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

[boko]

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

Just because Anet changed the direction of the product doesn't mean the quality reduced. So much in the game improved since release.

Many things changed. But the game "improved" for the worse unfortunately. The way PuGs have died out compared to when GW proph or even Factions were released, tells us about how great GW is as an multiplayer Coop game...and apparently Anet agrees too, since they are going to remove Heroes in GW2...

So, maybe it's true that many things change, but the fact that Anet decided to add stuffs which goes against their original policies (Grind) means that the game switched direction and went for the cheap way. + Dumbing down of a game is never good for a game.

Have you heard anyone who was playing GW proph during its glory days tell you that they could c+space through the whole game?

Which do you think is a better game? a game where you play and have to actually be active and follow orders and work as a team? or would you prefer a game where you can basically click c+space and read a book while waiting for the mission to end?

As for pvp, too many exploits and abuse already, and I don't really want to get into it...

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

The bug ratio of this game is low if you look at the bigger picture. QA at Anet is very good. Sure they make mistakes, like the XTH last months. Even Blizzard needs to fix bugs and stuff. It's part of the complex process. You sound like they're a couple of guys hosting some servers in a garage that have all the time in the world and spam new content and what not with the blink of an eye. It costs time and money. Time is limited and money comes from NCSoft who sponsors the project with the intention to get big sales afterwards from the consumer.

But it's true though, Anet did a marvelous job creating GW. It's just too bad they did not manage to keep the consistency. But hopefully, they'll get it right with GW2...

[qvtkc]

Originally Posted by Improvavel

I will have to look at the kind of gameplay of Mass Effect, but neither Baldurs Gate nor KotOR were great examples of incredible skillful gameplay or balance, with melee chars owning both games.

Whatever is this supposed to mean?

1) Baldur's Gate party with various missile weapons tear through the entire game very easily without having to go in melee.

2) Melee characters being dominant doesn't say anything directly about balance, but does hint that whatever game you are playing is balanced.

[Bryant Again]

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

Just no, time is always against devs. Time is money in the business, everybody knows that.

Just because Anet changed the direction of the product doesn't mean the quality reduced. So much in the game improved since release.

Uh, appealing to certain types of players as opposed to several types is indeed a degradation of quality. This is pretty much going exactly off of what Boko said: the changes were not for the better.

Originally Posted by qvtkc

2) Melee characters being dominant doesn't say anything directly about balance, but does hint that whatever game you are playing is balanced.

I can't say I didn't see a terrible amount of imbalance in BG2, but I can say that sorc soloing was pretty damn funny (in the worst sense possible, though).

[boko]

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

In the glory days I could farm UW dry on my own using protective bond by just moving around, didn't even need to c-space. They added nightmares afterwards. Farming was way easier. You just had to be on top of things before the masses knew about it.

Your telling me that your you could just solo all mission with ps?

Please we all know that these are just cheap exploits that were use for farming. Similarly, look at both sides, the same situation still exists, and did not really changed. Similarly, I can say that "I could farm UW dry on my own using PermaSin by just moving around, didn't even need to c-space". But could you c+space back then? Did you ever did THK at that time with a hench team at that time?

Don't try to hide the truth... what I am saying are facts...

Edit :
About Pvp, erm no. Most of the matches were played using 8 man team without bots.... and there were much less exploits to abuse. The game was more about skills instead of present-build wars...but that's mostly my opinion... I might be wrong, maybe it got better since i quit...i seriously dun't follow gw pvp anymore since i'm more busy with other stuffs IRL...

And yes, I want the same thing as you too. So, let's hope for the best!

[boko]

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

I said UW, not all missions and yes THK was hard, but that's because we got better at the game now. Put a pug of first timers there without help or wiki and they get wiped don't worry.

And how did that change from now? Take the same situation now and you will get the same result... why? because the player is bad... nothing to do with the game itself. You are talking about player skill...

What I am telling you is that before it was insanely hard to do THK with hench, and now it is a piece of cake where I can basically sit around and do nothing... Now that is so wrong... a challenge reduced to nothing...

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

At one point almost everything becomes c-space. I remember I could tag along with a german team for a fow clear. Pugs failed terribly most of the time, but those guys just steamrolled the place without heroes or cons or whatever back then. The shame was I had to pug most of the time. It was a real refreshment I could join a good team once in a while.

Again you are quoting player skill. A good team will always be good. Btw, while you were c+spacing, I don't think that the German team was c+spacing because if they did , they would be what you were referring to as a bad pug... and you would all be dead from the start...

While you were slacking off and missing out on the fun, I can assure you that they ,on the other hand, were having hell of a good time playing the game...

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

Heroes make it possible to create your own efficient team now, which is a plus. Don't talk to me about about pugs pls, they suck and are annoying most of the time (not always) and if you want to play that way so be it. Btw, the playerbase agrees as they changed from pug to heroes overnight when Nightfall got released.

Yes. I was overjoyed too when I heard about heroes but I was naive at that time. Reality is harsher than you think...

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

The facts are Anet changed direction and the truth behind it is something I want to hear from Anet themselves.

That is a truth that I want to hear too, but which I am afraid is closer to what I think it is...and knowing ANET, we will never know, at least until GW2 is out...

[boko]

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

Hey I helped keeping their german asses alive and learned a lot that night It was fun.

I know! With good PuGs, it's really fun usually
That's why I probably miss them so much

[snaek]

im a little bit late on the time spent on games discussion, but i think theres a difference between time spent playing a game because its required, and time spent playing a game because you want to.

gw requires what? 1000+ hours to get max koabd? and so people will spend that much time getting it. mega man nes series (1-6) requires maybe 100 hours or less to beat it. however, i will tell you that i have probably spent just as many hours on mega man as i have in gw (pve...i won't count pvp).

i think a more deciding factor is not how many hours will a game require to beat, but how many hours will you spend still playing it after you have beaten it (aka re-playability). i think "arcade classics" and "console classics" have proven the test of time.


regarding pugs:
i really don't like this attitude that pugs suck and therefore will use heroes instead. the community is dying because we refuse to play together. if no one is playing together and sharing knowledge, the community as a whole grows less. one of the only thing thats keeping the community alive right now in terms of skill level is wiki, and to a degree fan forums.

[the_jos]

Originally Posted by Fril Estelin

To be slightly provocative (don't take it personally, this applies to all long posters here): just imagine we don't write walls of text here, but instead focus on writing guides. Similar amount of time and efforts for us, but spent towards "guiding" instead of simply "discussing". It benefits the community, and this comes back at us because we're going to meet, play with or against "better" players.

I won't and can't, for the simple reason that most of my posts on GWG are from my work during luchtime. Or, like now, at the end of the day while finishing up some last bits of work before going home.
Before I am posting I'm constantly reverting and editing things I said (I've changed this part at least 5 times so far), when making a guide it's even more editing and rewriting. And for several guides I would need a working GW client to check some things.

Besides that, there are numerous 'starter' guides both here on GWG as on wiki. Starting isn't the real problem. It's people that for some reason get 'stuck' in their gaming development and can't move past that point.
On that level we are talking about more depth of understanding a certain profession's strengths and weaknesses and controling the environment (positioning, aggro control, certain game mechanics).
Past that level there is another hurdle (still talking PvE), mainly dealing with team builds and synergy.

That's what I mean when I speak about details.
Positioning is relative to the environment and the strengths and weaknesses of professions depend on the used attributes and the foes that are faced.
It's not something easily explained explained.

But, these are mainly the things when people start to talk about good and bad players. They (even I) judge people on builds at first and the position on the field after entry of the environment. When talking about good team-leaders it's about how well they can get a working team together.
And I'm easy, when someone pings an odd build I just ask them to explain why it works.

Off-topic, I'm still working on my switch but can't play much at the moment because I somewhat hurt some muscles in my shoulder which causes pain after about 30 mins of typing/playing. But I've noticed several other players are having the same kind of problem so I might just chat with some people and/or bring them together.
Because learning together is more fun than learning alone

[zwei2stein]

Originally Posted by the_jos

Besides that, there are numerous 'starter' guides both here on GWG as on wiki. Starting isn't the real problem. It's people that for some reason get 'stuck' in their gaming development and can't move past that point.
On that level we are talking about more depth of understanding a certain profession's strengths and weaknesses and controling the environment (positioning, aggro control, certain game mechanics).
Past that level there is another hurdle (still talking PvE), mainly dealing with team builds and synergy.

I claim that:

* You can give player enough info to start way way past that point where people get stuck.
* Intimate class understanding is easily summarizable. And easily understandable. All you need to do is to get rid of carebear attitudes (aka, "everything works", which is for masters).
* And so is strategy and team interaction.

Because few, important, observations completelly change how game is understood and played.

It may take years to gather this info, but it can take hours to absorb it, understand it and act on it.

Picture slighly related: Most guides start with "master" philosophy, while, in fact, they should start with apprentice philosophy. This is why players get stuck, because attempt is made to teach them backwards. Which just leads to lots of problems.

[Fril Estelin]

I knew you were an agile dev zwei2stein!

[DreamWind]

Originally Posted by Fril Estelin

I made the mistake to put in the title (and the OP, which many people didn't read carefully I guess) keywords that triggered common prejudices and misinterpretations. Players suck? Player skill? Teaching? And then there's been a deluge of off-topic (which, of course, were claimed to be on-topic because I'm the one who doesn't understand what I'm talking about) which goes back to the old topics debatted at length on Guru.

I still say the thread is on topic. You had to expect that the conversation would evolve to every aspect of the discussion rather than just stay on your small fixed topic.

Originally Posted by Fril Estelin

And this is another part of the OP people missed: how do we create an inclusive community which "cares" about players, however good, bad, young, stupid, illiterate they are? A few of you here claim to have become good and even spread that around by helping newbies. Good, but my point is to move that to the next level, write a guide that will help a lot of people, make a tutorial on this aspect of the game where you're best at, gather online resources in a centralised and helpful way.

You can't create this community. At least I don't believe you can. In life there is just a seperation between the "bad young stupid illiterate" and the "good experienced smart intelligent" and that extends over to Guild Wars. There is even a seperation between the rich and poor. The only way a person is going to escape being "bad young stupid illiterate" (or poor) is through wanting to get out of it themselves. A guide (that already exists IMO) is not going to teach them why being "good experienced smart intelligent" is good for them. In reality, most people who are "bad young stupid illiterate" either think they aren't that way or they realize they are and have fun with it which makes the idea even more impossible.

Maybe I am still missing your point. You talk about a community that "cares" about each other. I don't think you can create that community either. For starters most of the "bad young stupid illiterate" people in Guild Wars are mostly soloing with heroes pretending nobody exists now, so THEY don't care about each other either. The other problem is that the "good experienced smart intelligent" people tend to spend their time getting MORE "good experienced smart intelligent" because that is how they got "good experienced smart intelligent" to begin with. Spending time teaching or teaming with "bad young stupid illiterate" people just doesn't work in Guild Wars for so many reasons....mostly because in Guild Wars (like I have been saying all along) the rewards for being "good experienced smart intelligent" and teaching people to be so have dropped drastically over the years, and the consequences for being "bad young stupid illiterate" are almost nonexistent.

So you are a teacher (I think IRL?) so you probably disagree with me, but this is how I feel on the topic having played Guild Wars for several years and running into these situations constantly. I still don't know if I've answered you (because you keep saying I haven't), but I'm sure somebody has answered your question a long way back.

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

They intruduced titles to fill the gap between gw1 and the new flagship gw2. It shows Anet finds it important people keep playing and people want to keep playing, at the same time they say you can take a break and put the game aside and they didn't make it an endless grind fest. Just enough for the majority to keep them busy.

This is a common misconception. They didn't introduce titles to "give us something to do"....they could give a rats ass about us having something to do. They gave us titles and HoM so we would have another reason to buy Guild Wars 2 in case we didn't have one yet. Essentially, they degraded their entire Guild Wars 1 philosophy to sell Guild Wars 2 if you want me to put it bluntly.

Originally Posted by Risky Ranger

In baseball a good player(hitter) fails 70% of the time.

Pretend it is all underhand wiffle ball pitches (like GW PvE basically is nowadays). You still suck. You won't be any good until you can hit fastballs (PvP) at 30%. The problem is so many people are either afraid to miss that 70% or don't want to step up to the plate at all. Ok my analogy went away from its original meaning but I thought this was good too lol. I just thought that one guys post about "if you are having fun you are playing the game right" was a stupid comment.

Originally Posted by Fril Estelin

Well, maybe the playerbase could change itself. This was the (unachieved) purpose of this thread, which obviously met the wall named "why would I change? I've got my own fun, to each its own".

Of course people are going to say that. What else did you expect?

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

When prophecies was released we were all beginners. Now a lot of us are vets and know a lot about the game. I agree though that it failed as a coop game, but that's because the format is not popular enough to sustain itself imo, like others said in this topic. Otherwise they would not have changed direction.

I keep hearing this from people and I keep saying it is dumb. "The game failed as a coop game because it couldn't sustain itself so they changed direction because of that". WRONG....people who have been playing this game forever know that THEY CHANGED DIRECTION SO THE COOP OF THE GAME FAILED. You are looking at it backwards. The coop of this game in the beginning was a huge success, particularly the PvP which is basically something unique that hadn't ever been done in that way.

I also think the idea that "we all improved that is the reason THK is easy for us now" is also dumb. THK is easy for us now because we have overpowered crap to blow through it with our eyes closed. The only reason newbs wouldn't be able to blow through it is only because they don't know about or don't have the overpowered crap, not because they suck at the game. If anybody thinks the game is better today where we can heroway c-space our way through the entire game is better than the old days when we have to have a competent human team working together to beat a mission (which was also the greatness of PvP), well then I feel sorry for you. The game was so much better in every way back in the old days its not even close. Guild Wars today isn't shit compared to what it once was and I can't believe anybody thinks otherwise. The phenomenon has led to a suckier game and a suckier community who thinks the suckier game is actually better because it fits their sucky style of play. /endrant

[Bryant Again]

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

I still see tons of people online, but they don't count it seems from reading your comments in the other thread.

As stated numerous times, all of this - the general dumbing down of the game - is addressing issues that the majority player is not going to care about. At the surface, Guild Wars is a very fun game, and for them that's all that's going to matter.

[snaek]

Originally Posted by zwei2stein

Most guides start with "master" philosophy, while, in fact, they should start with apprentice philosophy. This is why players get stuck, because attempt is made to teach them backwards. Which just leads to lots of problems.

i disagree. i have come across very few guides that start on a "master level" as you say. in fact whenever i buy guides, it is purely for the art that is contained in them, not for the basic info that is found within them because it is too basic for me. in terms of gw specific, pvxwiki gives you exact builds and explains how to use them. how is this not "apprentice level"? it doesn't tell you to run anything you wan't.


btw, there is too much bickering in this thread. problems of gw have been presented in this thread for the purpose of trying to improve gw and its community. if you think gw and its community are already perfect and do not need any "improving", then there is no reason for you to argue in this thread (i won't name any names).

[Gigashadow]

If you want hardcore, I guess you'll just have to wait for Vin Diesel's MMO. Yes that's right, he's developing an MMO, and it's in Bellevue just like ArenaNet.

[Savio]

Originally Posted by snaek

i disagree. i have come across very few guides that start on a "master level" as you say. in fact whenever i buy guides, it is purely for the art that is contained in them, not for the basic info that is found within them because it is too basic for me. in terms of gw specific, pvxwiki gives you exact builds and explains how to use them. how is this not "apprentice level"? it doesn't tell you to run anything you wan't.

Most guides intend to tell you information, however they don't always take into account who their audience is, what information to convey, and how best to convey that information. Additionally, some types of information are near impossible to convey using a traditional guide. The wiki is a fairly poor guide for builds.

[snaek]

well its more a "database" than a "guide". so if you don't know what or where to look, it can be confusing and therefore considered a poor guide (since technically it isn't one at all). but the content there is very valid imo and so if you do know what your looking for and where to find it, then it will be an invaluable resource. it does not really go beyond "breaking" or "ignoring" the rules as per zwei2stein stated in "master level".

the same can be said about the wiki. it is meant to be more of an encyclopedia/database of information--not a guide. if you do not know how to use a wiki, then yes a wiki about gw will be less useful to you. are kids not taught how to use encyclopedia's or how to research books in schools these days?

i guess people want/expect more of a step-by-step walkthrough guide format?

perhaps its not that they're teaching a "master level" process as zwei2stein said, but that the material is presented in a wiki writing format vs a guide writing format? so you may be right, savio, that they are fairly poor guides... but certainly not because they present "master level" content.

[Master Fuhon]

Originally Posted by zwei2stein

I claim that:

* You can give player enough info to start way way past that point where people get stuck.
* Intimate class understanding is easily summarizable. And easily understandable. All you need to do is to get rid of carebear attitudes (aka, "everything works", which is for masters).
* And so is strategy and team interaction.

Because few, important, observations completelly change how game is understood and played.

It may take years to gather this info, but it can take hours to absorb it, understand it and act on it.

Picture slighly related: Most guides start with "master" philosophy, while, in fact, they should start with apprentice philosophy. This is why players get stuck, because attempt is made to teach them backwards. Which just leads to lots of problems.

Not relinking for size reasons, but that chart is very valuable. As mastery increases, things come easier and more naturally. Fundamentally, you don't start being yourself until you have reshaped yourself into being a master.

I don't know if guides actually do this; I think players designate themselves as masters shortly after buying the guides, and proceed to operate in this manner. They assume the simple act of finding the information (like from a guide or wiki) propels them into a higher level of mastery at which they can skip the apprentice/journeyman steps. This encompasses a little of what snaek was saying.

In other words, they might think that mastery is directly transmissible from another master, instead of something that must be developed from within. It's like with learning, typically people assume they are smart because they can work from previously given equations. Smart people were the ones who first derived them. Just like players think they are skilled, when all they have done is work from the knowledge base someone else has provided for them.

[DreamWind]

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

I still see tons of people online, but they don't count it seems from reading your comments in the other thread.

You see tons of people online? Hmm interesting. Tell you what...I'll give you a list of 50 outposts and get back to me when you find a team in any of them.

Originally Posted by Gun Pierson

Do you still play and if not what game(s) are you playing instead? Cause it must be irritating for you to be confronted with GW on a daily basis.

I play many other games. I am just one of many people who post here but don't play the game seriously anymore...I quit for the very reasons I have discussed in this thread.

[Fril Estelin]

You know what, I'm giving up on this idea, completely. It's going to make my life much easier. I'll ask mods to close it, which may or may not happen based on what they think.

Ty in particular to Master Fuhon and the_jos (also zwei2stein).

[the_jos]

Originally Posted by zwei2stein

I claim that:

* You can give player enough info to start way way past that point where people get stuck.
* Intimate class understanding is easily summarizable. And easily understandable. All you need to do is to get rid of carebear attitudes (aka, "everything works", which is for masters).
* And so is strategy and team interaction.

Because few, important, observations completelly change how game is understood and played.

<skip some text and chart>

Agree.

The way I learned GvG back ages ago was learning to play one build till complete understanding. Here you have a build, no complaints, just play it.
Learn to feel it, play on instinct. Next we adjust one skill, again learn to feel the build.
It works in PvP because it's a demanding area. In PvE, I'm not sure.

It's not because of the 'everything works' way, more because of the diversity of players. In PvP, I assume every player now has a PvP character. If not, delete one of your precious PvE characters and make a PvP one.
If you don't have all skills for the build you can play some RA/AB/JQ till you have them, no Zkeys till them.
I had several guildies who were able to play one or two builds when they joined (high end PvE guild). First demand for them was to get some additional skills so they could run a greater variation of builds. And builds that were more generic than their own builds.

But again, that demand was there because those guildies knew they were joining a high end guild.
Those demands would not have been there in a regular guild.


@Fril,

Too bad you are giving up.
On the other hand, I think it's not something that people should do alone.
I won't mind writing some stuff, I can hardly play at the moment but can still type (or write stuff down and type later).
But I don't know where most players get stuck nowadays, so I have no clue to start.