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Guild Wars 2: The Community – A Mixed Bag
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
Guild Wars 2: The Community – A Mixed Bag
For years Guild Wars 2 has garnered a sense of cooperation and community within the general PvE population in a way that was welcoming to players of all skill levels and competencies. This was one of the founding principles behind my decision to make Guild Wars 2 an MMO I constantly return to. While the community at large still has a fairly stellar reputation as far as online games go, it appears that through the years, there are many players in game that have soured. This is what happened.
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Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
I was so into this game at launch. The ideas they had for it back then sold me on it. But what happened was as the game became more popular the worse it got. And i don't blame it all on the devs. Players had a hand in what the game has become because of their demands that it be more like Wow. They lost direction and now we have this big mess that gets worse with every update.
Overall, I'd say it's a friendlier community than most, so long as you avoid the competitive sects (with WvW especially being the worst). After all, they don't have to compete for mobs, resources, and drops. The excellent scaling and soft-grouping systems ensure that everyone is working together rather than against one another. So in regards to general PvE community, the game itself is intelligently crafted in such a way so as to ensure the friendliest possible gameplay experience.
It's why I will never play another MMO that doesn't use similar systems. Personal loot, personal resource nodes, and shared mob tagging are the way to go.
Yep, me too man, me too and with both those games you mentioned. Funny thing is that both have similarities when it comes to their communities but also a huge difference, one of them being that EQ players as of recent(went back for a couple of the TLP servers) are a bunch of middle aged to elderly people where WoW is a bunch of younger generations kids to middle aged people. Two different age groups but the 1 thing they have in common is how horrible they act over a video game. I was astonished when I saw how badly these middle aged to older men were acting over EQ, I truly was in shock just how pathetic some acted. Definitely the way things were years ago.
Community lost its way back in WoW when it eventually started catering to a broader audience which I think was around late BC expansion or maybe a little later. Community was a huge driving force of WoW and I miss those days similar to missing those days in EQ. Community is a huge part of an MMO and we just don't have them anymore unfortunately. With phasing tech, to dungeon finder tools, all this instanced based shit. Those 3 alone have killed any sense of community within each server. I remember the days of remembering peoples names I grouped with and actually communicated with. Nowadays its press a button, pop, enter, run the dungeon with little to no words spoken and leave. Instant gratification at its best. On top of that, this current generation of MMO players have zero patience when it comes to dying in content like dungeons. If members start wiping on a boss in a dungeon, they start dropping like flies. No more figure stuff out, try to help others. Its truly pathetic.
I think it all boils down to MMO's catering to a much broader audience that has spoiled/ruined things. Instant gratification is now riddled all throughout these games. People want things easy, they want them quick, and they want them now. If anything falls outside of those lines, all hell breaks lose.
PVP is always going to be a fickle thing. You can't change anything about anything in any MMO without backlash from some people. If you make a class that is performing lower than expected stronger all the sudden everyone starts crying that the class is OP now. If you nerf a class because it was to strong, you killed the game. The PVP side was always like it is now.
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
But there are people running Raid training for new players despite them having 1000+ raid clears and static groups they can run with.
And (many) people who help with random PvE content, like taking newbies through the entire 1st expansion to get their skillpoints, by organizing public groups every few days. Literally no benefit to themselves, they just do it because they love the game and want to see the community prosper.
To be honest, even in WvW I've had some ridiculous laughs joining random commander groups on Voice chat.
And many, many more examples. I personally haven't seen communities this well put together in other MMOs.
I suggest anyone playing GW2 join https://www.gaiscioch.com/ for a great experience. Best gaming guild on the planet if you want a community. Turn off all other chat.
I haven't played sPvP since and it used to be what I did 70% of the time in GW2. Toxic mess that mode. Turn chat off completely if you're using unranked for some proper training and don't do ranked unless you've got really good with your build and fully understand how all the maps work or else be prepared for a shit storm of profanity.
PvE side of things? Never had a problem.
Then with the rise of fractals and raids I hit the same wall I hit in other MMOs... Performance/Dungeon anxiety.
I raided for so many years in WoW as a Resto druid and I always felt competent and confident so long as I stayed on top of it.
But with GW 2 and now more recently, ESO, I'm having to learn and get better at things everyone else has learnt and had time to perfect, which makes me nervous and anxious due to the elitist nature of the communities and feeling like I'm going to let everyone down.
I decided to brave the random dungeon finder in ESO regardless the other day (to do pledges for a recent event), despite being level ~160CP and was thrown into an Advanced dungeon and constantly told my gear and DPS were subpar. This was my first dungeon and sadly once again, threw me off completely.
It just sucks that all of this Dungeon/Fractal/Raid content is content I want to experience, but thanks to the Min/Max culture, I just find myself avoiding.
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
I am probably bias since I have played since launch but to me, a very casual MMO player, looking for more than loot pinata the game has improved by leaps and bounds. Just to put it into perspective in the 1st 3 years of the game we saw them add 3 new zones. In the past 2 expansions they added 21 zones. The 1st expansion added a difficulty spike most players were not accustomed to and it felt great! Meta events actually had 150 players working together to complete and had a very real chance of failure if people actually didn't try their best. The game evolved into something much better than it was at launch and trust me if you think the game is getting worse over time your dead wrong unless you like auto attacking mindlessly. In fact I would say this past episode is the best Guild Wars has ever been. They pretty much did a victory lap with the new zone and closing out a story for the season!
hay don't get self down ESO has the most toxic player base ever.
Very friend, very helpful, both in game and on the forums. I would wager one of the most welcoming communities I had ever been in.
Then, they put in Fractals, and that became a breeding ground for a more Toxic player base, and it only got worse from there, and finally climaxing to Raids being put in, to cater to the most elitist and toxic of the player base.
Might be why they are trying to reverse that kind of damage and go back to their Living Story/Community Driven content, but, truth be told, once that kind of damage is done, it's near impossible to reverse.
Aggression is not the only way to combat aggression intelligence and a conviction to making the communities we are a part of better safer places to be and community support these bullies only have power because our silence gives it to them. This is true in the real world Aswell as the virtual.
I have to agree with you 100%
I play how i like and what i like because i find players that enjoy the same style. However, when i join groups with other play styles that differ than mine, i play by their rules. It's their group after all.
Most groups i see pretty much state what kind of style they are and what expectations they have. I see a lot of players not taking the time to find this out. It's easier to complain.