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[Column] Guild Wars 2: Ascending!
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
Guild Wars 2 players have a chance to earn and make ascended gear in both weapons and armor varieties. In today's Guild Wars 2 column, we take a look at how fun it is and whether it's worth it in the end. Read on!
Why is a grind an issue? Nearly every MMO in the past has used the grind, and the item treadmill as a form of character progression. It wasn't fun then, and it isn't fun now. Guild Wars was the first online RPG that didn't put you into that type of situation. It focused on player skill, rather then the power of your items. That same design philosophy was promised to be carried over to Guild Wars 2, never forcing players to grind for better items. So far technically they've kept their promise.
Read more of David North's Guild Wars 2: Ascending!
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Other MMOs put the power of the items over the abilities of the player.
Comments
I don't mind Ascended gear or vertical progression but their implementation sucks. Frankly, their implementation of most of their updates sucks.
If they made Ascended acquirable through people's preferred play styles this update would be amazing. Make Ascended acquirable through event karma, wvw badges, spvp glory, dungeon tokens, and crafting than you'd have people out in the world playing in droves.
But its limited to crafting, why? Cash Shop. You can't buy badges, glory, karma or tokens but you can buy crafting mats with gold. It seems like every update they've pushed in past 8 months or so just reems cash shop down your throat.
I understand they have to make money but please, just one update that isn't clearly designed with cash shop in mind.
You can actually obtain ascended weapons from fractals and exotic champion boxes as rare loot.
Also, you can't buy dragonite ore, empyreal fragments, or bloodstone dust. You must earn those in game. Ascended weapons also require obsidian shards, only obtainable by karma, fractal relics, or laurels. Globs of Dark Matter are also accountbound and obtained by salvaging exotic equipment (I use excess tokens from dungeons for this).
All in all, you can only really buy deldrimore, spiritwood, and elonian leather from TP...the rest is acquired from the players themselves.
Technically, they incorporate karma (obsidian shards), WvW (dragonite ore from keep lords), and dungeons (salvage dungeon items using excess tokens). Perhaps you are asking for a more streamlined approach?
Also, the article doesn't mention the fact that every class is acquiring unique heal skills next patch. You can check them out at dulfy http://dulfy.net/2013/12/05/gw2-new-healing-skills-for-next-patch/
There is also a huge balance update coming tomorrow. https://forum-en.guildwars2.com/forum/game/gw2/Dec-10th-Balance-Preview-Updated-Nov-6th
Hope that helps give a more complete view of the patch...it's certainly not only ascended armor that's incoming.
"As you read these words, a release is seven days or less away or has just happened within the last seven days those are now the only two states youll find the world of Tyria."...Guild Wars 2
The article is quite critical. Did you read it?
"As you read these words, a release is seven days or less away or has just happened within the last seven days those are now the only two states youll find the world of Tyria."...Guild Wars 2
You still have to level your crafting skill to 500, that's all pure gold.
In theory you could obtain Ascended weapons and armor through playing the game but you're looking at 3-6 months of devoted play for just 1 piece. But with the assistance of cash shop, its a week tops, it only takes a few days of play to acquire the non-purchasable ingredients.
The update is clearly designed to push cash shop otherwise they'd wouldn't force people to level their crafting to 500 to make a piece of gear. You can spin your PR any way you want, I'm going to call a duck a duck.
The one time I don't read it. I retract my initial comment, sort of.
thats not true
getting ascended box isnt that hard at all the first day when they gave us the update i saw already about 10 ppl in guild getting these boxes
just play the game and have fun and you will get it too theres no need to get your crafting to 500 or farming 24/7
Theres a few things I don't really understand about the use of Ascended gear... I mean IF you have all of your ascended trinkets/jewelry, you could get your AR extremely high to the point where the ascended gear itself isn't really necessary for anything other than what... maybe a 5 - 10% stat increase if you have a full set?
Anyways, I just finished my Ascended weapon last night, and it took me 2 weeks to complete, and I've really only been back and playing for just over 3 weeks, so it doesn't take long to craft. As a reference, I came back to the game with about 10 - 15 gold 3 weeks ago, since then I've run a few of the trains, used the event timers, and I've only just gotten to Fractal 11 a couple days ago. I spent about 60 gold last night getting from Artificer 480 - 500, the rest of the materials I had or received through harvesting but mostly breaking down tons of items to increase my luck (which is at 100% and climbing).
I do like the game, and Fractals are a lot of fun, they provide a challenge somewhat, but I dislike everything that goes into crafting these ascended items, and truthfully, after I received my staff, it was a little anti-climactic because it wasn't exceptionally shiny, or special really....
As the column said, I would rather see the introduction of more weapons, maybe a few more skills, because if it really is going to take 2 weeks or longer per ascended piece of gear... I mean its a time sink, and one that I probably wouldn't finish before the burnout starts. I don't find this rewarding long term players at all. Wasn't the Legendary Weapon grind enough?
oh i remember them saying that top level gear would be accessible to all playstyles. I don't mind vertical progression at all what bothers me is that apparently this armor will be only for those who have the money to make it.
this go against everything they said in their manifesto.
Every update since launch has pretty much been a disappointment to me. I loved the game at launch, and the direction ANet took just drove me away. I don't think there is any way they will salvage the game into something I personally want to play at this point.
I hope everyone who currently enjoys the living story content and ascended items are happy with the game though, it just isn't for me personally.
Maybe someone will one day make a true MMO with dynamic world and no gear grind, fingers crossed that EQN or another upcoming title will be the game that I wanted GW2 to be.
You summed up my feelings exactly, sadly, since I loved GW1.
Ascended weapons and armor are a terrible grind. Not tradeable to other players, so non-crafters have to grind to 500 which cost a large amount of gold. Either that or hope for a very rare chance of a drop of the weapon. Getting the materials is grindy, I did temples and bosses daily for a few weeks to get enough for all 4 weapon slots. Too bad I didn't foresee the great grind that would be getting to 500 crafting that would be in my way. So far I'm at 464~ and like the other guy said, dread touching crafting because it's a gold sink/farm grind.
The kicker? Critical crafting EXP + chance boosters in the cash shop, which means pretty much 2x exp when crafting. I'm guessing they removed them from the clear the end of the game reward because when I beat the game again with another character, I got every booster except the crafting one.
A lot of armour looks good on Charr. Try another race if you don't like it. ArenaNet have actually made the armor for Charr look better, they fixed some glitching issues and such.
I don't even want to enter this ridiculous debate but consider this:
You don't NEED ascended gear - exotics are SLIGHTLY less powerful and easily obtainable. Just yesterday on my guardian I tested something. I couldn't find a squad so decided to try and solo the Hybrid in the tower. I have exotic weapons and rare armour and yes I made it - using no food or anything else besides the chefs rice balls.
Ascended gear is there for a reason - for a certain selection of the community with the desire to get it. I think the balance between getting the ascended stuff, the cost or grind and the need for it at all, is very well thought out and balanced.
Plus for those hoarders like myself with thousands of low level mats saved up, I'm going to make a motsa selling them, so others can chase their ascended gears, woot woot.
It's such a shame. This game had so much potential, and they squandered it by throwing in all that grind once ascended gear came out, not to mention how poorly they've handled their living story content/ special events. (remember the bug and exploit ridden disaster that was dragon bash?) Good ideas are not enough to hold a game afloat if the implementation is shoddy, which it certainly has been as far as post launch content is concerned.
I'm glad I quit playing when I did.
Simple example in wvwvw with elem I killed 1 mesmer and 1 guard 2 vs me both had ascended weapon I even made a screen of epic fail and guess what I'm full exotic
you see boost from ascended items is not significant. omg 3o power wow 0.7 dmg scale on skill wooow will hit so much harder .. sarcasm
Omg realy ? I did 6 weapons without even planing to make them. maybe you guys are just bad? delete you're game you play it wrong