DEBATE: Solo-Farming

Hm, I guess unless you can provide us with some evidence that this...let's say, a bit bold statement of yours is actually true, people won't take it very seriously, you know?

Argentinus said:
I see your point. I have explored parts of Tyria by myself and quite enjoyed that, maybe more than the times I was rushing through missions with people I had never met before (though this was fun often enough, depending on the party). After not having played pve for a while (more a pvp players, me), I did Galen's quest by myself with henchies one night (as it is almost impossible to find people for anything but farming greens with standard farm groups in SF). And I really enjoyed that, bringing back memories to the times I was by myself (maybe with henchies) in post-searing Ascalon and exploring Tyria, the dessert, etc. I even had the time to listen to a conversation between dwarfs worrying about their jobs being taking over by machines. I love being able to really take in the landscapes and not needing to rush after someone.

What does this have to do with solo farming? Nothing at all. This has to do with soloing and soloing with henchies. I am all for that and I hope this will be possible to do in most area's in the next chapter.

Solofarming is not exploring, it is going to a place you already know, and repeating the same path over and over again, doing the same thing. Or it is to most people, as this is how you get most gold and items in the shortest amount of time. Which is kind of boring for me. But if you want gold, this is the best way to go. I would rather explore and do missions/quests though.

The sollution has been suggested before: make drops per enemy killed less frequent for parties, depending on party size. Soloing would still be rewarding in terms of gold and items gained compared to doing qiests, missions, etc., but less so.

well i think that solo farming is great but a little boring after a while (wich is a opinion) but my best farming i SF with 5 men with a little fun with it and u dont feel alone but 4 money and stuff only i will train my monk for that because the money side ain't bad either but i miss a lot off fun that way but for short notice i choose solo

Neutral to Solo Farming.

I've just ascended and got into Droknar, thinking of getting great new armour at last - but the 5k I have won't cover it, let alone all the steel etc required. Runes too are v.expensive - way out of my league. The only ones I've got have been from drops and some cheap ones I got in the beginning. Dyes, black dye especially, cost way too much for me. I don't see any option but to solo farm somewhere if I want these things. Maybe I'll just carry on with the quests though - far more fun than spending hours trying to get gold for some armour that'll be useless by the time I get to ring of fire.

If buying stuff from NPCs pushes up the price, shouldn't selling stuff to them bring the prices back down again? Maybe it works like this already but it doesn't seem so.

Perhaps if trading between players is limited to items and not gold, then perhaps the economy can be effectively controlled without intervetion by the devs??

There must be someone doing an economy thesis or something out there who'd like to take a closer look at the Guildwars economics/

i really dont care if people take it seriously for one, and i dont have time to screenshot and link everything. the fact is that if someone doesent like what i say they are going to argue with me regardless of any link or screenie i post. like i mentioned the first time around people told me flat out if it was an exploit anet would nerf it and then anet nerfed it. afterwards do you think those people pm'd me and said 'wow according to my own words now its officially an exploit'?

ahh, i understand some of the confusion now...

yes i did mean higher levels. as close to the exact words as i can recall were "for anyone to be able to solo several creatures of higher levels was obviously never intended by the devs..."
that would be anywhere that people solo farm in the game except riverside, which is broken. i assumed that evrybody who solo farms farms areas where useable/sellable loot drops.

here are the actual words themselves.

Thank you for finding that post, curious what page in the 77 page threads in the Nov 10/11 patch debate did you exactly find it. I gave up looking for it.

and if you look at the words used, it doesn't seem to HER that solo farming should be there, not ANET feels farming high level areas is NOT going to be allowed.

I wish for the final time, ANET come right out and say what your official position is on this subject so this can end this debate.

I am sick of this.

full post is here

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...193#post662193

Look, Gaile Gray is simply the PR person, and she clearly has a kind of view on gaming that's not the kind of view of the majority of the gaming world. It does not say anything about how the rest of the devellopers feel, not to mention that successfull games change while playing, change towards the way players like to play. Since solo farming is so much appreciated this WILL become an issue of importance, no matter if it was intended or not.

Its understandable that high level areas should be difficult. But the statement should be changed by now into: since solo playing is now an integrated, well respeced part of GW... Its this fact that needs to be accepted, and a commercial team of devellopers better change their attitude in this, no matter what was intended in the past...

anet doesn't have to do a thing and can make any changes they see fit. you do not own, make, create, or control this game. they do.

gaile might be just some PR person to most people. if you are that shallow in your thinking that is far as you are going to get. the PR person is your direct link to anet. she does as she is told just like any other PR (i should know i am one). demands are in most cases thrown out the window. a suggestion on the other hand might get more merit (notice the word "might" in there).

soloing was never part of the plan and now they are fixing it. now people have grown this slot machine addiction to it. with anet's gold figures of 75% of the players have less than 20k gold that 75% is probly not farming abusively. that would mean that the majority of pve players are not abusing farming therefor it will not hurt them as bad as some people may think to stop soloing.

i remember the days of release when the game was vibrante and alive. now go to the wilds and see what you get. a bunch of lvl 20s that bulldoze through everything. shame to see the game's pve decline so much.

as high as prices are most people HAVE to solo. w/ runes up at the high of 100k and others around 10-20k they have to solo. i know people will say taht they are rare b/c people do solo and tahts y the prices are high. THAT IS WRONG!! prices are high because people want them and tehy are rare. if people who soloed found them then they wouldnt be so much in demand and they would be less.

to address yur 75% of people have less then 20k so they prolly dont farm i would like to say that is not completely accurate. first of all even if someone doesnt solo they can stil have over 20k. all they have to do is save there money. ive done it before. i had around 47k w/o soloing or farming. most people spend their gold like crazy. and w/ runes prices up so high they think its the only way to do it. then once they get enough they spend it all and they are back down below 20k so taht would put them in the 75% even w/ them soloing.

to the 20s bulldozing through the wilds they are proly getting paid too do taht. taht is crap. that should be proly be nerfed somehow. thats whats casueing the pves decline not soloers or farmers.

im sure i will get flamed on this and many flaws will be pointed out but just remember this is my opinion. i am just addressing issues that were posted ahead of me. but i am stil for soloing.

the soloers are actualy helping the non soloers. by find rare items they can lower prices if they become in abundance so it allows the people w/ under 20k to buy them.

"as high as prices are most people HAVE to solo"

No, you don't. Simple as that and explained million times before. You *want* to solo, because you *want* those expensive items, you don't *need* them. Learn the difference between those words before you use them as argument.

if you go back to when the solo farmers were not around the prices for sup vigor was about 35k. the price for sup absorption 50-60k. now you want to use that arguement again be my guest. point is more people played w/o soloing and more of a demand for those items more than ever b/c no one had anything. prices are not high b/c soloing was not around. the prices are high now b/c soloing is around pumping mass amounts of gold into the econemy. you want an example go back 30 years when the government tried to fix the econemy by printing more money. what happened? it blew up in their faces and caused the inflation to grow faster than it already was.

btw you should notice that word "probly." that means by most accounts true but not all. bet you 90% of that 75% margine is new players that can't afford crap b/c prices are sky high with drops rates being crap for groups.

the funniest thing i notice about this is look at the proffesions on people's profile. look at the relatoinship of where they stand on this arguement and look at their profession. notice any w/mo or mo/w among the crowd?

Well I think the issue here isn't whether Solo-Farming should be allowed it is WHERE solo-farming should be allowed.

I personally say that only the desert should be the farming area becuase the most common form of solo-farming (griffon farming) is availible to EVERY profession.

However on the other hand I don't agree with Soloing the UW. Come on the Underworld is sposed to be the highest lvl of difficulty and the only profession that can go in alone is the 55 monk or ele (yep eles can go 55 too) now a days.

Asclon,, Shiverpeaks North ,, Kryta North ,, Jungle Place ,,,Kryta South ,,,
Desert ,,, South Shiverpeaks ,,,| Ring of Fire ,,, UW
..........................................^
Where I draw the Line

Include something like after your agruements if what to agrue WHERE solo-farming should take place.

NO WHERE

it was never suppose to be apart of the game. the drop rate wasn't made for it. the econemy wasn't made for it. skills have been nerfed to only stem solo farming b/c of a dumb AI. no one had a problem with pro bond in pvp. how about balth aura. now its just a very high energy cost, long casting, long recharge bug repelant. sure it was used in pvp with the e/mo but it wasn't overpowered in that environment. usually stripped as soon as you use it.

give the skills back and improve the AI.

I want you to think what you said there.......you are saying you should solo-farm no where INCLUDED charr in ascalon and other extremely low lvl places. Please think some more before opening your mouth

And I got a lot of the money for my first 15k set from questing and doing missions. Of course, that was around release, well before drops got a taste of the nerf sledgehammer.

twicky_kid, the 75% with less than 20k is highly inaccurate. I have had well below 20k total many times, but I also had three full sets of 15k armor at the same time. A better thing to see would be the average net worth of every account, but since that cannot be calculated, we will not see it.

What really gets me is all the solo farmers saying "omg don't nerf farming!" and all the anti-solo farmers saying "omg nerf farming!". No matter what happens, farming will exist. The real problem is the massive imbalance of "loot" between the two groups. It is possible to fix that imbalance without touching solo farmers, please no more of these calls for farming nerfs, or people complaining about whiners trying to get farming nerfed. The problem is not farming. The problem is the imbalance.

Solo farming can happen anywhere. It will happen anywhere. Many people solo because they find it challenging. I say, why remove the fun they are having? As I have said, the problem is not with the soloers, it is with ANet's handling of the situation (massive global drop reduction, effecting groups more than soloers.)

maybe you should go back and read your first post. might want to read that part about not flaming people for their ideas. oh what's that on your profile profession? a w/mo wow, what a surprise. thank you and have a good day

about imbalances yes there are great imbalances between loot from groups and soloing. my problem with this is how many skills are they going to nerf before they get it right. btw enjoy your spitefull spirit while is last. since its being abused to solo UW expect to see its dmg and/or duration decreased. yes another great pvp skill out the window due to farmers.

while all these skills nerfs are for pve (which means nothing as this game is more pvp oriented) those nerfs carry over to pvp. pvp is a place where most of the now nerfed skills were never abused in the first place, besides ether renewal and zealous fire.

i do agree that the 20k marker is a little low and not entirely accurate. it does however give some insite of HOW many people have mass amounts of gold. 25% of the population has more than 20k readily available to use. that can easily affect the econemy greatly if focused on a few items (mainly 1 ecto). don't know about you but i have decked any character i have made out with about 30k.

If you believe this, then I have to ask why you care about farming? ANet has changed one skill, protective bond, because of farmers. Prot bond is not exactly your PvP quality skill, before or after the update. Balth. Aura was changed because of smite group abuse just as much as for farming. Draw conditions, a condition remover for use on your tank that worked marginally well, was nerfed from abuse in PvP.

Also, I believe the spiteful spirit builds are using two people, correct? That does not count as solo farming.

So, to you, the big problem is that solo farming causes massive skill nerfs?