Curse

Weezer_Blue · Jun 22, 2005, 11:54 AM // 11:54

Can we at least narrow it down? If you bought Guild Wars thinking

-It is a casual game
-It has a lot of great PvE content
-You can jump right into the PvP
-There is lots of PvP content
-Anything it says on the box
-Anything in any of the GW reviews/interviews

and only those things, then don't buy the game. you won't like it.

Racthoh · Jun 22, 2005, 12:34 PM // 12:34

All my friends were telling me "If you loved Diablo II you'll love this game". Ugh, were they wrong.

300+ hours is nothing. That would be good for a console game not a MMORPG. Hell in Diablo II I must've spent thousands of hours playing that game. That was just single player...

They should put right on the box - Max level is 20. I know I wouldn't have boughten this game if I knew that. Finding that out after mousing over my level almost made me cry considering I got level 20 so quickly. Then finding out how weak weapons are, but how freaking expensive armor is. How casual is earning 15k, plus the materials for ONE piece of equipment when monsters drop 100 gold if you're lucky they even drop gold? Game about skill not endless hours my ass when it comes to getting equipment. Raise the level cap already so there is something to do when you're earning all that money for that armour. If the monsters can be level 20+ then why can't I? I wanted a game that required skill, but not fighting enemies one at a time and having to pray that I live.

Oh and for a game with the graphics and capabilities of today... make the freaking NPC's lips move during cutscenes. I'm sorry but that is just absolutely pathetic.

One of the main things that turned me off was getting to the HoH and getting a Rare Gladius instead of a sigil. In the time it took me, including fighting and waiting around for parties, I could've just earned the 60k to buy the damn thing. I never felt like I had wasted more of my time then when that sword popped out of the chest.

PvP would be fun if monks didn't exist. They ruin it entirely, and it's no fun waiting for them to join your group. I'd just do it with henchmen but for some reason I can only bring in the original 4.

Celes Tial · Jun 22, 2005, 12:41 PM // 12:41

Quote:

Originally Posted by Weezer_Blue

Can we at least narrow it down? If you bought Guild Wars thinking

-It is a casual game
-It has a lot of great PvE content
-You can jump right into the PvP
-There is lots of PvP content
-Anything it says on the box
-Anything in any of the GW reviews/interviews

and only those things, then don't buy the game. you won't like it.

Dont listen to Weezer, he's one of those trolls with too much time at their hands who need an outlet for their frustration by jumping around, growling and shaking fists. Look at his posts of the past month or so and you'll agree.

FACT IS: Even good games dont cater to everyone. Some find it fits their playing style, while others dont. You only find out by trying it yourself.

Now, my opinion in response to Weezer:

-GW IS casual gamer friendly. You can play 4 hours a week without any problems whatsoever. BUT: As with any competitive game, dont expect to be at the top of the ladder if you only have a little bit of time to play. A casual gamer would not win any FPS tournaments either.

-GW has great PvE content, but there isnt a lot of it. Agreed with Weezer here. If you are not interested in PvP at all, this probably isnt for you in the long run - but you might still enjoy yourself for a good 50-100 hours.

-You CAN jump right into the PvP, but again, if you are a casual gamer without much time to hone your skills, you will not be one of the best. However, most others in the 4v4 arenas arent great either, so you can have some success from start.

-Weezer is right, there is not a lot of PvP content as in different maps, different game options, etc. However, with the tactical depth of skill combinations, there is still plenty to keep you entertained for a good long time if you dont mind joining a good guild. Without a good guild, you'll have trouble finding even semi-competent groups.

-I dont remember what the box said, so no idea. I read up on the game on websites before buying it, and it was even better than I had expected.

-Most of the reviews sound accurate to me. Some seem a bit off on a couple points, but with so many reviewers, that can hardly be avoided.

Dahl · Jun 22, 2005, 12:43 PM // 12:43

Guild wars only just got out of beta, you know. Maybe if you'd stop flaming, and be more patient, you'd know that they're constantly adding more content, they have updates for download almost every day. And as for monks, if you're talking about people who run, then you should be prepared for that and bring skills along. Sprint + Hamstring makes all the difference in pvp. Simple way to kill a monk - Sprint, Hamstring, Sever, Gash, Final Thrust. Then you can take out the others easily.

Celes Tial · Jun 22, 2005, 12:51 PM // 12:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dahl

Sprint + Hamstring makes all the difference in pvp. Simple way to kill a monk - Sprint, Hamstring, Sever, Gash, Final Thrust. Then you can take out the others easily.

It would not work to kill my monk

Some monks who are a bit better organized / prepared require strategy to be taken down. But there's ways to counter everything, you just need to figure it out.

Asplode · Jun 22, 2005, 12:54 PM // 12:54

I think he's talking about waiting to get 3 monks on your team, rather than fighting monks in pvp

Shadow_Avenger · Jun 22, 2005, 01:04 PM // 13:04

Quote:

Guild wars only just got out of beta,

That doesn't mean Jack. There is far too much competition these days, consoles, pc games. If you release a duff game, it doesn't matter because nobody will buy it, even if you patch it and make it the best game ever. If its slated at the start it will die a death.
Point is once a Game is released it is open season, in beta you have excuses, its not finished.
Fortunately for GW it actually is a fairly competent game and did get good reviews pretty much across the board.
The general feeling though is the game is great, but for an Online only game its lastability is poor.

Myself, I like GW, it is not the best game I have played, but it is good. Its a game that on playing for 2 weeks I'd give it 9/10, but after playing for 1 1/2 months I'd give it 7.5/10.

..shade!! · Jun 22, 2005, 01:15 PM // 13:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dahl

Guild wars only just got out of beta, you know. Maybe if you'd stop flaming, and be more patient, you'd know that they're constantly adding more content, they have updates for download almost every day. And as for monks, if you're talking about people who run, then you should be prepared for that and bring skills along. Sprint + Hamstring makes all the difference in pvp. Simple way to kill a monk - Sprint, Hamstring, Sever, Gash, Final Thrust. Then you can take out the others easily.

"ok" u play 4v4 pvp and u are happy with your newb warrior... now go at tombs and look how work the REAL pvp.

And how much should i wait for a real improvement of the game? and if none says his opinion how can Anet know the problem that the game has?

I spent more than 600 hours with this game (2 character lvl 20 + many hours in pvp) and i'm bored coz it's impossible to play pvp with random group, coz it's hard to find them (like 20 minutes to form a group) and they are always owned by guilds (coz of better organization).
This game is called GUILD WARS, not GUILD AGAINST RANDOM TEAMS WARS.
Anyway we aren't here to whine about this game, but we are helping Anet to rend this game interesting.
Here are 5 pages of guys that don't like the game and are bored.

I think it's obvious that if i don't like this game i will NEVER buy the expansion, and in this thread there are many guys that don't like this game.
How to improve? Realize a random team competitive ladder 8v8 with fame, and place that in tomb or wherever u want (this is my opinion).
NO MORE GUILD AGAINST RTeam plz !!!

Averon · Jun 22, 2005, 01:16 PM // 13:16

I thoroughly enjoyed the game the first time through. I'm a bit of a packrat, so the incredible lack of storage space forced me to buy a second account to use as a mule. Worked out ok, since my wife uses it to play.

After completing every mission and quest, sans UW/FoW, and getting my 60k armor, I spent most of my time farming. To me, this was just as much fun than the whole levelling up process. I enjoy doing things that progress my char, either by collecting items/money or gaining xp/skills. I had fun killing a group of mobs at a time, solo.

After farming was whittled away, I got bored very fast, so I decided I wanted to try every class. Hmm, only 4 chars per account. Guess I need a third account. So, I made one of every class and got them into the teens. Got three of them past ascension. All of them have the 1.5k armor.

While it's amusing at best to try different builds, the most fun I had was farming. It's nice to get loot solo or kill a group of higher level mobs solo. Everyone in my guild quit long before I started getting bored, and I have no interest in joining another guild.

So, for me, I will quit playing altogether and have no plans to buy any expansions. While the original game was fun at first, an expansion will not be. It will simply be new quests and new areas that will not progress a char in any significant way worth the effort. In fact I would dissuade anyone from buying the game if they should ask my opinion.

Everyone seems to associate grinding with farming. Sorry, but they are not the same. It surprises me that ANet doesnt see the difference as well.

Grinding is a repetitive, monotonous action that you would rather not be doing. Killing thousands of mobs to attain max level is grinding. Destroying an entire zone looking for a boss mob to capture an elite is grinding. Dragging your feet through numerous linear missions for the third time in order to progress and get the next map teleport is grinding.

Farming is all about the excitement of what items may drop, possibly rares or uniques or runes. Money is nice but not really all that useful beyond buying the 60k armor. It's just plain fun to kill a big group of mobs of equal level by yourself and then gather up all the booty.

Summary: No one likes grinding, but quite a few people like farming. Who cares if there are bots or chinese sweat shops filled with people who play 18 hours a day to feed an ebay auction? The game is entirely instanced, and even the greatest advantages in armor, runes, weapons and skills dont equate to much in pvp. Either you're a good player or you're not. Bring back the farming and the fun, or the players you lose will not be returning for the expansions.

LoneDust · Jun 22, 2005, 01:22 PM // 13:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dahl

Guild wars only just got out of beta, you know. Maybe if you'd stop flaming, and be more patient, you'd know that they're constantly adding more content, they have updates for download almost every day.

GW has been in retail for almost two months, it's hardly "just out of beta". If the game is still in beta, I too would be patient to see how they fix numerous mechanical/social problems in the game. However, paying customers deserve a product that is much better than the state of the game is in at this moment. Players being bored of the game can be caused by different reasons (broken promise, grind, bugs, exploits, griefing players, messed up economy, etc). It is a symptom of a bad mmo system, and it needs to be recognized by the developers.

Miyamoto Tzu · Jun 22, 2005, 02:05 PM // 14:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by Averon

After farming was whittled away, I got bored very fast, so I decided I wanted to try every class.

While it's amusing at best to try different builds, the most fun I had was farming. It's nice to get loot solo or kill a group of higher level mobs solo. Everyone in my guild quit long before I started getting bored, and I have no interest in joining another guild.

Everyone seems to associate grinding with farming. Sorry, but they are not the same. It surprises me that ANet doesnt see the difference as well.

Grinding is a repetitive, monotonous action that you would rather not be doing. Killing thousands of mobs to attain max level is grinding. Destroying an entire zone looking for a boss mob to capture an elite is grinding. Dragging your feet through numerous linear missions for the third time in order to progress and get the next map teleport is grinding.

Farming is all about the excitement of what items may drop, possibly rares or uniques or runes. Money is nice but not really all that useful beyond buying the 60k armor. It's just plain fun to kill a big group of mobs of equal level by yourself and then gather up all the booty.

Summary: No one likes grinding, but quite a few people like farming. Who cares if there are bots or chinese sweat shops filled with people who play 18 hours a day to feed an ebay auction? The game is entirely instanced, and even the greatest advantages in armor, runes, weapons and skills dont equate to much in pvp. Either you're a good player or you're not. Bring back the farming and the fun, or the players you lose will not be returning for the expansions.

You make some awesome points here Averon...I feel very similar about the whole Farming issue.

To me, Farming = replayability. Taking it away to equalize a poorly implemented PvP system makes little sense...it just means people will stop playing all the way around.

Farming in a system that supports it is fun, challenging and profitable and IT SHOULD BE!!

Your distinction between Grinding and Farming is dead on target.

I could care less if sweat shop owners are making tons of RL dollars on virtual nothingness. It just goes to show you how incredibly stupid some people are to have to BUY in game resources with RL cash...you will never catch me spending real money on a bunch of ones and zeros for my character to use in a friggin game.

Why should everyones in game experience be impacted so severely by these retards?

Laters,

Tzu

silvertemplar · Jun 22, 2005, 03:08 PM // 15:08

Quote:

-GW IS casual gamer friendly. You can play 4 hours a week without any problems whatsoever. BUT: As with any competitive game, dont expect to be at the top of the ladder if you only have a little bit of time to play. A casual gamer would not win any FPS tournaments either.

This is my main beef with this game at this stage. It is NOT imho "casual gamer" friendly. I have found i can NOT log on for only an hour and expect to be further in the game [only pre-sear]. This in PvE terms. I believe the "uncasual-ness" of PvP has been highlighted, so ill just go into the PvE part.

1. Missions are too long with alot of dependencies and penalties. With henchmen an hour is generally not enough, with players you tend to redo the mission over and over. This in fact has the OPPOSITE effect in making the games life SHORTER! Why? You WILL rush through these missions, and ANYTHING slowing you down will piss you off.

If they want to include the casual gamer in this, then these missions must be OPTIONAL and not be on the main storyline path. Let players take the time to read stuff, talk to NPCs, find out info, don't put them in a position where they are forced to rush to the next waypoint "or else". Result of this is the INEVITABLE storming through the PvE part so you can get in a position of "CASUALLY" playing...and then you realise there is nothing left to be casual about!!.

EDIT : by "too long" i mean too-long-without-waypoints or opportunity to explore/interact. In fact it is SO LONG without-waypoints that i blame the -anti-social behaviour of players in these missions solely on that. The whole player attitude during missions are "just-get-this-the-hell-over-with-i'm-not-here-to-chat"-attitude...anyone wondered why?

Although as many have said, i do believe this game was my $50 worth. Ive played it almost as long as Gothic/Morrowind which i also paid $50 for.

But i must admit the moment i treat this game as pure single player then the motivation to repeat missions, get all the bonusses [by repeating missions!] and uncover areas [which have nothing more than cloned merchants 90% of the time] drops to 0. Hell even on my first character i wouldnt go through that, i would follow the story and finish the game and move on [like KOTOR, you just dont "Farm" on your characters in those games].

Lane · Jun 22, 2005, 03:32 PM // 15:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by Racthoh

PvP would be fun if monks didn't exist. They ruin it entirely, and it's no fun waiting for them to join your group. I'd just do it with henchmen but for some reason I can only bring in the original 4.

A Warrior/Necromancer saying he wishes that monks didn't exist... this game is not for you my friend... go play BF2.

Jab · Jun 22, 2005, 03:47 PM // 15:47

Randomize maps would go a long way to improving replay value, but then again it would make traveling between cities a living nightmare. Imagine how hard it would be going from piken square to the courthouse if the map randomizes each time .

shinseikaze · Jun 22, 2005, 04:05 PM // 16:05

yes I have also lost interest in the game, but playing and finishing the P v E first time was very enjoyable experience. Now I play casually for fissure/uw runs. Definately money well spent.

A net did a good job
Note: No Games Would Last You Forever Stop Complaining Either Wait For The Expansion/Next Big Update or Play Another Game (e.g GTA San Andreas,Battlefield 2)

Algren Cole · Jun 22, 2005, 04:07 PM // 16:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by shinseikaze

yes I have also lost interest in the game, but playing and finishing the P v E first time was very enjoyable experience. Now I play casually for fissure/uw runs. Definately money well spent.

A net did a good job
Note: No Games Would Last You Forever Stop Complaining Either Wait For The Expansion/Next Big Update or Play Another Game (e.g GTA San Andreas,Battlefield 2)

there are a multitude of games that will last you forever...one could conceivable play any multitude of FPS or Sports Games forever without losing interest...games that have an ending won't last forever...that's why they have an ending.

JjK · Jun 22, 2005, 04:57 PM // 16:57

When the mods of these forums feel the same way we do... That's a bad sign )_)

Feli · Jun 22, 2005, 06:12 PM // 18:12

If you are one of those persons that ignore a post just because it is long. Don't comment on this one if you did not read it. You don't need to read it in a whole. You don't need to read it at all... do as you please but if you skipped it in total - don't comment on it.

Introduction
Guildwars is a great Game and i had tons of fun with it. I loved the idea at first, to slowly learn the game as the game forces you to adapt towards teamplay, and on top of that i am a player who is heavily team-focused. Back when Natural Selection was fresh in the mod scene, there was some astonishing teamwork going on and it was... great fun. It came down to everyone... yet every single person had enough freedom to do things their way.
Commander said -> Take out Hive and hands you the weapon of choice, assigns a teammate to you and sends you towards the Hive. There you are, free way towards your target. You could just use the hallway but there might be that invisible fat Onos Thingie waiting for his tasty pray. What about the vents? They could work out, but things would get real scary if a roaming skulk found you there. And what about the way using the generator?

PVE
So here comes the second part. Why did i mention Natural Selection at all? Because if any game can be compared with Guildwars it is Natural Selection. It is based upon teamplay and working as a team. It has Skills (Technology) and a lot of tactics.
So what difference is there between Guildwars and Natural Selection other then the most obvious ones? It had one thing that Guildwars brutally lacks, and that was called freedom. Honestly, when did you get a mission you could do in more then one way? When did you actually get a choice in the mission?

For example:
Random NPC: "My Prince! The Charr come for this camp as we speak. We are doomed!"
Rurik: "We will make them pay dearly. Get your weapons, towards honor, towards battle!"

Player: "Wait my prince, we have a way of making sure no innocent people die today... There still is the old tunnel under the Sanitarium."
Rurik: "Those caves are doomed by insanity, many a two people lost their common sense and started saying things about trolls in forums. But we have little choice in this matter..."

The cutscene zooms towards the innocent people and the charr come for the Sanitarium. What now? You can fight them, you really can and have a chance at doing so or you could venture into the old tunnels. Right now as the game goes on, it forces you to do things the Storyway. Which would be: Escape the charr as a timer will kill all of you when it hits zero. Yeah, fun.

See, in Guildwars you simply do not have the choice. You have no choice at all. Most of the times you don't even have an alternative route to get to your target in a mission. It is just straight and plain simple -> Protect a on his way to b, go to c for bonus - Start next Mission.

This really bothered me the first time i was completing the game, but it seriously kicks ass the second time i play. The ass of my playing motivation. Where is the Freedom in Guildwars?

If you do not want to give us freedom in the storyline, at least give us alternative ways to reach a target with a total different approach. Let us things do our way instead of forcing us to do them your way.
___________________________________________

I did not expect endless fun when i bought the game. To be honest, i got my portion of fun. It was quite okay the first time you played through it.
What i am missing, besides some minor rewards for quests and missions are some places to actually discover. The temple of ages, boy i loved it! Not because of the Fissure of Woe Thingie... but because you did not get to it as part of the main Storyline.
I loved the Area Majestys Rest... why? Because of things you can see you did not see anywhere else and a minor challenge in there as well.

But... well.. where is more of that? Ok, Marhans Grotto, Granite Citadel but i was disappointed when i reached them. Fighting through waves and waves (speaking of slaying hundreds of dwarves and mursaat) i reached the granite Citadel. I expected something great, one damn large stylish citadel like the thing in wizards folly and was real disappointed when i saw that thing that waited there instead.
And when i headed for Marhans Grotto, i did with fun, i expected to find some kind of cave to venture into - just to find it being a small... very very small cave.

Well, and speaking of cave... one thing i surely did miss in this game are DUNGEONS! Come on, every fantasy game has them - for a reason. I went through the Crypts Pre Searing and was in love with them - so to speak. I went through there 3 or 4 times just for the fun of it. Something i did not do again for the whole times playing ever after. I was really disappointed to find the rest of the game taking place in wide open fields - yet limiting your movements as if you were stuck in a cave.
Nothing wrong about limited ways to go, but then don't torture me with free looks everywhere raising the wish to move freely - only to force me to move in small lains.
Well and the final thing, add some diversity into the late game areas.
In my opinion they really looked rushed. Ok... i gotta explain that one.
They were really good looking, but way to repeative. On Screenshots those will always look great, and so will they the first time you venture through them, but when you just hit the same thing a few seconds later... and another few seconds later you hit another one of those things it looks rushed.
Simply compare pre searing with post searing when it comes to diversity and creativity.

PVP
PVP. I looked forward towards the PVP Experience as it rocked during the Beta Weekends. Well that maybe was because no one had a huge advantage based on knowledge. But if you nowadays hit tombs there is no such thing as PVP... it is organized murder. Where actually is the fun in competing with the top notch guilds? Even if you get a great guild yourself - if they have not been in the beta weekends they simply lack knowledge. If they did not farm at the beginning of the game, they now have NO chance of reaching the level those Tombs/HOH Roamers have. So to have a battle which is fun, you'd have to have the knowledge outta the betas plus top notch equipment. Sad to say, even though items and runes aren't meant to make a large difference... they do.
There really... REALLY has to be some Division of the HOH into Skillranks. People who kept the HOH 91023 times, should just not be allowed (and forced) to slaughter of people who have never seen the HOH. I don't think this is fun for the losing party and neither for the winning party. It just is slaughter and over in a matter of seconds.

Compare it with your favorite FPS, if some guy comes in who is brutally more skilled then you, you have a different set of options depending on the game. If you play Counter-Strike you start to call him cheater, if you play any other game you stay to get slaughtered in a matter of seconds (a progress so fast you dun learn anything from) or ... just leave the person alone and pick another one of those large battles all over the world until you find your place that is challenging but do-able at the same time.
How is it going in Guildwars? You re-arrange your team and will ultimately hit the same uber player again with no choice of avoiding that, other then totally logging out.

Conclusion:
I'm not actually bored with this game, but frustrated about being limited in my freedom. On top of that i loved to farm, which was brutally nerfed. Well it is Arena.net and their game. Do with it as they please, but i will stop playing this game soon as right now - too much of a barrier for me.

Rieselle · Jun 22, 2005, 06:18 PM // 18:18

Although I really like RPGs too, the games I love are simple and short, yet complex and infinite. I'm talking about fighting games (Soul Calibur, DOA, KOF, VF,etc), and action games (like the classics of Golden Axe, the Capcom arcade D&D games, Devil May Cry 1&3, etc).
Also coop games like Gauntlet.
And skill (rather than story) based RPGs like Nethack - you start from the start of the game every time, but the dungeon is random, and your goal is to get as deep as possible. Only a super-rare combination of skill and luck will allow you to ever finish the game. And even when you do, you just make a different character and try again!

Although GW isn't bad (certainly better than WoW or EQ2 - such time-wasting grind!) I'd really like to see more elements from those games work its way into GW. Why? Because those games are timeless... even if you're bored with them, you can still pop back on for an hour or two after a few weeks and still have fun kicking some ass and doing a spectacular super move or two.

Key points:

1. Combat graphics need to be cooler, and more varied. This includes things such as block & evade animations (that look stylish rather than stupid) more special animations for different attacks, more effects for certain occurences. (See my sanitarium post about "Special Death Effects")

Since so much of the game is about killing things over and over again, it needs to be made more fun and varied. Easy monsters should be a chance to show off some flashy juggle combos, or overkill them with some giant attack that completely obliterates them in a cloud of ash. Or a chance to dash headlong into a crowd and totally pwn them with AOE and other cool multi hitting moves. (Earthshaker + Aftershock is a small taste of this)

Hard monsters should be an ultimate test of reactions, timing, and knowledge, where correctly interrupting the right skills, correctly activating your "block the next hit" skills at the right time, all for a period of several minutes whilst you wear them down and wait for an opening to do critical damage to them.

Boss monsters should be a test of reactions and flexibility, and tactical thinking. They should vary their abilities and attack patterns constantly (but with visible signs showing what they've switched to), keeping you on your toes, forcing you to adjust. They should have multiple hit areas or multiple ways of defeating them, allowing you to plan different strategies (attack the arms and weaken his attacks? or go straight for the weak point - the head, and try to kill him before he kills us? If we can kill all of his underlings first, we get more xp and drops - but it's much harder?)

PvP should be the same - easy players should be a chance to do some crazy things, show off a little, do things that make the easy players go "OMG, I just got totally kicked - but it was so fun to watch that!"

Top level pvp is probably so competitive that everyone sets the gfx to low and doesn't care, so we won't worry about them too much.

2. There needs to be some sort of progressively harder infinite/very long random dungeons in the game. Maybe fully random dungeons aren't possible due to server storage or something - but randomising the monsters, the monster types, making them wander around a lot, or having a "random" dungeon formed from a wildly branching paths, with different paths blocked off with spawned rocks or something. Or a random dungeon made from multiple random small zones, with the portals connecting the zones being randomised.
Places you want to try again and again, with different characters and builds, for fun, to see how far you can get this time, to test your skills, etc.

I hope any new downloadable areas or expansions are based on this philosophy, rather than the "play through it once, get to the end, then you've seen it all" sort of level design that seems to prevail in american PC games.

3. PvP needs to made more interesting from a social point of view. Eg. when you enter the arena areas, there's a billboard which when clicked on, shows the current ladder of those teams that are playing, and how long their streaks are. Maybe also other things like what Kill/Death, Win/Loss ratios are for individual characters.
When you start a match, during the countdown there should be a big window "Fred/Bob/Jane/Alex vs Peter/Wutong/Kiara/Ippo!" - it doesn't show their classes, but it gives a better display of who you're up against. (atm you can tell by watching the "xxxx has joined the game" display in the chat window.)

You should be able to access ingame, the guild ladder, and you should be able to access information about a player's guild by clicking on them - their guild rank, their guild's motto, some short descriptive text, etc.

In other words, I hope any further expansions and improvements that ANet makes are made with the goal of dynamic, self-varying, skill-based, "infinite" gameplay, rather than just adding a new area thats exactly the same in style and gameplay as any of the existing areas. I'm not interested in sightseeing, nor am I interested in farming or climbing a treadmill - I want to fight, have fun, do cool attacks, try different characters and builds, and stuff like that!

silvertemplar · Jun 22, 2005, 06:46 PM // 18:46

Quote:

This really bothered me the first time i was completing the game, but it seriously kicks ass the second time i play. The ass of my playing motivation. Where is the Freedom in Guildwars?

I cant say how much i agree with this aspect. I don't know if anyone noticed the difference between Pre and Post-Sear is primarily an increase of freedom. I loved Pre-Sear, i took 6 characters through it and enjoyed ALL 6 times [the fact that only 2 of the 6 ever got further than lvl 12 says something :P]. Sure it is easy, although not that easy when you try things at lvl 1 instead of lvl 5. But i could go wherever i want, i could do any quest in any order, i never felt rushed through any aspect, i actually cant recall any tedium regarding moving through the same areas multiple times either.....then

Post-Sear you are welcomed by 2 carrion devourers at the entrance of Ascalon City..and that will be your first introduction to repetition and linearity. Post-Sear the mission system starts. I actually didnt know what it was and thought it was optional farming type of missions and skipped them at first. I ran through to piken square and fort ranik [through regent valley] which were alot harder than i bargained for, but it was acceptable. Only then did i realise i actually MUST do these silly missions and then i woke up at Amnoon Oasis to realise i've been on a linear trail and didnt do much of anything other than these missions ..the quests became secondary and merely an annoyance to keep me from rushing into another mission [i swear if there wasnt skill quests i wouldnt have stopped AT ALL].

I would recommend Anet look at Pre-Sear and go from there....heck there is even a dungeon and i havent seen one since [closest semblance was those ice caves, but there you are on a linear road yet again...no freedom nothing]