim to find botters showing up in all facets of GW. A similarly poor response was given when an issue of security was raised. While that select issue has been dealt with, the time it took in order to pull a response out of the Live team about the breach was considerably longer than it should have been.
Balance - Ever since the loss of manpower to GW2 and the skill split between PvE and PvP, balance in this game has gone haywire. I don't feel that this point needs further explanation.
Dragon's Nest - Seriously, RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GO this game.

The Worst:

Guild Wars 2 - The sequel to GW, and the way that ANet practically threw its entire team off from GW and onto GW2, was the single most disastrous decision to ever come to GW. As a result of it, GW has since never had (and does not look like it ever will have) the manpower behind it that it needs in order to put out the kind of service it deserves for the kind of game that it is. The scaling back from an entire studio to only about enough people to be counted on one's fingers killed any potential for GW to continue thriving as it once had, and hastened its plummet into disorder. It's not as though there haven't been great things that have happened in GW since the announcement of GW2, but without moving on to the sequel, or at least not with such gusto as to leave GW in the hands of only a handful of people, we could have seen today a much more appropriately treated GW. With only the perspective to see what has happened to GW, it remains to be seen whether this sacrifice was worth it or not by what GW2 eventually becomes, but GW2's success or failure won't make up for lost potential in GW.

Kook~NBK~ · Feb 02, 2012, 06:42 AM // 06:42

The Good:
1. Daily Zaishen Challenges
2. Nick the Traveller.
3. WiK - BFLA one of the most fun quests in the entire game.
4. Dungeons
5. Ability to save and share skill bars in-game.

The Bad:
1. Speed clears.
2. Embark Beach - Great idea, but horribly implemented. (The Map sucks and newbies get lost there.)
3. WoC, part 1. (Part 2 wasn't as bad)

depeche · Feb 02, 2012, 07:53 AM // 07:53

The Good :
* GvG still being fun after +6 years
* Zaishen challenges & Boxes
* Templates

The Bad :
* 7 hero's & consets ; made the game too easy & people should play together
* Removing Team Arena and Hero Battles ; the problems should have been
fixed instead of completely removing it
* Codex Arena ; i loved the idea ; the execution of the idea is flawed ;
doesn't work as intended.

Still, Thank You ArenaNet for delivering a great game to us and i hope GW2 will be as good.

Gill Halendt · Feb 02, 2012, 08:02 AM // 08:02

The Good:

- GW is still a great game after all these years
- GW is still free to play and supported, even tough support is lacklustre at times (see below)
- WiK, expecially after the revised pre-requisites shaving a lot of tedious dialogues, and the Master Quest guiding player through.
- A lot of needed improvements to the game, like new services, security features, revised titles, gameplay facilitations.
- Rollback feature for hacked accounts!

The Bad:

- HoTN. Boring, predictable, single player impersonation of an undecided random idiot from a Wintersday quest. Not fun at all. Oh, and this is the only repeatable part of Beyond right now. Well, thanks for nothing...
- WoC. Ok, some of us have been craving about new content. Still, that doesn't imply we'd be happy about any new content. WoC was just poorly designed, generic, random heap of stupid quests. Part II was better, let's hope for Part III...
- The stupid rhetorical blabber about ethics and morale as a leit-motiv behind WoC, after six years of extermination of anything that posed any problem to Tyria and its people. Really?
- Speed clears, farming and HoM filling being the name of the game today. Not surprising, since new content is scarce, but still...
- Speed clears being so much more effective than any other setup.
- PvP being in a sorry state, getting no care at all...
- GW is still a great game, but as time passes, I realize it's less for its own merits, and mostly due to the appalling competition...

The Ugly:

- The fact that most of the improvements (rollback included) came so late that they ended up upsetting a lot of people anyway
- The current state of skill updates: once a year one single profession is picked and turned into something grossly overpowered. Rinse & repeat after 6-8 months.
- Anet's chronic inability to solve problems in a timely manner...
- Anet's chronic inability to solve problems with solutions that make sense...
- Anet's chronic inability to solve problems.
- Anet's sort of naive approach to problem-solving
- Non-existent quality checks, inadequate testing

_Aphotic_ · Feb 02, 2012, 08:14 AM // 08:14

The Good:

Secondary Professions Okay, okay... most people say that this was one of the worse implementations ANet did for GW, and ANet even goes so far to agree by getting rid of them entirely in GW2. However, Secondary Professions allowed for a lot of innovative play (gimmicks included) which allowed for people to run a lot of strange, fun-intentioned builds (that aren't nearly as effective as what is now accepted as meta).
PvP Don't get me wrong here, but I find GW being oriented as a MMORPG that was originally built as a PvP game (and that PvP being equally as rewarding as PvE, if not moreso) to be a brilliant move on ANet's part. No other MMORPG out there spends the amount of time ANet has on PvP (and I can't wait for GW2). I hope they execute their intentions for pvp in GW2 much more fashionably.
Free Expansions- WiK/WoC. I can honestly say I appreciate ANet for giving us free content in addition to the bug tweaks/fixes and skill balances. Between all of the above mentioned, I don't blame ANet for taking so long; they have a lot on their plate and such a small team working on it.

The Bad:

Cutscene-Script Writing/Script Writing in General Cheesy/trashy script writing. This is fanfic-esque material (it sounds as if ANet took their favorite fanfic writer and had them write out the story). Incredibly most noticeable in the Prophecies campaign.
Music- Jeremy Soule rocks. You're ambient music, and EotN opening themes have truly won my heart. But there is nothing defining in the music of Guild Wars. Aside from a few short motif themes, what your churning out goes no further than "video game music." I hope GW2 is better.
P.S. Your Oblivion/Skyrim score was good, but once again, it won't go any further in terms of "video game" music.
Titles The only way to find out if a player was better or more worse than you. Half the time, it isn't even true. There should have been a better way to distinguish good players from the bad (having good connections with the relevant community helps a ton, aside from titles).
Friends List Limit I absolutely loved the simplicity of the Friends List UI. However, the limit gets pretty annoying at times; I am currently forced to delete my closest GW buddies (because i remember their names far easier), in order to add future guests/pvp buddies/etc.

The Ugly

Hall of Monuments/EotN Provided the entire selling point of EotN, as well as preparation for GW2. Congratulations ANet, your team rocks at marketing for the fanboys/masses. Sure, there's no cosmetic bonuses, but plenty of people will probably want "that cool GW1 exclusive" gear everyone else has come GW2. Not to mention, shortly after the release EotN, practically ALL of ANet abandoned GW to work on GW2 (see shayne's post above). Cheers to slower content releases.

Marketing aside, Patient Spirit is reason enough to buy this expansion...

KZaske · Feb 02, 2012, 08:18 AM // 08:18

The Good:
1. Zaishen Menagerie
2. Nick the Traveller.
3. WiK
4. Ability to save and share skill bars in-game.
5. Embark Beach
6. Daily Zaishen Challenges

The Bad:
1. Speed clears.
2. Con-sets - When first intorduced they were not bad, now they have gone wild.
3. WoC
4. Heros.

The Ugly:
1. The PvP Elitist attitudes and thier constant attempts are reinforcing it.

**Marty Silverblade** · Feb 02, 2012, 09:33 AM // 09:33

Most things I can think of have been said already except for one thing: Sorrow's Furnace. It's still easily one of my favourite updates, and some of my favourite GW experiences have been back there in 2005. You could join up with anyone, you'd all help each other, and it was all around good fun, especially if someone was lucky enough to get a green. Every time I see some idiot in RA abuse someone for bringing one wrong skill or not being perfect, all I think is how they're never going to understand those experiences we had back then. /cue nostalgia.

Missing HB · Feb 02, 2012, 10:34 AM // 10:34

Good :
- Prophecies and Nightfall campaigns and soundtrack
- Pre searing care
- War in kryta/sorrow furnace
- Green items usually
- PvP tournaments( when they were active)
- Saving skills builds
- Event games

Bad :
- HoM/titles : it's not as bad as other points, buti think they're too much a substitute for real content after so long..
- Speedclears/consets : it relies too much on abusing mobs IA thanks to a key skill and too many bonus items, profit made is usually too high
- Henchman contest/xunlai house ( first one did reward people for copying wiki...)
- Too many useless bug fixes while most annoying ones( i.e turtle in JQ/FA) is still there
- Lack of developement of some areas such as Polymock, Alliance Battles, Codex arena , zaishen challenge, competitive missions in PvE

Ugly :
- Removing Hero battles, a 1 man required format which had tournaments and personnal form of ranking, in a dying game, a smart move ; removing heroes from PvP while the game is dying, an other smart move
- Removing Team arenas for codex arena, which is basically a pseudo Team arenas
- Flux/skill updates affecting the whole game while they're clearly only made regarding GvG MAT
- Inscriptions in PvE which was basically a bye bye to green items
- Too many "try your luck" boxes in the game ( zaishen chest, hall of heroes chest, mallyx box, birthday boxes, royal gifts, nicholas gifts, etc...)
- Game being a farm factory for a few months( PvP version of snowball fight of gods, april fools quest, ...)

Terrible :
- Syncers are rewarded in PvP for abusing completly the game while fair players can't do anything( maybe something should be done with multi launch in the future..)

Swingline · Feb 02, 2012, 11:43 AM // 11:43

The Good: Pretty much everything from 2005-2006, except Shadow Form.

The Bad: N/A

The Ugly:

-Nightfall
-Inscriptions
-Heroes(Killed grouping)
-Shadow Form
-Speed Clears(in their current form)
-Massive Lag Issues(due to taking servers away from GW1)
-Elitism
-Mesmer Update(PvP)
-Dervish Update(PvP)
-Consumables
-Hard Mode
-Pretty much everything from 2007-Present, Anything that could be deemed good was just a band-aid for the game.

The Unacceptable: Anets unwillingness to fix problems with balance/security and their IDGAF attitude. The most notable issues are bots, hackings(took over 6 years to get account restoration) and syncers.

The Insane: No AH. Players are intended to sit for hours in a town trying to sell crap instead of playing the game. Then when they say their in the process of making one they scrap it because its too much work for them.

............./´¯/)
............/....//
.........../....//
...../´¯/..../´¯\ -- You Fail Arena Net --
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Bright Star Shine · Feb 02, 2012, 04:09 PM // 16:09

The Good:

- Factions skins: There are some nice Prophecies skins in the game, but they're few in number. Factions brought some of the best looking weapons and shields to this game. Also, the fact that they didn't make all of them inscribable is some props to Anet.
- Elite Missions: Urgoz, Deep and Sorrow's Furnace are the best ones by far, followed closely by UW pre-dhuum (post-dhuum I care not for this area), and DoA. I don't know how many hours I've spent in DoA...
- Some of the little things: Deep/Urgoz scrolls, small things like that that made some very annoying things more durable.
- Templates: That is by far one of the best updates they ever did. I remember seeing people ping their build, and you'd just have to trust them on it, and that their attributes were set right.
- WiK: Was real fun if you got past the dialogues. BFLA was also really fun, especially before they toned it down. I remember going in there in HM just to see if I could do it. I could, after getting curbstomped like four times.
- Bugs/glitches: One of the most fun parts I find about GW is that there is such a tremendous effort put in by the player base to find glitches that can be abused. I remember doing WoC HM with 14 heroes and just stomping through there 3 mobs at a time facerolling the entire thing, knowing that Anet did their best to make the mobs difficult with OP builds, and me just strolling through there and stomping their faces was so fun. I regret that they completely nerfed it now, but it was incredibly fun while it lasted. Also, VQ'ing Varajar Fells in 16 minutes with a party of 20/8 was pretty fun.

The Bad:

- Ursan: That was such a stupid skill, and it took them for ever to nerf it.
- The fact it took them 5 years to fix eles.
- Some skills: DwG, Shadow Form (yes, I abuse it on a daily basis, but not doing it would be retarded) are the ones that come to mind.
- Inscriptions: They raped this entire games weapon system. Anything that comes after NF was trash. Inscriptions are one of the worst things in this game. I don't care what you say, they are. All Anet had to do was add some extra weapons collectors and green weapons so that they covered every possible mod combination and it would have been fine. Then people would pay good money for aesthetics, but at least everyone could get the weapons they needed. There are already very few weapon combinations that are impossible to obtain without inscriptions.
- Nightfall in general: I hate that campaign so much I payed a friend 50e to get one of my characters through it. I couldn't get myself to do it again, it's such a terrible campaign. The quests are horrific, the missions are trash and the story is a big MEH. Most disappointing campaign of them all.

The Ugly:

- Elitism in general: But well, we're only human. If I'm going to solve math/physics problems I'm not going to ask a 14y old to help me with it. I'm going to ask my mates from class. So, it's pretty natural, it could just get a little bit annoying at times. But, wherever you will find humans you will find elitism.
- Account security and recovery: They simply don't give a shit in 90% of the cases. They should've implemented better security from the start.
- Botters and scammers: Took them how long to do that massive botters ban? Seriously...

Veldan · Feb 02, 2012, 08:05 PM // 20:05

Started shorty after factions release. A review:

The Good

1. easy build linking and saving with templates
2. 7 heroes update so you can make a fully customizable NPC team
3. minipets (aren't they awesome!)
4. hall of monuments, purely from a GW1 point of view to give a sense of achievement
5. nice pvp, not talking about skill balance here but just about the formats like GvG and HA

The Bad

1. the most expensive armor set being the ugliest for most classes
2. rangers having no real role in PvE, that is being worse than other classes in whatever role they decide to play (even splinter barrage dmg is higher on a Rt/R)
3. caster heroes always being the best choice in PvE
4. removal of TA (HB too, but a group-oriented game didn't need an 1v1 format imo)

The Ugly

1. Shadow Form: worst skill idea ever
2. Botters / Leechers in JQ and FA and the lack of action against them
3. Carriers getting stuck in JQ and FA and the lack of a fix in 5 years

The Worst Of All

balancing by changing skill functionality. This one is really killing the game for me atm. All the fun skills that were used less than average were functionality-changed into mainstream or even meta skills. I LOVED the initial Incendiary Arrows, I LOVED the initial Thunderclap, I LOVED the initial Invoke Lightning, I LOVED the initial Strike As One... I could go on for a while, but you get the point. If a skill is weak, please balance by number tweaking, not by revamping the skill. Arenanet themselves has said in several GW2 interviews how they balance skills by finding the right number, yet in GW1 they half the time change the functionality. Your initial ideas for skills were great, please stick to them.