Just like in reality. Would you want everyone to have the same equal standing even though you work twice as many hours as the other guy doing the same job? This equality crap to me makes no sense because if that is true why not go give half of what you own to some random homeless near you?
The problem with this statement is that raiding in most MMOs is not technically "harder" for the individuals. Most individuals just have to memorize a few little details about the fight and how they need to react to those details. It's scripted mechanics for each encounter and a whole lot of people who raid just go online and watch videos of someone else doing it to memorize the script.
Raiding is only technically "harder" in two ways:
1. If you are one of the first groups doing it and you have to learn the fight and figure it out for yourselves.
2. You have to organize and get a large group of people to coordinate, which is difficult for the ones RUNNING the raid (not those who are just participating)
Now, I agree, if you are in the #1 scenerio above, raiding is incredible. It is exhilirating and it is a ton of fun. And imo, that is the only reward or incentive you actually need. It certainly is the only incentive I ever needed to do it.
For the #2 scenerio, even if I choose to buy into the fact that the people working harder deserve to be rewarded better...then only raid leaders and sub-leaders deserve any special rewards.
Either way you cut it, let's be honest about it and acknowledge that for the average raider, raiding is not harder to do. It might be harder to get into in the first place, but the actual beating of the content is nothing but rote memorization of cues and the appropriate reaction to them. When I was raiding in MMOs where I was not in guilds that were doing raid content before guides and videos showed up online it was some of the most boring content in those games because of this.
Originally posted by Rayshe Thats basically why i said what i said. While the combat is different, the dodge mechanic is still in there so being laggy means your a dead man. When a company has a good idea another company using it isnt a bad thing. I dont think TSW will ever do anything bigger than a 10man, if it even does that. GW2 should look at it the same way. find a way that the top players and guilds can do these "raids" for lack of a better term with a higher difficulty. perhaps make Normal Elite and Nightmare Servers (TSW difficulty terms) for those players and allow free transfers. or even higher difficulty instances. that way you have the same freedom however the players that get bored of the fight can go make it harder.
The flaw with your theory (highlighted above) is that those "raiders" who are reacting negatively right now will still complain, UNLESS they also get "the best" gear, statistically, for that harder content, with no other way to get that same gear. It goes against ANet's manifesto to give them that "better gear".
This argument is not just about what content is in the game, it is about the reward for that content. In fact, it's more about the reward than the content for those raiders arguing here. Just go back and read their posts to see how it always comes back to that.
I've raided in all of the previous MMOs I have played and the raiders reacting negatively here actually represent a very small subset of even the raiding community as a whole. They are the ones that absolutely must have the best possible gear rather than partaking in the raiding for the experience and challenge. They do not even represent the entire raiding portion of the MMO community, which as has been said before is already a small subset.
Put in simple terms, there is really no way for GW2 to accomodate them without tossing out their own design manifesto. And I don't really see why anyone would want there to be a way to accomodate them...there are already plenty of other MMOs they can play to satisfy their needs.
I can't really agree with what you are saying because what is the point of spending more time raiding for just an experience? So what the 5 man dungeon drops the same as a 20m? It goes back to the point there are no gamers that don't want their characters to be superior to someone else. The amount of people the play the games casually, and I mean they don't give a damn and rarely socialize with anyone else. Just logs on lfg clear a dungeon for a few hours and just logs off.
If you argue that, what I am saying is bias then are you telling me that you don't care about the gears when you raid? You personally passed on every gear when you raided in the past? You didn't enjoy it when you won a piece of epic gear that took 1 month of camping?
I am bias in the sense that I experience where true hardcore/dedicated player come from. I understand their side of the story because my first MMO was EQ1, and back then when open world bosses had 1 week/1 month timers guess what you are on call 24/7 and checking around the clock to see if the mob is up. Now with this new system are you telling me that the people that are camping around the clock does not deserve something more?
Also, I don't know about you but, if i was the developers/marketing person behind GW2, I would totally put it in because the 10% of the population which I don't get how people are pulling that number are usually the people that are most likely to spend money on F2P because like I said earlier they "strive to be better". It doesn't mean their elitists.
Calling people that are elitists becasue they spend more time and effort than you on a game to be better at it is like calling people that work 40 hours a week elitist.
Ozerinx, Blizzard has released numbers indicating the percentage of their players who reached various content within WoW. That is where people are getting the numbers of such a low percentage for hardcore raiding.
I'm not going to pick at the rest of your post because I have already basically addressed all of your points in previous posts that I made. You are simply making many assumptions that are, based on available data, incorrect. They are all quite common misconceptions though, so I am not saying that in a way that is meant to be negative.
And, as I have said before, I have raided myself in all past MMOs, so I do understand where you are coming from. I'm simply saying...well, you're mistaken about a few things and that leads to conclusions based on faulty premises.
However, you are right about one thing, hardcore raiding does have a place in the MMO world. Go and watch the videos from the developers outlining their GW2 design manifesto though; you will see that that place is simply NOT in GW2 for those raiders that need the carrot to be a better carrot than anyone else can get.
Just like in reality. Would you want everyone to have the same equal standing even though you work twice as many hours as the other guy doing the same job? This equality crap to me makes no sense because if that is true why not go give half of what you own to some random homeless near you?
The problem with this statement is that raiding in most MMOs is not technically "harder" for the individuals. Most individuals just have to memorize a few little details about the fight and how they need to react to those details. It's scripted mechanics for each encounter and a whole lot of people who raid just go online and watch videos of someone else doing it to memorize the script.
Raiding is only technically "harder" in two ways:
1. If you are one of the first groups doing it and you have to learn the fight and figure it out for yourselves.
2. You have to organize and get a large group of people to coordinate, which is difficult for the ones RUNNING the raid (not those who are just participating)
Now, I agree, if you are in the #1 scenerio above, raiding is incredible. It is exhilirating and it is a ton of fun. And imo, that is the only reward or incentive you actually need. It certainly is the only incentive I ever needed to do it.
For the #2 scenerio, even if I choose to buy into the fact that the people working harder deserve to be rewarded better...then only raid leaders and sub-leaders deserve any special rewards.
Either way you cut it, let's be honest about it and acknowledge that for the average raider, raiding is not harder to do. It might be harder to get into in the first place, but the actual beating of the content is nothing but rote memorization of cues and the appropriate reaction to them. When I was raiding in MMOs where I was not in guilds that were doing raid content before guides and videos showed up online it was some of the most boring content in those games because of this.
Uhm.. I don't know what game you have been raiding in but, for example, in EQ2 there are dungeons that was only doable by one guild in the whole world. The videos were out for a long ass time but no one can do it until they started buffing people on a monthly basis/or nerfing the dungeon.
Also, I still don't see how my statement is wrong you just made my statement stronger. If you are arguing that it is the same exact work just more time spent; then why should the person A doing the same Job as person B be getting paid more for doing more hours? You know how lazy the working people would become because they will just follow the laziest person in their department because they will not be rewarded for putting in more time. Now, think about it in a game if that was the case why log on and spent countless hours because I can get the exact same shit in 1 week of playing?
As for being the first to clear etc means nothing because as a player even though someone else did it and you watched their video to do it; doesn't mean you will get the same experience.
Now as for raid-leader/sub-leader getting the reward will only cause even more elitist bs and more people to rage/qq about the game.
I agree that games get repetitive after a while if they don't come out with new raid contents. Which is why I quit most games because after getting full progression clear "raid wise" I usually have nothing else to do. In ff11 and eq1 took me the longest to complete but I enjoyed every minute of it because like you mention it is a very special experience.
Games strive on the fact that people are greedy and competitive in nature. League of Legend for example is an MMORTS that is making $$$$$ from a F2P model is the perfect example. Why do people play countless hours to try to get their ranking up, or bother competeing on a international level? In their case you get paid by sponsors etc. But, in MMORPG you can get sponsorerd too if you clear contents first etc.
The numbers from blizzard are the 10% that has cleared the hardest content. Not the players that have done any raiding at all. That is super faulty statistics. If you don't believe me start a new thread in general and ask how many people have had raiding experience.
I have watched most of those videos like I said I actually played the beta but, if they are going with that faulty 10% crap they are really going to be missing out.
You are right now telling me that everyone in the game is going to be equal because content is made for casual players. Which you guys believe is 90% of the population.
I am not going to lie that I believe a lot of people are going to play GW2 but from talking to multiple guilds/random people out of 300 people that I know are playing, 250 of them are playing it for the PvP content which I guess then raiding is irrelevant. Thumbs up to those people but for me personally I love PvE, Crafting, Housing, etc so I am a sucker for sandbox games. So taking Raiding out of a game completely to me is like saying there is one less thing for me to do PvE wise.
The numbers from blizzard are the 10% that has cleared the hardest content. Not the players that have done any raiding at all. That is super faulty statistics. If you don't believe me start a new thread in general and ask how many people have had raiding experience.
I have watched most of those videos like I said I actually played the beta but, if they are going with that faulty 10% crap they are really going to be missing out.
You are right now telling me that everyone in the game is going to be equal because content is made for casual players. Which you guys believe is 90% of the population.
I am not going to lie that I believe a lot of people are going to play GW2 but from talking to multiple guilds/random people out of 300 people that I know are playing, 250 of them are playing it for the PvP content which I guess then raiding is irrelevant. Thumbs up to those people but for me personally I love PvE, Crafting, Housing, etc so I am a sucker for sandbox games. So taking Raiding out of a game completely to me is like saying there is one less thing for me to do PvE wise.
-ozerinx
simply put then, GW2 may not be for you long term. Everyone in the game won't precisely be equal though, just "close" to equal. You really should watch the handful of developer videos that explain all this. It is those videos which are my basis for saying you will not get what you want out of GW2 because they aren't likely to change their entire manifesto for you.
I'm also more PvE oriented than PvP, but GW2 has plenty to do for me. In the past I have raided for the sake of seeing the raid content and on some occasions because I liked the look of a certain tier of gear; Transcendance armor set from BWL in vanilla wow comes to mind as one example, as does the legendary enchanter staff in EQ1...although I forgot the name of it. IN both cases, my motivation was how it looked, not the stats on it.
Technically, the whole "better gear rewards needed" is a flawed argument because the raid content in games that use that approach is also scaled up such that you need that better gear to progress. Hence your actual power as compared to that content stays flat. You have not, in fact, gotten more powerful.
Unless of course what matters to you most is that you are more powerful than someone who has not done it. I don't know how to respond to that because that kind of need is alien to my way of thinking so I simply don't even understand where you are coming from. That would only make sense, to me, in a PvP environment...and you already said that is not your thing.
But, in all seriousness, the real issue here is some bizarre expectation that GW2 should try to appeal to everyone who plays MMOs. It shouldn't, it doesn't. There's nothing wrong with that at all. I'm not really sure why anyone with your mindset, that a game needs tiered progression raid content to be worth playing, would be following GW2 at all. Trying to smash a round peg into a square hole is going to just get you frustrated if you keep at it long enough.
GW2 is different from other theme park MMOs that have come before it. There is nothing wrong with that. Those of you who are happy with how other theme park MMOs have handled the issue of end game need not play it. But, the real question is...if the model you espouse as being "needed" to motivate people to play is so good, why do games other than WoW who follow this model seem to have issues holding onto players? I would argue, because it isn't a particular good model at all for anyone that doesn't have the resources of Blizzard. i.e. anyone else.
These posts really amuse me because absolutely everybody is trying to sound like they are just saying it how it is and being unbiassed and at the same time erybody is being completely biassed. The ones who like guild wars 2 are trying to say that they are 100% right about end game being amazing and the others are trying to say that they are 100% correct about their veiws about end game but you really never get anywhere because its just lots of people who will just say the same thing no matter what anyone else says. I feel I should add in an unbiassed opinion. I have sort of watched guild wars 2 for a while but not massively. I have not prepurchased but have played on a friends bwe and enjoyed the levelling, however I agree that if pve end game is the same as what I've done in the first 15 levels than I will not continue playing. However I do not know what it's going to be like at later levels and if anyonee has and would like to show me proof of what it's like then I wil go hey it has good endgame but in the meantime I will sit and be neutral until I know what it's really like, and thats how I believe more people in this thread should be. By the way sorry about the wall of text ;P
The real issue here is some bizarre expectation that GW2 should try to appeal to everyone who plays MMOs. It shouldn't, it doesn't. There's nothing wrong with that at all. I'm not really sure why anyone with the mindset that a game needs tiered progression raid content to be worth playing would be following GW2 at all. Trying to smash a round peg into a square hole is going to just get you frustrated if you keep at it long enough.
GW2 is different from other theme park MMOs that have come before it. There is nothing wrong with that.
Those of you who are happy with how most other theme park MMOs have handled the issue of end game need not play it. The real question is...if the model you espouse as being "needed" to motivate people to play is so good, why do games other than WoW who follow this model seem to have issues holding onto players?
I would argue, because it isn't a particular good model at all for anyone that doesn't have the resources of Blizzard. i.e. anyone else. You could, of course, argue that it is because none of them do it well. But with the number of them which have crashed and burned in recent years, it does make sense that some developers are now thinking outside the box to deliver a different approach.
There is no right or wrong in this debate. There is only different flavors. Some will like chocolate and some will like vanilla, but chocolate should absolutely NOT try to be more like vanilla because of that. Some of us like both flavors.
I, for one, have enjoyed raiding in the past. I also am quite happy that an MMO is soon to come out that is trying something different from the same tired old formula. Those who like it will keep playing it, those who don't won't. If you are one of those who doesn't, there are plenty of other MMOs that are designed to fit your idea of "end game".
Jagarid said it perfectly. And last biggest flop around the block aka SWTOR, PVE game with end game raiding just confirms that. People don't need yet another MMO with raids, there are enough out there already - WoW, LOTRO, RIFT - just to name few AAA titles. From company wievpoint you don't compete offering old boring stuff, bioware learned that painfully.
Kinda funny thought though, next thing we'd heard if GW2 would get instanced raids with gear would be - "Where's tank and healer, raid sucks without those!"
edit: duh bugged editor ate my whole post , so just short version
At first when I read through this thread I thought that it wouldn't be that out of place for Anet to include progression raiding in their game for PvE endgame. Instead of being gated by gear progression it would be gated by PvE progression- once you complete all of the exploration dungeons then you'd be keyed for the first raid instance and following completion of that you'd be allowed to enter the next- it really didn't seem out of place.
But then on second thought, aside from dungeons and perhaps sPvP (I have no idea) where there is a set number of players participating together at once it seems that the whole point of gameplay in GW2 is to be as inclusive as possible to however many players that wish to play together rather than exclude players from enjoying content together. Any type of gated progression would only serve to exclude players which doesn't seem to fit.
At first when I read through this thread I thought that it wouldn't be that out of place for Anet to include progression raiding in their game for PvE endgame. Instead of being gated by gear progression it would be gated by PvE progression- once you complete all of the exploration dungeons then you'd be keyed for the first raid instance and following completion of that you'd be allowed to enter the next- it really didn't seem out of place.
But then on second thought, aside from dungeons and perhaps sPvP (I have no idea) where there is a set number of players participating together at once it seems that the whole point of gameplay in GW2 is to be as inclusive as possible to however many players that wish to play together rather than exclude players from enjoying content together. Any type of gated progression would only serve to exclude players which doesn't seem to fit.
Exactly.
For me that is one of the major aspects that separates GW2 from most other mmos; and one of its best attributes. This, among other features, will be the reason why I think GW2 will do tremendously well and succeed not only as an mmo but as a social game.
THE POINT TO PLAYING VIDEOGAMES IS TO HAVE FUN AND ENJOY YOURSELF
Something that GW2 PvE will not provide for the vast majority of gamers.
The game was designed with exactly this in mind. It was designed to simply allow people to enjoy themselves and not worry about people facerolled because somebody that plays the game 10 hours a day everyday has top tiered gear that has stats good enough to one shot you. You can say what yuo want about gw2 fans but you obviously have a vendetta against the game and from your earlier "I QUIT" the forums post about GW2 fans ruining your time on this board you obviously have no intention in these forums but to bait people and troll. What is your obsession with a game you have no interest in playing aside from stirring the pot? Yes I see gw2 mentioned a lot in other forums but MOST of the time its just to say people prefer this or that of GW2 not to sit and bash another game over and over and over and hail gw2 above all(yes it does happen sometimes). yet people like you come in constantly just to bash a game they have no interest in..pretty sad.
I angered the clerk in a clothing shop today. She asked me what size I was and I said actual, because I am not to scale. I like vending machines 'cause snacks are better when they fall. If I buy a candy bar at a store, oftentimes, I will drop it... so that it achieves its maximum flavor potential. --Mitch Hedberg
What I see is an attempt to explain how not having raiding included in the game does not hurt the game. I am still waiting for being told what is so GREAT about it.
I think that including raiding in the game would not only not hurt the game, but also improve it since the part of community interested in raiding would have one additional "ride" to enjoy.
As others have already said, the game technically does have "raidable" content.
So you need to be more clear about what you mean by raids.
If you mean "gear progression tiered raid content", then it does indeed hurt the game, because it goes against principles outlined in their design manifesto. You might as well ask why you can't get a Big Mac at Burger King if that is the question.
If you mean some other type of raid content besides gear progression tiered raid content, but not the kind that is already present, it still hurts the game in at least one respect. It takes development time, and if you take time to cater to one group of players it means some other group of players gets less. Development time is a limited resource. Especialy when you consider that hardcore raiders have voracious appetites for content...so they are a pretty expensive crowd to cater to compared to other types of MMO players.
Either way you cut it, there is a downside. You are right that there is an upside (at least for those who want it), but there IS a downside. There is always a trade off.
The PvE content will be EXACTLY like every other zone except it will have a different enviroment and monsters!
hey guess what? you would be wrong but thanks for that.
so there wont be dynamic events, hearts, vistas, skill challenges, etc in hgih level zones?
some do not have hearts but my comment was more about they will NOT be exactly like the earlier zones ... many not even close.
Saying that PvE content will be "EXACTLY" like every other zone is like saying all raids are the same because they are raids. It is shocking that someone would even consider it an argument at all.
Of course you dont consider it an argument because the only argument you will listen to is "GW2 PvE is the greatest of all times!"
GW2 zones will be exactly as I stated earlier. It will be the same mechanics that all the other zones had except they might have less (or no) boring heart quests and add more boring "events" and of course it will have a different theme and monsters to fight. OMG SO AMAZING AND DIFFERENT WOWEE! And of course dont forget that everything you do in these zones will proivde zero character advancement at max level.
Well, I'm just glad for no gear grind raiding. It's repetetive as hell, and when you get excluded, even by friends, for not having good enough gear, it's hurtful.
I obviously did not mean the gear progression tiered raid content since it goes against basic principles of the game. I meant simply instanced raids which would give some cosmetic rewards, titles, achievs and whatever the PVE rewards are in this game.
I was reacting to the original post where the person attemtped at explaining why it is GREAT and I responded that I do not see it in his original post.
You claim that basically implementation of anything has a downside of spending development time. By this logic, anything you implement in the game ultimately hurts it. I do admit that implementation of anything would have some sort of opportunity cost which would apply for raiding as well.
My question is "Why is it GREAT not to have raiding included in the game" (the one with cosmetic rewards, titles, achievs) since the OP did not succeed at explaining it, in my opinion.
In that case, I mostly agree with you. But, ANet seems to want to spend their development time in terms of growing the game on DEs. They believe those will be very popular long term, from what I they have said. That would be where the opportunity cost comes from.
Whether or not they are right, I don't really know.
I will tell you though that I personally would explore the content you describe if it were in the game. Without gear progression raiding is far less of a pain in the arse and I have long wished for an MMO that delivers the former (raid content) without the later (tiered gear progression).
I say as long as they stick to their guns that gear has no statistical advantage, why not add an instanced 10-man or 20-man dungeon? Just do it like any other dungeon, give the same statistical gear but just a different look for those who like it.
For me every game has been about finding the coolest looking armor and weapons and showing them off. I could care less about stats - and I am definatly spending money per month on this game just because it has this cool feature where its all about looks and not stats at end game.
THE POINT TO PLAYING VIDEOGAMES IS TO HAVE FUN AND ENJOY YOURSELF
Something that GW2 PvE will not provide for the vast majority of gamers.
The game was designed with exactly this in mind. It was designed to simply allow people to enjoy themselves and not worry about people facerolled because somebody that plays the game 10 hours a day everyday has top tiered gear that has stats good enough to one shot you. You can say what yuo want about gw2 fans but you obviously have a vendetta against the game and from your earlier "I QUIT" the forums post about GW2 fans ruining your time on this board you obviously have no intention in these forums but to bait people and troll. What is your obsession with a game you have no interest in playing aside from stirring the pot? Yes I see gw2 mentioned a lot in other forums but MOST of the time its just to say people prefer this or that of GW2 not to sit and bash another game over and over and over and hail gw2 above all(yes it does happen sometimes). yet people like you come in constantly just to bash a game they have no interest in..pretty sad.
Aerowyn, check out his post history. I wouldn't bother to continue this with him.
I try to get to that point when I can. The quote that is next to my name on the left is not just a quote, it's something I always try to keep in my mind when disagreeing with other people.
But hey man. If you have fun doing these things then by all means have it it. Im sure it will be fun...at least for awhile until you realize GW2 PVE is pointless.
[mod edit]
THE POINT TO PLAYING VIDEOGAMES IS TO HAVE FUN AND ENJOY YOURSELF
Something that GW2 PvE will not provide for the vast majority of gamers.
That's why there's PvP and WvW which will be the main focus of GW2 endgame. It'll be fun, to the point, and satisfying.
But any game with challenging raids that do not need to be repeated endlessly to get the gear you want has a great asset. Raids are fun, challenging and great teamwork, as long as they do not turn intoo requirements in the geargrind process.
In my opinion every dungeon should have a 1 person, 3person, full group, dual group and raid versions of 20, 25 or even 40 or 50 people. But for every version there should be totally different content inside, including dynamics.
WOW! Honestly thank you so much, reading through this whole thread was about to make me sick, this is exactly my thought, thanks for bringing some sanity into this thread. Tho I am sure after I read and respond to you, every other poster is simply going to ignore this and continue on with their own drivel.
Aerowyn, check out his post history. I wouldn't bother to continue this with him.
i know but if I just go GW2 is awsome so STFU i'm no better than he is.. I'm trying to be reasonable.
I angered the clerk in a clothing shop today. She asked me what size I was and I said actual, because I am not to scale. I like vending machines 'cause snacks are better when they fall. If I buy a candy bar at a store, oftentimes, I will drop it... so that it achieves its maximum flavor potential. --Mitch Hedberg
Originally posted by BadSpock Yeah I'll take more open world elite DE's that are pretty much public raid encounters than instanced grind content any and every day of the week.
Comments
The problem with this statement is that raiding in most MMOs is not technically "harder" for the individuals. Most individuals just have to memorize a few little details about the fight and how they need to react to those details. It's scripted mechanics for each encounter and a whole lot of people who raid just go online and watch videos of someone else doing it to memorize the script.
Raiding is only technically "harder" in two ways:
1. If you are one of the first groups doing it and you have to learn the fight and figure it out for yourselves.
2. You have to organize and get a large group of people to coordinate, which is difficult for the ones RUNNING the raid (not those who are just participating)
Now, I agree, if you are in the #1 scenerio above, raiding is incredible. It is exhilirating and it is a ton of fun. And imo, that is the only reward or incentive you actually need. It certainly is the only incentive I ever needed to do it.
For the #2 scenerio, even if I choose to buy into the fact that the people working harder deserve to be rewarded better...then only raid leaders and sub-leaders deserve any special rewards.
Either way you cut it, let's be honest about it and acknowledge that for the average raider, raiding is not harder to do. It might be harder to get into in the first place, but the actual beating of the content is nothing but rote memorization of cues and the appropriate reaction to them. When I was raiding in MMOs where I was not in guilds that were doing raid content before guides and videos showed up online it was some of the most boring content in those games because of this.
Ozerinx, Blizzard has released numbers indicating the percentage of their players who reached various content within WoW. That is where people are getting the numbers of such a low percentage for hardcore raiding.
I'm not going to pick at the rest of your post because I have already basically addressed all of your points in previous posts that I made. You are simply making many assumptions that are, based on available data, incorrect. They are all quite common misconceptions though, so I am not saying that in a way that is meant to be negative.
And, as I have said before, I have raided myself in all past MMOs, so I do understand where you are coming from. I'm simply saying...well, you're mistaken about a few things and that leads to conclusions based on faulty premises.
However, you are right about one thing, hardcore raiding does have a place in the MMO world. Go and watch the videos from the developers outlining their GW2 design manifesto though; you will see that that place is simply NOT in GW2 for those raiders that need the carrot to be a better carrot than anyone else can get.
-Jagarid
The numbers from blizzard are the 10% that has cleared the hardest content. Not the players that have done any raiding at all. That is super faulty statistics. If you don't believe me start a new thread in general and ask how many people have had raiding experience.
I have watched most of those videos like I said I actually played the beta but, if they are going with that faulty 10% crap they are really going to be missing out.
You are right now telling me that everyone in the game is going to be equal because content is made for casual players. Which you guys believe is 90% of the population.
I am not going to lie that I believe a lot of people are going to play GW2 but from talking to multiple guilds/random people out of 300 people that I know are playing, 250 of them are playing it for the PvP content which I guess then raiding is irrelevant. Thumbs up to those people but for me personally I love PvE, Crafting, Housing, etc so I am a sucker for sandbox games. So taking Raiding out of a game completely to me is like saying there is one less thing for me to do PvE wise.
-ozerinx
simply put then, GW2 may not be for you long term. Everyone in the game won't precisely be equal though, just "close" to equal. You really should watch the handful of developer videos that explain all this. It is those videos which are my basis for saying you will not get what you want out of GW2 because they aren't likely to change their entire manifesto for you.
I'm also more PvE oriented than PvP, but GW2 has plenty to do for me. In the past I have raided for the sake of seeing the raid content and on some occasions because I liked the look of a certain tier of gear; Transcendance armor set from BWL in vanilla wow comes to mind as one example, as does the legendary enchanter staff in EQ1...although I forgot the name of it. IN both cases, my motivation was how it looked, not the stats on it.
Technically, the whole "better gear rewards needed" is a flawed argument because the raid content in games that use that approach is also scaled up such that you need that better gear to progress. Hence your actual power as compared to that content stays flat. You have not, in fact, gotten more powerful.
Unless of course what matters to you most is that you are more powerful than someone who has not done it. I don't know how to respond to that because that kind of need is alien to my way of thinking so I simply don't even understand where you are coming from. That would only make sense, to me, in a PvP environment...and you already said that is not your thing.
But, in all seriousness, the real issue here is some bizarre expectation that GW2 should try to appeal to everyone who plays MMOs. It shouldn't, it doesn't. There's nothing wrong with that at all. I'm not really sure why anyone with your mindset, that a game needs tiered progression raid content to be worth playing, would be following GW2 at all. Trying to smash a round peg into a square hole is going to just get you frustrated if you keep at it long enough.
GW2 is different from other theme park MMOs that have come before it. There is nothing wrong with that. Those of you who are happy with how other theme park MMOs have handled the issue of end game need not play it. But, the real question is...if the model you espouse as being "needed" to motivate people to play is so good, why do games other than WoW who follow this model seem to have issues holding onto players? I would argue, because it isn't a particular good model at all for anyone that doesn't have the resources of Blizzard. i.e. anyone else.
The real issue here is some bizarre expectation that GW2 should try to appeal to everyone who plays MMOs. It shouldn't, it doesn't. There's nothing wrong with that at all. I'm not really sure why anyone with the mindset that a game needs tiered progression raid content to be worth playing would be following GW2 at all. Trying to smash a round peg into a square hole is going to just get you frustrated if you keep at it long enough.
GW2 is different from other theme park MMOs that have come before it. There is nothing wrong with that.
Those of you who are happy with how most other theme park MMOs have handled the issue of end game need not play it. The real question is...if the model you espouse as being "needed" to motivate people to play is so good, why do games other than WoW who follow this model seem to have issues holding onto players?
I would argue, because it isn't a particular good model at all for anyone that doesn't have the resources of Blizzard. i.e. anyone else. You could, of course, argue that it is because none of them do it well. But with the number of them which have crashed and burned in recent years, it does make sense that some developers are now thinking outside the box to deliver a different approach.
There is no right or wrong in this debate. There is only different flavors. Some will like chocolate and some will like vanilla, but chocolate should absolutely NOT try to be more like vanilla because of that. Some of us like both flavors.
I, for one, have enjoyed raiding in the past. I also am quite happy that an MMO is soon to come out that is trying something different from the same tired old formula. Those who like it will keep playing it, those who don't won't. If you are one of those who doesn't, there are plenty of other MMOs that are designed to fit your idea of "end game".
Jagarid said it perfectly. And last biggest flop around the block aka SWTOR, PVE game with end game raiding just confirms that. People don't need yet another MMO with raids, there are enough out there already - WoW, LOTRO, RIFT - just to name few AAA titles. From company wievpoint you don't compete offering old boring stuff, bioware learned that painfully.
Kinda funny thought though, next thing we'd heard if GW2 would get instanced raids with gear would be - "Where's tank and healer, raid sucks without those!"
edit: duh bugged editor ate my whole post
, so just short version
At first when I read through this thread I thought that it wouldn't be that out of place for Anet to include progression raiding in their game for PvE endgame. Instead of being gated by gear progression it would be gated by PvE progression- once you complete all of the exploration dungeons then you'd be keyed for the first raid instance and following completion of that you'd be allowed to enter the next- it really didn't seem out of place.
But then on second thought, aside from dungeons and perhaps sPvP (I have no idea) where there is a set number of players participating together at once it seems that the whole point of gameplay in GW2 is to be as inclusive as possible to however many players that wish to play together rather than exclude players from enjoying content together. Any type of gated progression would only serve to exclude players which doesn't seem to fit.
Exactly.
For me that is one of the major aspects that separates GW2 from most other mmos; and one of its best attributes. This, among other features, will be the reason why I think GW2 will do tremendously well and succeed not only as an mmo but as a social game.
Can't say I'll regret not having raids. Even if only because I won't have to organise them any more, god what a mess that is.
Will also allow me to focus on other things, like PvP events and generally events that don't follow a very strict timetable and structure.
Feel free to use my referral link for SW:TOR if you want to test out the game. You'll get some special unlocks!
The game was designed with exactly this in mind. It was designed to simply allow people to enjoy themselves and not worry about people facerolled because somebody that plays the game 10 hours a day everyday has top tiered gear that has stats good enough to one shot you. You can say what yuo want about gw2 fans but you obviously have a vendetta against the game and from your earlier "I QUIT" the forums post about GW2 fans ruining your time on this board you obviously have no intention in these forums but to bait people and troll. What is your obsession with a game you have no interest in playing aside from stirring the pot? Yes I see gw2 mentioned a lot in other forums but MOST of the time its just to say people prefer this or that of GW2 not to sit and bash another game over and over and over and hail gw2 above all(yes it does happen sometimes). yet people like you come in constantly just to bash a game they have no interest in..pretty sad.
I angered the clerk in a clothing shop today. She asked me what size I was and I said actual, because I am not to scale. I like vending machines 'cause snacks are better when they fall. If I buy a candy bar at a store, oftentimes, I will drop it... so that it achieves its maximum flavor potential. --Mitch Hedberg
As others have already said, the game technically does have "raidable" content.
So you need to be more clear about what you mean by raids.
If you mean "gear progression tiered raid content", then it does indeed hurt the game, because it goes against principles outlined in their design manifesto. You might as well ask why you can't get a Big Mac at Burger King if that is the question.
If you mean some other type of raid content besides gear progression tiered raid content, but not the kind that is already present, it still hurts the game in at least one respect. It takes development time, and if you take time to cater to one group of players it means some other group of players gets less. Development time is a limited resource. Especialy when you consider that hardcore raiders have voracious appetites for content...so they are a pretty expensive crowd to cater to compared to other types of MMO players.
Either way you cut it, there is a downside. You are right that there is an upside (at least for those who want it), but there IS a downside. There is always a trade off.
Well, I'm just glad for no gear grind raiding. It's repetetive as hell, and when you get excluded, even by friends, for not having good enough gear, it's hurtful.
In that case, I mostly agree with you. But, ANet seems to want to spend their development time in terms of growing the game on DEs. They believe those will be very popular long term, from what I they have said. That would be where the opportunity cost comes from.
Whether or not they are right, I don't really know.
I will tell you though that I personally would explore the content you describe if it were in the game. Without gear progression raiding is far less of a pain in the arse and I have long wished for an MMO that delivers the former (raid content) without the later (tiered gear progression).
I say as long as they stick to their guns that gear has no statistical advantage, why not add an instanced 10-man or 20-man dungeon? Just do it like any other dungeon, give the same statistical gear but just a different look for those who like it.
For me every game has been about finding the coolest looking armor and weapons and showing them off. I could care less about stats - and I am definatly spending money per month on this game just because it has this cool feature where its all about looks and not stats at end game.
Aerowyn, check out his post history. I wouldn't bother to continue this with him.
I try to get to that point when I can. The quote that is next to my name on the left is not just a quote, it's something I always try to keep in my mind when disagreeing with other people.
That's why there's PvP and WvW which will be the main focus of GW2 endgame. It'll be fun, to the point, and satisfying.
WOW! Honestly thank you so much, reading through this whole thread was about to make me sick, this is exactly my thought, thanks for bringing some sanity into this thread. Tho I am sure after I read and respond to you, every other poster is simply going to ignore this and continue on with their own drivel.
i know but if I just go GW2 is awsome so STFU i'm no better than he is.. I'm trying to be reasonable.
I angered the clerk in a clothing shop today. She asked me what size I was and I said actual, because I am not to scale. I like vending machines 'cause snacks are better when they fall. If I buy a candy bar at a store, oftentimes, I will drop it... so that it achieves its maximum flavor potential. --Mitch Hedberg
Understood.
Same here.