GW2 Ascended Gear, A Step In The Right Direction

So much for GW2 re-inventing the wheel. And before the haters chime in, GW2 is a GREAT GAME. But someone has to figure out a way to create meaningful end-game content in a brand new way. And GW2 couldn’t do it.

Who will? And more importantly, what the heck can end game content be without new content dropping every 4 weeks that doesn’t constitute grind?

I know people scream bloody murder over weapons degrading but it does provide a continued purpose without the normal fear grind. It also supports the economy and making crafting more worthwhile. Maybe having an upkeep cost for high end gear like swg had.

Ascended Gear = that one type of dungeon progression. The stats aren’t great enough to be a MUST have over exotics.

The gear isn’t so great that you have to have it to beat someone in WvW or to do the other dungeons. They added another avenue of character progression for those people that felt they need it. There is still the progress for world completion, legendary weapons, achievements, and weekly server pride in WvW.

That said, for those that do not feel they need progression, but just want fun stuff to do. Plenty of new events and jumping puzzles to complete or re-do.

As long as you have an avenue to have fun, it doesn’t matter. However, if you HAVE to have that feeling of progression, then so be it. They just gave you another avenue.

I sinceresly think that it’s a step in the *wrong direction*.

You have plenty of games with tiered gear and vertical progresion that makes it a lot better that GW2, for example Lotro, Rift and of course Wow.

I choose to play GW2 because i allows me to exit the hamster’s wheel of others MMOs and play only for fun, i don’t need bigger numbers to makes me feel better or to own newbies in a single hit.

I play a lot of GW2, mainly WvWvW and i enjoy every moment and the last character i’m playing are currently at 78 playing only WvW since level 5 but now they change the game from horizontal progresion to vertical progresion to please only wow-like players, and i’m sorry but that is a mess.

Probably would make that people lime me leave the game (i’m not going to gring equipment) and i doubt that a lot of players return because they would be playing other games with better vertical progresion.

Time would tell, but alienate you old players (GW1 players and players that choose GW2 only because it didnt have vertical progresion) to please players that choose aa plying stile from other games don’t seems a wise thing to do (at least for me).

I’m actually surprised at this blog entry from you. But to each their own. For me, personally it’s made me lose interest in the game. Was enjoying the WvW but…. I can’t stand the whole Ascended Gear design thing. An instance you have to grind over and over….and not to mention the instance gains “levels” each time you complete it forcing you to LFG for people on the same dungeon level as you… it’s ridiculously dumb. I did my gear treadmill time in WoW… i thought I was done.

As someone who really dislikes Ascended gear, I have to disagree with this:

“To be honest, there was a huge problem with how quickly players reached the top.”

I *loved* how quickly players can reach the top. I wanted to get full exotics for one reason only: so I’d never have to think about gear again, and I could just play the game. Considering GW1 was very successful and allowed players to ‘reach the top’ even faster than GW2, I’m not sure why it’s a problem. A lot of players, myself included, prefer it that way.

“That is essentially why I stopped playing — I ran out of things to do.”

I also think this is unfair, and kind of dishonest. Did you get 100% world completion? I know you didn’t do much sPVP, dungeons or finish the personal story. The truth is that there were still a ton of things you could do – you just weren’t interested in them. Which is fine of course, but it’s important to make the distinction because right now you’re framing the problem as Arenanet’s lack of content when in reality it’s just not the type of game you enjoy.

@Lethality

I’m not trying to say that you need to do *everything* before you can complain or ask for more. What I’m trying to say is that people shouldn’t use “I ran out of things to do” as equivalent to “I got the best gear”.

As far as ‘players leaving in droves’, it’s probably best to keep out sensational language that isn’t based on actual numbers (since we don’t have any).

I feel after reading these last few posts, I must reiterate:

ASCENDED GEAR IS PRACTICALLY MEANINGLESS TO THOSE WHO DON’T CARE ABOUT FRACTALS OF THE MISTS.

Compare the stats between exotic gear and ascended. The few points difference does very little for those who have it versus those who have exotic. It will not break a 1v1 fight. That said, I do know some are complaining about the extra few percent of magic find, but that can be negated by magic find on other gear or magic food. Again, the over all affect of this is only for those who actually care about the new dungeon. If you are used to playing WvW, then why are you even worrying about this?

That said, if ArenaNet continues it’s vertical progression, then I would agree we have something to complain about. This current step up in gear stats, however, does very little for there to be this much deal made about it. The stats of Ascended gear have not made exotic suddenly worthless …

“WAAAAH GIME MAH WOW GEAR GRIND”

No thanks. If that is what the dame devolves to, I’m out.

(Yes, DEVOLVES is the correct word)

I just wish people in general weren’t so obsessed with “character progression”. It’s like when it comes to doing content a lot of players are more concerned about the size of the gold star the developer hands out than how much fun it is.

I don’t know, maybe I’m in the wrong genre or something. Instead of getting bored when I have the best stuff, I am the happiest because I can finally ignore gear stats and focus on enjoying content for its own sake.

@Fidjit – I agree with your last post. I’d rather focus on enjoying the content rather than some form of progression. I think that there are a lot of people who decided to play GW2 for that particular reason, hence the outcry against adding another tier of gear.

@swarmofseals – Supposedly, as you go farther up the line of fractal strength into the 30s and beyond, now only do you have the affect of agony, but the bosses supposedly (or will in future patches) add more mechanics to the fight. As such, one could argue that those players that never progress out of fractals 1-10 will never get to see such “content” (the added boss mechanics … although after just reading someone’s account of Level 31 fractal perhaps this is still missing at the moment). In any case, the rewards are supposed to be increased the higher you go making it a tug of war for some that might otherwise prefer to just enjoy the content at the lower levels for what it is. So then you have players debating whether they prefer the rewards over just enjoying the content. Perhaps I’m extending this discussion too much, but I’m sure you understand where I’m going with this.

@Keen – MMO’s do NOT have to be entirely about progress. An MMORPG such as GW2 simply has to be an RPG with multiple player social aspects whether it be dynamic events/questing together, WvW, jumping puzzles in a group, etc.

The fact that you feel you need some kind of progression goal simply means that GW2 may not be for you. I don’t like level, gear treadmills (although the building a house aspect doesn’t sound horrible especially there is content to play after the house is built). I have fun playing WvW with only weekly goals to dominate and have server pride. While the DF aspect of DAOC was fun, I had more fun going against people in RvR and using equipment to siege the keeps.

Again, I propose that perhaps GW2 simply isn’t the MMO you are looking for. That said, it doesn’t mean it’s a failed model. As is evident by at least 3 other people here and hundreds on reddit, there is a following of people who prefer to just enjoy the content at an MMO level without requiring a treadmill.

@Keen – First, the agony mechanic is not new. It was part of GW1 and therefore it is entirely possible that as was mentioned previously by one of the devs that this was a missing tier of armor that was originally intended to exist. As such, it may also mean that the treadmill as it were is meant to stop at where it currently exists and will be extended no further.

Secondly, grind and “progression” (or if tied to levels or gear … treadmill as I prefer to call it) can be a slippery slope. What may feel like progression to one, may feel like a grind to someone else (especially to those who would prefer no such treadmill exist).

Third, while ArenaNet may not have a pay to win model with their cash shop, this could also be a window in to their greed if you will. they could be attempting to introduce a much slower treadmill than is normally introduced into “progression” type games in order to maintain the presence of both types of players (those that like treadmills and those that don’t).

@steeldragon — Yes I see where you are going with it, especially if they add new mechanics. As it is now though all that gets added is agony, so you are basically getting a very similar experience at fractal difficulty 1. You can see the content and have fun with it even with crap gear.

Also, even if you do want to see all of the difficulty levels… you will get the gear just by leveling through the fractals. It’s not that insanely hard to get.

I do like progression but people have become way too focused on it. When I played Legend of Zelda as a kid I played the game not because I wanted that cool looking level three sword, but because I wanted to defeat Gannon. The powerups in Metroid were a means to getting to Mother Brain, not an end in themselves. Sure finding a new gun in Doom or Doom 2 was fun and I wanted to have all the guns to use — but again, the goal wasn’t to collect the guns. It was to kill ALL the demons.

Nowadays all too many players just skip all the dialogue and story elements. It’s not about defeating Zhaitan or killing Jormag — it’s about getting the shinies. I bet most players don’t even really know what the Fractals of the Mists even are other than a thing you do to get more shinies. This pattern is a result of choices made by players, not developers.

@steeldragon – the problem is, ArenaNet started to see too much of the “maybe this MMO isn’t for you”. At some point, it has to start being *for someone* in order for them to survive. And by their actions, it seems the players who didn’t want more character progression were in the minority.

I have no doubt they needed more character progression… Ascended tier of gear was an odd choice especially at this point in the lifecycle.

@Keen I disagree. I think that Zelda and Metroid were just as much about progression. Heck, take classics like Final Fantasy 6 and 7 — those games had ever heavier progression elements.

In all of those games a major goal of gameplay was to gain access to tools that would make your character more powerful. In fact, some of these games have even harsher gating mechanics than most MMOs do. In Metroid, for example, it was common to reach a point where you literally could not go further in the game until you obtained a certain powerup. Some MMOs have very strict content gating, but GW2 is not one of them. You can do the vast majority of GW2’s content with sub-optimal gear.

I can’t speak to Planetside 2 as I have not played it.

The thing about MMOs is that they are generally more open-ended games. Classic single player games generally set out a very specific goal — save the princess, kill mother brain, etc. In an MMO you get to define what your goal is yourself. It might be to finish the story mode, or to clear all the dungeons, to kill every son of svanir you see or whatever. True sandbox MMOs are incredibly open-ended, whereas themepark MMOs are open-ended with limitations. If the game is “about progression” for you it’s because you CHOSE that focus for yourself.

Also you can’t make the argument that classic games are more story driven than MMOs because many MMOs have just as much if not way more story than just about any early video game.

“I think they’re on the right track though. Ascended Gear needs to be in the game because it represents a sense of purpose.”
It represents the wrong sense of purpose if you ask me. I played GW, I was more than happy with grinding to get a specific set of gear ONLY because of the looks (stats where IDENTICAL to what I was already wearing).
To me this not only is ANet breaking their promise, it’s a giant leap in the WRONG direction for the game if you ask me. It’s exactly what MMOs doesn’t need…

I hate the idea of the new ascended gear due to the impact that it will have on WvWvW which is the only reason I play GW2. Scale down the stats to match exotics in WvWvW and I will be fine with the carebears getting their shiny new gear grind.

@Keen: In the right direction for you, and the type of players that needs those kinds of carrots to keep playing. “Problem” is however that not every player wants that, some actually doesn’t want vertical progression AT ALL. GW was full of these players, they sold millions of copies of the GW campaigns to players like this. These are (among others) the people screaming that ascended gear is bad for the game, because that’s how we feel.

While you felt no purpose in continuing the game because you had “nothing to stretch for”, it’s the opposite for me. I felt I could stretch for getting other armor models, but it’s all optional. Getting BETTER gear is never optional, and therein lays the problem.

Now I agree that to keep a huge pool of players satisfied they needed to add gear progression, because the facts are in the numbers, most people want gear progression to justify their time spent ingame. That doesn’t make it the right choice for me though. I’m not deluded to thinking ANet wants to give away an opportunity to earn more money, so I understand very well why they did it, but it still is a step in the wrong direction for me. I’d take a game with 200k active players with NO vertical progression over one with 20million active players that has vertical progression any day.

Vertical progression is a placeholder for fun. If the game or the activity is fun and satisying by itself then you really dont need vertical progression. However, if the game or the activity you engage in is boring or dull then vertical progression will help you get over these dull moments. It is a crutch…it seems to be especially important to themepark MMOs.

GW2 needs to incorporate more fun activities – for a themepark that would most likely mean cranking out new and interesting content on a monthly basis…if they cannot do this, they need to rely on vertical progression to close the gap and to keep people entertained.

As an example – Themepark v. Sandbox dungeon

Themeparks have the problem that everything is designed from the ground up in order to control content – that means if I experience that content for the first time – it is likely to provide me with a certain minimum level of entertainment (which will make it fun and interesting). However, every additional encounter with the same content will be less satisfying and eventually be boring. Vertical progression takes the edge off.

In a sandbox dungeon, you dont know what will happen. The experience could seriously suck or it could be awesome – this dungeon has a sense of adventure. Maybe the dungeon is crowded (non-instanced) and the whole experience is annoying. You get it to yourself with your friends and you make bank or find good loot. Maybe the spawn today is especially tough but you make it through it…maybe you find some extra good random loot – maybe you find squat…maybe there will be a group of PK’s entering the dungeon killing you and your friends…you can can run this dungeon many times and vertical progression may not really matter. However, even with this, vertical progression may be required to take the edge off the bad experiences 9which may be random in Sandboxes but which are increasing with time as you repeat content in themeparks)

WvW is the only thing I see in GW2 that could be fun without vertical progression but it isnt there yet – in order to get there – you need something…a sense of accomplishment, realm pride, a sense of adventure,…you need something. Howeverm as mentioned before, vertical progression even has its part in this aspect of the game.

“But GW2 was designed without those restrictions, and we’ve always expected that we will someday raise the level cap in GW2.” – Mike O’Brien, ArenaNet.

That’s right, so there will be some form of treadmill coming. WoW Jr. Maybe. Not sure. It depends on how innovative they make the level increases. If it’s just higher levels with higher level gear, I’ll start looking else where because I’m not going to stick around to run a treadmill.

I am not too happy about the new gear added but I understand they do want to add it for progression seeking players. And I don’t think the new gear is going to turn GW2 to WoW Jr simply because you can still do everything with old gear, so no content is really gated. And if they keep their promises of a shallow power curve and making new gear easy to get through other means like WvW, I don’t see it having a big impact on the part of the game I care most (WvW).

However what I am worried about is their pacing of implementing the whole system. As we can see from the responses, the decision has really pissed off a large portion of ANET’s loyal fan base, and I doubt the new system is going to bring back a lot of players that already left. So unless ANET do something soon to appease the current player base, I fear a massive exodus will happen soon…

Well, we don’t see any party require exotic gear for dungeon runs right now anyway and it’s not going to happen with ascended gear as well. The only exception is when you are doing 30+ level fractual but by then you should have got the gear anyway…

I am only seeing minor differences between gw2 and wow now. The only thing gw2 has going for it is wvwvw and it has no monthlh sub.

Had they made the ability to unlock new skills, not same skill +1, but different skills and allowed you to customise your character more their vl progression might have worked. As it stood it was pretty shallow. So they went vertical progression instead.

Ok first off. I would like to say that this is “a step in the wrong direction”

But hold on. I am not just a troll coming up here to hate everything. I actually have some sense to my words.
First off arena net originally made this new rarity because in quote “the most dedicated players were achieving ther set of exotic gear, and hitting the legendary wall”.
Now what they mean by this is that MOST players were making it to the end of the level progression, and from there most player would be unable to get legendary(wall). So because people would hit the end of the gear grind. Arena net thinks they would have nothing to do. so they thought they should have another rarity to separate legendary from exotic, and give players something to do…………..ok stop. First off people were hitting the exotic gear because that’s how the game was suppose to happen. Legendarys are not suppse to be end game. they are supose to be those things that are made for Those hard core player. which by the way make up less then halve the players.It’s after u hit exotic that there is no gear grind. You are done. Now you can go a wvwvw, and Dungeons. Which by the way……it not much. Simply because dungeons are a disapointing, and wvwvw is fun yet it does not appeal to everyone. Really arena net should have only added new content(. Lost shores was an excellent expansion for dungeons. ) Instead of simply adding a grind for players to waste there time . instead of actually having fun. Really just because a game has something to do does not make it fun.

But let’s go over why most people down right hate this thing. Like arena net stated ( the most dedicated players were hitting there set of exotics). This population is made up of people that have spent a ton of carma, gold, crafting. In other words people that have spent a LOT of work in order to get the end game gear that they wanted. But the simple. Ever so simply fact that there will be a higher tier of armor/weapons. Is heart breaking for those that have spent all of there time heading for what they thought would be the end of the grind. Only to have wasted there time and energy. Sure arena net have said that the legendary weapons will get the boost in stats if there comes the time when we get acended weapons(oh god no). But hay. What about the rest of us. “The most dedicated players”. All of our work for our exotic gear will be wasted. I will probably just stop grinding the other dungeons because the armor i will get from them is now gay. Really what can i keep from my now old end game. What will we keep from it? Maybe the skin if its worth keeping. But other than that it was a waste of time and effort.

Really sure we don’t have acended weapons/a few armor pieces now. But the simple fact that the acended tier is not complete will encourage arena net to finish the tier. Which would have been a mistake.
Arena net has gone against thir own philosophy. Some people say this is ok. Assuming the philosophy was wrong it begin with. WHICH IT WaS NOT!!!! What made guld wars 2 such a hero to us mmo players was that it SET US FREE!!!!! The simple fact that they are going back on their word, and are locking us in chains of the philosophy of other mmo’s (grinding is fun o0…mind control). I know that arena net did a simple thing. But they made a huge mistake by doing it.

What arena net should have done? Ok first off they should not have added the new tier considering there reasons they added it. Just because people do not have enuff things to do at end game. Does not mean you should add more to the work effort. Why. Because work is not fun. By adding a new thing that we will have to work for (because it is now a must have as it is the new end game). Really they should have added only new things to play in the game. Not things to work to play in the game. The fractals of the mists was a beutiful example of what they should be doing. Which is making more things that players can CHOOSE TO DO. Not things that players HAVE TO DO. They should have added a exotic gear that has infusion slots. That way people can get the protection they need. Withought having to chain all the players regardless if they like it or not.

What they should do? Really the simple fact that their is only a few acended gear out there. There are no acended weapons yet (thank god). So arena net still has a chance to fix themselves before its too late. They should nip it at the bud while they can. They should do this by getting rid of the acended rarity. Lower the stats slightly on the acended gear(which is now exotic). now people that want to have protection in the dungeons can, and the rest of us do not need acended gear in order to have fun. If they come out with more armor/weapons. They should be exotic with infusion slots. After that they should not simply “give us something to do”. Instead they should add more content, and in other words “give us something to do that’s fun”

Really what makes a game fun is freedom. With mmo’s there really is not that much freedom. Until gw2 that is. Well at least until they broke the heart of thousands of people by chaining them up, and getting rid of its previous freedom.

William Wallace once said ” FREEDOM! “, and that is what this game has lost. Freedom!