Curse

urania · May 19, 2011, 05:06 PM // 17:06

Players (like you?) who only whine instead of doing something to improve should piss off, instead.

GW pvp used to be hard to get into, when there was no obs mode and few places to get useful advice from. The game, as it as now, can't really produce good players anymore, so.
Moreover, the 5v5 of GW2 equals the gvg of GW, just so you know.
I dont understand how can it be that hard to improve in GW pvp, when all you have (well, had) to do was just play plenty of games (so you get the right feel for things that need to be done and the way they have to be done), do some reading/ask more exped players for advice. That can take a while, depending on how much time you can invest, but its pretty much it.

You sound just like a scrub, so can't blame me for blaming you to be one, can you?
On a side note, chess and sc are both easy to access and all, but you'll get whooped on a whole different level by a better player there than on GW.
So, I see no different results at the end but either of these 2: give up on becoming competitive (because perhaps that was not the aim to start with) and just play for fun or get really good (and that i mean good enough to perform successfully on international tournies).

The barrier you're complaining about is partially a result of lacking medium-range player base that for the most part evaporated into thin air because of yours of horrible balance updates and people moving on/getting fed up.

Skyy High · May 19, 2011, 07:52 PM // 19:52

Oh FFS, you agreed with my argument when Ensign said it, wtf is wrong with you? Stop arguing against what you think I'm saying, stop assuming that I'm some talentless scrub, and in general stop being such a f***ing tool. All I said, ALL I SAID, was that GW PvP does a terrible job of funneling players from casual formats into the more competitive formats. That is FACT, and it is the ONE THING you should be responding to. Tell me how the hell anyone is supposed to get good at GvG or HA by doing RA and AB. Tell me!

The comparison to Star Craft, chess, CS:S, and ANY OTHER good competitive PvP game was meant to illustrate the fact that during the entire time that a player is playing and improving, the skills and strategies they are learning are completely applicable to the next "tier" of players. Every single one of those games presents a long and difficult struggle to master the game and stay on top of your ranking, and none of them are wanting for depth, yet all of them have casual PvPers and the most hardcore of the hardcore playing the same game, occasionally with minor differences.

To reiterate, for your obscenely closed mind: YOU DO NOT HAVE TO MAKE LEARNING THE GAME A STRUGGLE TO HAVE GOOD PVP. In fact, that is the exact opposite of good game design. The top end of skill can still be incredibly high (see: all of the games I've been citing), but there needs to be a clear path for a new player to follow to get to the top. These games PROVE that. "Suck it up and deal with it n00b" is a terrible attitude to have. That attitude, coupled with the utter inability for any casual PvP player to learn how to play at a higher level without getting dragged there by a better guild or friend, is precisely why PvP is in its present state. No new blood is coming in because it's impossible to learn to play GvG without playing GvG. The first wave of players all basically got good at the game together, and they helped train the next wave, and so on and so on, until the skill level at the top became high enough that it became impossible to break into GvG without help. At that point, every new GvG-er was forced to learn through the kindness of friends or strangers dragging them along into GvG to teach them, because there is no place to go to learn it yourself in a more casual setting.

I'm not saying that you're wrong to not play with new players; just like Ensign said, that's not your job. It's the game's job to make that transition possible. It's possible in every other good PvP game, and it's not possible (or, if you'd prefer, unnecessarily hard) in GW1. It will be possible in GW2. That's why GW2 will be better, in terms of PvP, than GW1.

Of course, I really don't expect you to understand any of this. You've already shown you have absolutely reading comprehension whatsoever...

Quote:

Moreover, the 5v5 of GW2 equals the gvg of GW, just so you know.

Seriously, wtf mate? That was the entire goddamn point. Random 5v5 will be the same format with the same objectives as the GvG "equivalent" in GW2. God DAMN why am I wasting my time on you...

urania · May 20, 2011, 12:41 AM // 00:41

Quote:

Originally Posted by Skyy High

Oh FFS, you agreed with my argument when Ensign said it, wtf is wrong with you? Stop arguing against what you think I'm saying, stop assuming that I'm some talentless scrub, and in general stop being such a f***ing tool. All I said, ALL I SAID, was that GW PvP does a terrible job of funneling players from casual formats into the more competitive formats. That is FACT, and it is the ONE THING you should be responding to. Tell me how the hell anyone is supposed to get good at GvG or HA by doing RA and AB. Tell me!

TA was the best format to help train people into higher tier formats, especially gvg (and i know quite a few who moved on to gvg from ta), and yet anet decided to kill it off. what does that tell you?

Quote:

The comparison to Star Craft, chess, CS:S, and ANY OTHER good competitive PvP game was meant to illustrate the fact that during the entire time that a player is playing and improving, the skills and strategies they are learning are completely applicable to the next "tier" of players. Every single one of those games presents a long and difficult struggle to master the game and stay on top of your ranking, and none of them are wanting for depth, yet all of them have casual PvPers and the most hardcore of the hardcore playing the same game, occasionally with minor differences.

what makes you think that (at least some parts of) that does not apply to gw pvp? e.g. once you learn what and when to shutdown on opponents of similar skill level, why would that not apply to better players too, as long as your timing id taking into account all the necessary conditions (i.e. when a mo >has< to cast or things will die, or when you notice a pattern in skill usage and can interrupt it the next time)? clearly, playing vs utter trash will help you learn a thing or two, as long as you're utter trash too, and once you improve you can further learn from players of similar and higher level again, just as you can in chess.

when i started off in TA back in boon days, it was not a pain to play and fail at the start. nor was it learning from my mistakes. the game was simply just fun to play and rewarding when things were done right. i remember no real annoyance or frustration when starting off, nor do i recall some extreme depth of play. TA represented the best start to become a gvg (or HA, but that's a waste) player, because it was the missing link between 4v4 and 8v8, organisation and coordination-wise.

Quote:

To reiterate, for your obscenely closed mind: YOU DO NOT HAVE TO MAKE LEARNING THE GAME A STRUGGLE TO HAVE GOOD PVP. In fact, that is the exact opposite of good game design. The top end of skill can still be incredibly high (see: all of the games I've been citing), but there needs to be a clear path for a new player to follow to get to the top. These games PROVE that. "Suck it up and deal with it n00b" is a terrible attitude to have. That attitude, coupled with the utter inability for any casual PvP player to learn how to play at a higher level without getting dragged there by a better guild or friend, is precisely why PvP is in its present state. No new blood is coming in because it's impossible to learn to play GvG without playing GvG. The first wave of players all basically got good at the game together, and they helped train the next wave, and so on and so on, until the skill level at the top became high enough that it became impossible to break into GvG without help. At that point, every new GvG-er was forced to learn through the kindness of friends or strangers dragging them along into GvG to teach them, because there is no place to go to learn it yourself in a more casual setting.

clearly something went amiss along the way, because the game hasnt been a struggle to learn start on. i didnt say you should suck it up and deal with it - I was always eager to give advice to anyone who actually asked me for it. But guess what - people stopped asking years ago and instead rather complain how hard it is to get into high end pvp. And after 6 years, can you blame them or be surprised it happened?

Most don't want to learn - most just want another point for their x/50 gw2 bonus.

Quote:

I'm not saying that you're wrong to not play with new players; just like Ensign said, that's not your job. It's the game's job to make that transition possible. It's possible in every other good PvP game, and it's not possible (or, if you'd prefer, unnecessarily hard) in GW1. It will be possible in GW2. That's why GW2 will be better, in terms of PvP, than GW1.

I wish I could share those sentiments.
But as already said, I have always been open to questions, but instead, RAers prefer calling me a cape-leecher when i refuse to heal p/r's with enraged lunge or trolls unguent, sins with breeze and rangers with rof and sh. They rarely, if ever, ask why don't i want to heal them. Even less, do they ask whether their build is ok (i.e. good enough to make a streak, getting gladis - unless they're just trolling with their bars).
Ppl don't play RA to become better or to get to higher tier pvp. That type of player base is (long) gone.

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Seriously, wtf mate? That was the entire goddamn point. Random 5v5 will be the same format with the same objectives as the GvG "equivalent" in GW2. God DAMN why am I wasting my time on you...

let's see.

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No matter how late in the game you start, you'll be able to work your way up through the 5v5 arenas to the point where you can, theoretically, if you work at it, get good enough to play actual GvG (equivalent)

your post implied as if 5v5 was a transitional arena like TA used to be, so i merely made sure we're on the same page. Take a chill pill and form your sentences properly next time.

*lemming* · May 20, 2011, 12:49 AM // 00:49

Sigh.

Too much to ask you guys to play nice, right?

*lemming* · May 20, 2011, 12:59 AM // 00:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Skyy High

The comparison to Star Craft, chess, CS:S, and ANY OTHER good competitive PvP game was meant to illustrate the fact that during the entire time that a player is playing and improving, the skills and strategies they are learning are completely applicable to the next "tier" of players. Every single one of those games presents a long and difficult struggle to master the game and stay on top of your ranking, and none of them are wanting for depth, yet all of them have casual PvPers and the most hardcore of the hardcore playing the same game, occasionally with minor differences.

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/h...t10208428.html

Skyy High · May 20, 2011, 02:37 AM // 02:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by lemming

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/h...t10208428.html

/facepalm

Quote:

Originally Posted by Skyy High

I'm not saying that you're wrong to not play with new players; just like Ensign said, that's not your job. It's the game's job to make that transition possible. It's possible in every other good PvP game, and it's not possible (or, if you'd prefer, unnecessarily hard) in GW1. It will be possible in GW2. That's why GW2 will be better, in terms of PvP, than GW1.

I'm not blaming high ranked players for not playing with newbies. I'm blaming the system for being so terrible at allowing those players to teach themselves how to play. It's almost mandatory, at this point, for someone to act like a good Samaritan in order for any neophyte GvGer to get enough experience to get good enough to not be a liability to his team. No other game that I can think of is like that, where high ranked players need to mentor players out of the goodness of their heart in order for those players to learn the ropes.

@urania: you're right, TA was the best way for a casual player to transition to higher level play. It still wasn't very good at the job (except if you wanted to monk. Monking in TA was legitimately tough most of the time). The format was still too different from the 8v8 modes to lead to an easy transition; really, the most you got out of playing there were contacts that you could use to get into teams in the other modes, not necessarily the experience itself. If the most competitive mode in the game is XvX, there should be opportunities for casual players to work their way up through increasingly difficult arenas, all of which are XvX and have similar objectives. This really shouldn't be a divisive issue.

Quote:

what makes you think that (at least some parts of) that does not apply to gw pvp? e.g. once you learn what and when to shutdown on opponents of similar skill level, why would that not apply to better players too, as long as your timing id taking into account all the necessary conditions

1) Because twitch skill isn't difficult to learn (and if it is, you're not going to get far as an interrupter anyway).
2) Because shutdown targets are very different in 8v8 situations than casual PvP ("Kill the monk" is often not the best option, for example).
3) Because you simply can't learn certain 8v8 skills in a casual 4v4 environment. There's little, if any, communication, so that's right out. Positioning is rarely important because you rarely have front, mid, or backlines. Splitting is obviously not going to happen. Positions like flagger are obviously not going to come up. Maybe it's overstating it a little to say that you learn nothing in casual PvP that will translate to GvG, but I don't think it's a stretch to say that even the best RA player will be terrible if you throw him on any GvG team.

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clearly something went amiss along the way, because the game hasnt been a struggle to learn start on.

Well obviously; when the game was new, everyone was a newbie. People learned the game together, and for quite a while there were tons of new players climbing up the ranks, getting help from the old ones and feeling out new territory themselves. 6 years in, though, that ladder has basically broken, and no one is consistently pulling new players upwards (partially due to, I'll admit, a lack of interest in improving from most players). The game has stagnated. New players don't have the tools to better themselves (because all casual arenas available to them are insufficient to learn the game well), and old players don't feel like gambling on the 1% chance that this newbie will be willing to listen and learn.

Quote:

Ppl don't play RA to become better or to get to higher tier pvp. That type of player base is (long) gone.

Well herp derp of course they don't. Or, at least, the majority don't, and the minority that want to aren't getting much out of it. RA shouldn't just be a training ground for people looking to move up in skill, but it should be able to serve that function. Or, rather, there should be levels of RA-type arenas where you're matched up against increasingly high ranked players, until eventually you're playing with the same guys who do competitive 5v5 tournaments (of course, on the same maps with similar objectives, just with organized teams). All of a sudden, boom, you're playing at the level you need to, with the people you need to know, to get into competitive PvP, and there was no sudden jump that anyone ever needed to pull you over. This is all possible through individual perseverance, if that's what the player is looking for. If not, they can stick to low level arenas and faff off with whatever build they want. Even better: there's never any need for any experienced player to take a gamble on some random newbie; anyone who wants to play badly enough will prove themselves at least moderately capable by getting to the top-ranked tier.

Missing HB · May 20, 2011, 08:19 AM // 08:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by Skyy High

you're right, TA was the best way for a casual player to transition to higher level play. It still wasn't very good at the job (except if you wanted to monk. Monking in TA was legitimately tough most of the time). The format was still too different from the 8v8 modes to lead to an easy transition; really, the most you got out of playing there were contacts that you could use to get into teams in the other modes, not necessarily the experience itself. If the most competitive mode in the game is XvX, there should be opportunities for casual players to work their way up through increasingly difficult arenas, all of which are XvX and have similar objectives. This really shouldn't be a divisive issue.

On the opposite , most HA'ers are terrible at GvG , whereas like i said few posts ago, TA'ers and HB'ers get good results if not win HB mat.... Why? Because HA is mostly about buttonbashing, dead hour farming , whereas other 2 format requires a little tactic and coordination , what is required in GvG...

Side note : could you please make shorter posts?? It's really unreadable and boring after a few ones....

urania · May 20, 2011, 10:01 AM // 10:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by Skyy High

/facepalm

I'm not blaming high ranked players for not playing with newbies. I'm blaming the system for being so terrible at allowing those players to teach themselves how to play. It's almost mandatory, at this point, for someone to act like a good Samaritan in order for any neophyte GvGer to get enough experience to get good enough to not be a liability to his team. No other game that I can think of is like that, where high ranked players need to mentor players out of the goodness of their heart in order for those players to learn the ropes.

unlike sc and chess, GW is a TEAM game, where interaction with other players is at the core of almost every format - it is only natural learning from other players is part of the game experience. You must learn how to coordinate your play with your team mates' play, and there's only as much you can learn on your own.

Quote:

1) Because twitch skill isn't difficult to learn (and if it is, you're not going to get far as an interrupter anyway).
2) Because shutdown targets are very different in 8v8 situations than casual PvP ("Kill the monk" is often not the best option, for example).
3) Because you simply can't learn certain 8v8 skills in a casual 4v4 environment. There's little, if any, communication, so that's right out. Positioning is rarely important because you rarely have front, mid, or backlines. Splitting is obviously not going to happen. Positions like flagger are obviously not going to come up. Maybe it's overstating it a little to say that you learn nothing in casual PvP that will translate to GvG, but I don't think it's a stretch to say that even the best RA player will be terrible if you throw him on any GvG team.

1)twitch rupting is not exactly a good way to rupt. prediction combined with twitch rupting (or no twitch rupting at all, but pure prediction once you have a proper feel for it) is the key to a good interrupter.
2) "kill the monk" doesnt work in lower end arenas either - or better, it only works vs horrible monks. and yet the majority of RA is convinced its the n1 priority in most cases.
3) if you're referring to TA here, you're very wrong. Positioning mattered, just as did smoothless coordination and communication between team mates.
RA, however, indeed has very little of that. You can still position yourself in a way that will make the melees or shutdown have to overextend to get to you, but given you play with nabs most of the time, it won't really achieve much.

Quote:

(partially due to, I'll admit, a lack of interest in improving from most players). The game has stagnated. New players don't have the tools to better themselves (because all casual arenas available to them are insufficient to learn the game well), and old players don't feel like gambling on the 1% chance that this newbie will be willing to listen and learn.

we finally agree on something.

One of the reasons why new players have a harder time then ever is also that pve has become a LOT easier ever since heroes and consets came into play. Moreover, the game has been so severely dumbed down over the years, that they don't have the conditions that would let them learn that which older players could.

I am getting this feeling that you want GW to be more individual focused, but that just isnt and never was the case. There's only as much you can learn on your own. Sooner or later you have to look around you, observe and learn from others, in one way or the other.

Moreover, why you shouldn't be too optimistic about 5v5 (if you had TAed at a high level, you'd have understood why it won't be as easy to advance in either, once an exped player base is formed):

Quote:

Originally Posted by Reverend Dr

This is something that people seem to either be forgetting, overlooking, or just not thinking about.

People think that smaller teams means it would be easier to get in and while its easier to get the appropriate number of warm bodies, each player has to pull [roughly] 1/5 of the team instead of 1/8, so an inexperienced player is more of a liability. I would expect PuG groups to become far more selective far faster in a 5 man team environment than they did in the current 8 man.

floor · May 20, 2011, 10:03 AM // 10:03

For a long time now, your actual player skill has only been a very limiting factor in getting into good teams. If you are exceptionally bad then ofc ppl dont want to play with you, but provided ur somewhat decent, the only requirement needed is this:

"have friends in high places"

For more or less as long as i can remember, gvg has been more about who you know than what you know, the number of truly terrible people in top 100 is frightening, and its simply for the above reason. If you are social and fun to play with, you will get into teams based on that alone.

urania · May 20, 2011, 10:27 AM // 10:27

same applies for HA too.

Skyy High · May 20, 2011, 03:12 PM // 15:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by urania

unlike sc and chess, GW is a TEAM game, where interaction with other players is at the core of almost every format - it is only natural learning from other players is part of the game experience. You must learn how to coordinate your play with your team mates' play, and there's only as much you can learn on your own.

Why do you think I threw in CS:S in my list of examples? It's probably the closest match in terms of what we'll get in GW2 PvP (5v5 with random players, hot joinable matches, same format and maps as the organized clan matches).

Don't have time for the rest, but it doesn't look like there's much left to say. Oh, except this: HA didn't use to be such a s***hole. Remember when well-known guilds held Halls for hours at a time? It was actually a pretty decent tournament structure. That changed when the population started declining and the gimmicky faction farming builds showed up, but gimmicky farming builds are only used there because of how rank works (you can never lose it, unlike rating).

*lemming* · May 22, 2011, 11:37 AM // 11:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by Skyy High

Why do you think I threw in CS:S in my list of examples? It's probably the closest match in terms of what we'll get in GW2 PvP (5v5 with random players, hot joinable matches, same format and maps as the organized clan matches).

I'm not going to claim any degree of knowledge about competitive team FPSes. However, I'd speculate that the difference between an organized CS team and an unorganized team of players of the same skill level is far less than it would be in a game that is more dependent on synergistic interactions like GW. I'd think that DotA games are better comparisons to GW2 PvP - competitive game, 5 mostly self-sufficient characters, team synergy and coordination paramount to success. As is well-documented, trying to get better the game by solo queueing in one of those is about as painful as headbutting a knife.

Also, I think you're conflating the ability to learn basic rules and mechanics with the ability to synthesize accumulated knowledge about the game in order to learn how to understand and play it. It's not hard to learn what the units in Brood War do, but how long does it take to get good at it?

I guess this final point is a little irrelevant in light of the direction this discussion has gone in, but every competitive game is going to demand the same attitude and work ethic that GW is. Perhaps getting into and getting better at GW PvP is more frustrating because there's less metrics by which to measure your progression, but it's still far easier to get to a high level of play quickly compared to other competitive games.

Vincent Evan · May 23, 2011, 02:49 AM // 02:49

Why would you compare a game like CS, regardless if it promotes teamplay, with a game like Guild Wars in the first place? Any "fact" claimed off that is irrelevant, that holds as much truth as some child saying their parents work for ArenaNet.

Codex Arena never had a chance. With Guild Wars being in the sad state of PvP it was in, and with a major lack of players, nothing good could have came out of there.

Missing HB · May 23, 2011, 07:10 AM // 07:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vincent Evan

Codex Arena never had a chance. With Guild Wars being in the sad state of PvP it was in, and with a major lack of players, nothing good could have came out of there.

But that's mainly part of their lazyness though... The way they promoted Codex looked like it would be something great , better than costume brawl... and it ended to be TA with restricted skills that's all....

It never had a chance but they never gave a chance to it though....

UnicornStampede · May 30, 2011, 08:16 PM // 20:16

you can say whatever you want about Hero Battles, that is was imbalanced/etc, however the main difference between Hero Battles and Codex is you could actually play Hero Battles! It had its own tournaments, it had its mat, it had its own playerbase, unlike codex which had no of those. So I still don't understand the logic or argument with the Codex apologists, because you could actually play Hero Battles.

So what Anet needs to do is do something similair to what they did to Jade Quarry to make people actually play it, or bring back Hero Battles, because people actually played and wanted to play it. And people who say Hero Battles wasn't fun, weren't part of the main hero battle community.Which is why when they took out hero battles, GW lost a lot of players.

Tryndamere · May 31, 2011, 12:39 AM // 00:39

Codex Arenas is Hero Battle's bastard child in that it too welcome(d/s) abuse. Rigged 4v4 says "Hi!". Also, OP'd skills can be abused badly there as well, and what's worse is there're less skills available to counter them in Codex.

Team Arenas had more activity in its last days than Codex had in it's first days.

Missing HB · May 31, 2011, 06:28 AM // 06:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by UnicornStampede

So what Anet needs to do is do something similair to what they did to Jade Quarry to make people actually play it, or bring back Hero Battles, because people actually played and wanted to play it. And people who say Hero Battles wasn't fun, weren't part of the main hero battle community.Which is why when they took out hero battles, GW lost a lot of players.

Codex isn't even fun to play on the only playable day , which is zquest.... I did a few fights , the only thing i faced was guild teams ( mostly top GvG'ers) , so what's the point fighting organized team with vent and etc when most players are just going to get a random build , 3 random players and go in ?? I actually wouldn't mind if there were 2-3 guillds upon 100 teams , but it was more like 10 guilds upon 12 teams.....

Moreover , those players are really entertaining new players : almost everytime we won , it was " gg noobs " , " go pve " , " nice abusing pool skills , cya in 8 hours "

Considering that threads about HB/TA are instantly closed for no reason and that we get 0 answer from ANet , i guess that the code is probably just deleted and they're too lazy to do it again.... My conclusion would really be though to make codex arena be random and turn RA into TA... that's the best way to do...

urania · May 31, 2011, 08:50 AM // 08:50

CA rocks when the deck is good.
On a side note, organised guild teams or friend groups normally steam rolled pug teams in TA too. Same goes for GvG. And HA.
Damn those organised formats.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tryndamere

Team Arenas had more activity in its last days than Codex had in it's first days.

orly.

UnicornStampede · Jun 01, 2011, 04:55 AM // 04:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by urania

CA rocks when the deck is good.

It's completely dead in American hours regardless of the deck. Idk about euro hours.

Missing HB · Jun 01, 2011, 07:22 AM // 07:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by urania

On a side note, organised guild teams or friend groups normally steam rolled pug teams in TA too. Same goes for GvG. And HA.
Damn those organised formats.

Yet the argument was that on this format the only fights you ever get are against top guilds on zquest day .... Farming noobs or Syncing arena so.... Great job they did...