239 replies to this topic

[raspberry jam]

Ghostwing, on 20 November 2012 - 01:51 PM, said:

Is that happening yet?

Yes

Alleji, on 20 November 2012 - 01:52 PM, said:

Not possible in an infinite system. You have to write each "smartness level" of the AI individually or write one and then disable components at lower levels. I guess they could make a dozen and turn them up every 5 levels, but it will inevitably hit a cap anyway.

This is the same thing as increasing damage. Moreover, there's nothing stopping them from tweaking both numbers. Maybe they already did at high levels... I wouldn't know since I only got to 12.

It's not GW's limited system, it's true for any system.

Yeah, but the AI could be self-teaching. By the time players reach level 20, they would be teaching the level 30 AI how to kill players.

Above level 10 there seems to be nothing happening except more agony.

[Lordkrall]

raspberry jam, on 20 November 2012 - 02:17 PM, said:

Yeah, but the AI could be self-teaching. By the time players reach level 20, they would be teaching the level 30 AI how to kill players.

Above level 10 there seems to be nothing happening except more agony.

I find it highly doubtful that ArenaNet (or any MMO-company) would have access to that high level of technology however.

[raspberry jam]

Lordkrall, on 20 November 2012 - 02:23 PM, said:

I find it highly doubtful that ArenaNet (or any MMO-company) would have access to that high level of technology however.

Machine learning is taught at university level, if you took Comp Sci you are likely to have studied it. There were training bots for various FPSes 10-15 years ago that learned how you played as you played with them. It's really a quite simple thing.

[Lordkrall]

raspberry jam, on 20 November 2012 - 02:31 PM, said:

Machine learning is taught at university level, if you took Comp Sci you are likely to have studied it. There were training bots for various FPSes 10-15 years ago that learned how you played as you played with them. It's really a quite simple thing.

They did learn, but within rather limited ways. What you are suggestion does require a much higher level of AI than that however.

[raspberry jam]

Lordkrall, on 20 November 2012 - 02:34 PM, said:

They did learn, but within rather limited ways. What you are suggestion does require a much higher level of AI than that however.

ML, not AI. Though it would need to use stratified AI as a wrapper. These concepts should not be unfamiliar to ANet. The truth of the matter however is that they don't do not because they can't, but because they don't want to. FotM isn't supposed to be an actual challenge, it's supposed to slow people down with a gradual trickle of ascended gear releases while ANet is working on the next content update.

[bdatty]

Protoss, on 20 November 2012 - 12:45 PM, said:

It's interesting how many of us, lazy bums, put in thousands of hours into GW1 to grind our asses off for pretty outfits.

This ain't GW1, get your head out of the clouds. It's like aesthetics and rarity cannot co-exist in one game, and if you guys spend more time on the look why not for the stats, not that hard in comparison. That just means more 'content'

Edited by bdatty, 20 November 2012 - 02:51 PM.

[Steadfast Gao Shun]

Ladies and gents. While no doubt a lot of what's been said make sense, wouldn't it be worthwhile to wait and see what happens? Those fractals have been out for less than a week. Is it fair to blame them for content that hasn't been released yet?

[raspberry jam]

bdatty, on 20 November 2012 - 02:46 PM, said:

MMO are meant to spend time on based on the players time management depending on content.

What does this sentence even mean? Does the players' time management depend on the content, or is the time being spent based on the time management? Or on the dependence between content and said time management? Or you you mean that you base your statement on the supposed dependency of time management on content?

[Alleji]

raspberry jam, on 20 November 2012 - 02:17 PM, said:

Yes

Yeah, but the AI could be self-teaching. By the time players reach level 20, they would be teaching the level 30 AI how to kill players.

I have no clue how this would work, but does seem awfully advanced

Quote

Above level 10 there seems to be nothing happening except more agony.

Hm, well that's rather disappointing. They could've fiddled with plenty of other numbers.

[raspberry jam]

Alleji, on 20 November 2012 - 02:59 PM, said:

I have no clue how this would work, but does seem awfully advanced

Hm, well that's rather disappointing. They could've fiddled with plenty of other numbers.

It ain't that advanced. Though that is what I meant when I said that GW2's system was limiting, because it allows for fewer strategies than GW1's did.

They might be messing around with other numbers, but I didn't notice. Only reached level 19 before quitting and deciding never to go in again due to boredom though.

Edited by raspberry jam, 20 November 2012 - 03:01 PM.

[Zippor]

Alleji, on 20 November 2012 - 02:59 PM, said:

I have no clue how this would work, but does seem awfully advanced

Not to say taxing to the resources of the game. Keeping tabs about all the teams and possibly all the individual players behaviour just to reference them at higher levels and calculate responses for hundreds of players going through the dungeon. To me it seems unrealistic in this day and age.

[Draugadan]

Honestly, how much of a moron does a person have to be to defend the mechanic we were all calling obsolete not a month ago, just because it was implemented in Guild Wars 2?

Oh, it's just one tier of gear? Well, WoW had the best gear obtainable in-game when it launched. Then came a new patch, with "bester" gear (this is where Guild Wars 2 is at now). Then, the next one with even "besterer" gear. Now it's sitting on "bestererer......er". What makes you think ArenaNet won't do the same? They don't even have the courage of publicly stating that Ascended is the last tier, because they know it's not true.

Then comes the expansion with a hard reset, rendering the several exotic sets some people have utterly obsolete. Oh, you could still have fun under those circumstances? Well then, have at it. I sincerely hope you'll be enjoying WoW 2.0 in Tyria.

[Ritualist]

bdatty, on 20 November 2012 - 02:41 PM, said:

This ain't GW1, get your head out of the clouds. It's like aesthetics and rarity cannot co-exist in one game, and if you guys spend more time on the look why not for the stats, not that hard in comparison. That just means more 'content'

Because we don't want to grind stats. We want to grind pretty and this is what GW2 was sold as.

[DuskWolf]

Ghostwing, on 20 November 2012 - 01:34 PM, said:

But what does it matter? Ascended gear only gets you access to the SAME content, but with increased numbers.

This one amuses and amazes me, so I have to poke it.

Okay, what does it matter? It matters because they've told us that they're planning on adding in other tiers, so the goalposts keep moving back. I'm with RJ. I don't like levels. In Mass Effect 3's mutliplayer, I can jump into gold difficulty on any map and rock it. I can do this because ME3 is all about horizontal progression (different as opposed to better). The only progression in ME3 is rare weapon upgrades, they're in the sub-1% range and reach a power plateau at rank X whichi s then not exceeded.

So, I can just create a new ME3 multiplayer account and I can play when I want, where I want, how I want. The only unlocks I get allow me to play differently. The base idea is something known as sidegrades. I'm sure you're familiar with the term. So they progress sideways, not upwards. GW2 is the opposite of that with its new progression system, the upgrades are better, not different.

And they've said that they can't promise us that they won't add new tiers in the future, because I think they're already afraid of being had on false advertising counts. Really, they recently said that 'they can't promise us that they won't be adding new tiers willy-nilly.' So what does that tell you? It means the goal posts will be moved back all the time. That means you're constantly chasing a moving target, as RJ pointed out.

Here's the issue I have with that: I want a power plateau. I can reach 80 in about two weeks. Again, RJ pointed this out and I'll explain why this is relevant. The promise given to me by ArenaNet was that when I get there, all new equipment is made up of sidegrades and cosmetic differences rather than straight upgrades. This means that I can get to 80 and not have to worry about grinding goals.

That last sentence is very important: I don't want grinding goals. I want to play the game for fun. I want to go and take on whatever bosses or dungeons I want, when I feel like it. For fun. I want to feel challenged because I know that new content is designed to try and engage my skills, not my numbers. Because that's fun. Watching a number grow isn't fun, it's frickin' actuary-porn. I'm not an actuary, or someone who wants actuary-porn.

I'm not that boring. My porn is way more interesting than that.

But apparently a minority here wants actuary-porn. They want to see numbers grow more than having their skill at a game challenged. Numbers! Numbers! Numbers!!! MOAR NUMBERS!!!! OH GOD YES THE NUMBERS!!!!! YESSSS! Pant pant pant. I mean, really? Is that all there is to a game for you? What RJ and I want is to just get the numbers out of the way so that we can play the game, and more importantly, so that we can have fun. Increasing numbers isn't fun.

I want to be able to wander the game, freely. To explore, to have fun, and to be challenged based upon my skill. I don't want to have to think about numbers because I'm not a number fetishist. It's fine if you are. I'm open-minded, and I don't begrudge you your number fetishism. But WoW is over there, and it's much more relevant to your very particular interests. It's not relevant to mine, I was hoping for a game which was more relevant to my interests.

Ascended gear matters because:

- I was expecting to not have any more grinding goals forced upon me once I hit 80.
- I was expecting future content to be designed around challenging the skill of players who'd hit the power plateau.
- I was expecting that there wouldn't be new tiers of gear to taint PvP with endless ladder climbing.

This is why Ascended matters. It's because of Ascended and future gear tiers that I will never be able to play the game my way. ArenaNet promised me that, but they haven't delivered. They promised that once we hit the power plateau, there'd be no more grinding. They promised us that future content would be designed to challenge us, not our numbers.

That's why Ascended gear matters. It's irrelevant whether it's a little or a lot, it's still grinding goals, and the power plateau goalposts have been pushed back. And they'll be pushed back again. And again. And again. I don't want that, I don't want a game where I can't stay at the power plateau. And why would I even bother when I have games like ME3 and Champions Online which actual fulfil this desire of mine without even ever having promised it to me.

[Menehune]

LethoOfGulet, on 20 November 2012 - 01:43 PM, said:

I really hate using the slippery slope argument, but do you truly believe that ArenaNet would invent a whole new gear tier and a gear-gating mechanic just to use it in one area?

Why not considering the effort ArenaNet put into a one time event. At least FoTM will still be available 24/7 whereas the weekend event is done and over never to be seen again.

[Draugadan]

DuskWolf, on 20 November 2012 - 03:15 PM, said:

But apparently a minority here wants actuary-porn. They want to see numbers grow more than having their skill at a game challenged. Numbers! Numbers! Numbers!!! MOAR NUMBERS!!!! OH GOD YES THE NUMBERS!!!!! YESSSS! Pant pant pant. I mean, really? Is that all there is to a game for you? What RJ and I want is to just get the numbers out of the way so that we can play the game, and more importantly, so that we can have fun. Increasing numbers isn't fun.

Well, with the crazy fetishes some people have, it wouldn't surprise me in the least if there were people for whom numbers constituted a sexual stimulus, least of all in an MMO. It's still funny though, in an extremely odd way: "My integer is bigger than the other people's. God, this is such a turn-on!" Mental self-pleasuring at its finest.

[DuskWolf]

Draugadan, on 20 November 2012 - 03:25 PM, said:

Well, with the crazy fetishes some people have, it wouldn't surprise me in the least if there were people for whom numbers constituted a sexual stimulus, least of all in an MMO. It's still funny though, in an extremely odd way: "My integer is bigger than the other people's. God, this is such a turn-on!" Mental self-pleasuring at its finest.

Yup. It was funny to me, and that's why I wrote it.

And I really don't begrudge anyone who uses numbers as some kind of measure of self worth, as mind porn to satisfy them, to make their lives complete. I don't. But... why this game? There are so many games out there where numbers and more numbers are the focus. Why does that have to happen to this game? The focus could be on making combat more fun, making professions more fun to play, providing content which challenges people based upon skill, and so on.

But no, it's numbers! Lies, damned lies, and bloody statistics! Hey baby, I have the greatest numbers out there. I'm hot now, right. And sure, for some people, that's a thing. Everyone has their thing. But why GW2? This was supposed to be one of the rare few  bastions away from that. But no, it's still about someone's integer being bigger than someone else's!

It makes me flail with exasperation. Whyyyyy?

[Draugadan]

DuskWolf, on 20 November 2012 - 03:30 PM, said:

It makes me flail with exasperation. Whyyyyy?

It may very well be because ArenaNet either lacked the competence to deliver a game that you would simply play for fun and so had to resort to the trick that most MMO developer use to keep players or they were pushed by NcSoft into doing this, with the thought that if WoW does it, then why shouldn't Guild Wars 2. What they failed to realize though is that no MMO ever has been able to defeat WoW at "WoW-ing". Why? Because for most players, WoW has, as of these days, an 8 year advantage. Why would anyone in their right mind leave thousands of hours invested in WoW go to waste, just to do the same stuff all over, but this time in Tyria?

I honestly can't understand these people. Do ArenaNet and NcSoft really want their game to be remembered as one of the "could have been"s?

[bdatty]

raspberry jam, on 20 November 2012 - 02:59 PM, said:

What does this sentence even mean? Does the players' time management depend on the content, or is the time being spent based on the time management? Or on the dependence between content and said time management? Or you you mean that you base your statement on the supposed dependency of time management on content?

sorry my Engrish is bud. You said "you must be unemployed." therefore no job = more time, correct? That seems to be the general idea anyway. So what is the difference between someone who has more time to progress vs someone who doesn't in this game. Absolutely nothing. It's all personal progression. You don't have to get the best stats in the game, you're not in a hurry for anything, but people feel obligated to do so because it's that mentality of getting the best of everything that makes them feel good yet no one can inspect player's gear. There is no need for maybe +5 stat difference. What ArenaNet should do is release a crap load of skins for people who want them and have stats come secondary on the while please those who do want stats because you have to consider the Fractals Dungeon concept.

Protoss, on 20 November 2012 - 03:10 PM, said:

Because we don't want to grind stats. We want to grind pretty and this is what GW2 was sold as.

What you say is true, I can not argue with that. (lol grind pretty) but you have to look at a game design point of view. First of all, you don't need to grind stats, no one said you have to. So the real problem lies on GW2 not adding more skins in the game.

Edited by bdatty, 20 November 2012 - 03:46 PM.

[Ghostwing]

raspberry jam, on 20 November 2012 - 02:17 PM, said:

Yes

Really? Well, then I stand corrected. They'd need to balance it.

DuskWolf, on 20 November 2012 - 03:15 PM, said:

Ascended gear matters because:

- I was expecting to not have any more grinding goals forced upon me once I hit 80.
- I was expecting future content to be designed around challenging the skill of players who'd hit the power plateau.
- I was expecting that there wouldn't be new tiers of gear to taint PvP with endless ladder climbing.

This is why Ascended matters. It's because of Ascended and future gear tiers that I will never be able to play the game my way. ArenaNet promised me that, but they haven't delivered. They promised that once we hit the power plateau, there'd be no more grinding. They promised us that future content would be designed to challenge us, not our numbers.

You missed the point of my post, which was preceded by a discussion saying that the new content can be done by most players, and the numbers increase is just there for the people who want it. The numbers, if Anet does it right, is cosmetic, in the larger scheme of things. Other PVE zones outside of fractals should downscale you accordingly (I don't know if they do, but they should). I was addressing the complaints here in this thread about players being gated out from content. I never said that increasing numbers as a way of increasing difficulty is ideal. But for those who DO want it, it's there, in the UPPER LEVELS of fractals. You can still do the lower levels, which does NOT take your numbers into account as much, and it's the same bloody content.

As far as WVW goes, it is not outside of their ability to balance it around this new tier. We'll have to wait and see.

As for your other spiel, yeah, it'd be great to have real time FPS combat in a MMO with hundreds of players that are in the same instance simultaneously. It'd be great to have AI that adapts to you, etc. Your imagination runs away from you. You don't seem to fanthom the technical limitations, the time limitations, the budget limitations, etc, that a real game is run on. You can go on and on about how this game can be better, but realistically, all your comparisons are invalid so far. Why don't you form up a development team, raise the capital, etc, and make that game you keep thinking GW2 can magically be?

Edited by Ghostwing, 20 November 2012 - 04:09 PM.

[MazingerZ]

Banned for too many infraction points (never had a one before) for advertising a friend's FOTM leveling service, and indicating that any gold can be bought at the ArenaNet Cash Shop with Gems.

Have yet to get any justification for the ban (Oh, I know why I was banned, I just never got an official word, and I'm not sure what I did in the legal parlance)

Edited by MazingerZ, 20 November 2012 - 03:51 PM.

[BlasBlas]

DuskWolf, on 20 November 2012 - 03:30 PM, said:

Yup. It was funny to me, and that's why I wrote it.

And I really don't begrudge anyone who uses numbers as some kind of measure of self worth, as mind porn to satisfy them, to make their lives complete. I don't. But... why this game? There are so many games out there where numbers and more numbers are the focus. Why does that have to happen to this game? The focus could be on making combat more fun, making professions more fun to play, providing content which challenges people based upon skill, and so on.

But no, it's numbers! Lies, damned lies, and bloody statistics! Hey baby, I have the greatest numbers out there. I'm hot now, right. And sure, for some people, that's a thing. Everyone has their thing. But why GW2? This was supposed to be one of the rare few  bastions away from that. But no, it's still about someone's integer being bigger than someone else's!

It makes me flail with exasperation. Whyyyyy?

You do not begrudge them, yet you mock them?

[raspberry jam]

bdatty, on 20 November 2012 - 03:45 PM, said:

sorry my Engrish is bud. You said "you must be unemployed." therefore no job = more time, correct? That seems to be the general idea anyway. So what is the difference between someone who has more time to progress vs someone who doesn't in this game. Absolutely nothing. It's all personal progression. You don't have to get the best stats in the game, you're not in a hurry for anything, but people feel obligated to do so because it's that mentality of getting the best of everything that makes them feel good yet no one can inspect player's gear. There is no need for maybe +5 stat difference. What ArenaNet should do is release a crap load of skins for people who want them and have stats come secondary on the while please those who do want stats because you have to consider the Fractals Dungeon concept.

I'm not the person who said you were unemployed, I just butted in.

But, yes, it's personal progression, it is that in every game including WoW. The difference is quite a bit larger than +5 though.

I totally agree that ANet should make cool new skins. I don't agree that they should please those who want stats because it locks in what the game will be in the long run.

[Zippor]

DuskWolf, on 20 November 2012 - 03:15 PM, said:

- I was expecting that there wouldn't be new tiers of gear to taint PvP with endless ladder climbing.

I have this itch you know...

[Azure Skye]

@.@ Shesh. So much bickering in this thread! I agree with Andrew Macleod on this. Run FoTM with PuGS (thrown to the wolves literally) or run it with a good buch of friends or guilds ( people you know). I rather take the friends, so understanable. @.@  I've done in even GW1. Why do you think it was hard to do Heroe's Ascent in GW1,you need to be competent to understand the basic mechanics of what you are facing. Either you need to be in a good guild or PuG yourself to level 3 or something. I never did HA, did i anything? No, would of done it,yes. Eh. Half of the time PuGs always fail but without warning in PvE or PvP.

Edited by Azure Skye, 20 November 2012 - 03:55 PM.

[Vayra86]

I have noticed something pretty shocking in this thread - people expecting an MMORPG to be devoid of any kind of statistics, level progression and other things that 'increase with progress'.

Did it never occur to you (Raspberry Jam - talking to you here - "Levelling an artificial mechanic that doesn't belong in GW2", WTF ?) that an RPG is actually all about numbers, stat progression and becoming stronger.

You guys are arguing about the genre, not about the game.

It would be nice if you noticed the difference for yourselves. If you want a game devoid of stats and difference in stats, you are playing the wrong genre. Wake up.

Edited by Vayra86, 20 November 2012 - 03:56 PM.

[Draugadan]

Vayra86, on 20 November 2012 - 03:55 PM, said:

I have noticed something pretty shocking in this thread - people expecting an MMORPG to be devoid of any kind of statistics, level progression and other things that 'increase with progress'.

Did it never occur to you (Raspberry Jam - talking to you here - "Levelling an artificial mechanic that doesn't belong in GW2", WTF ?) that an RPG is actually all about numbers, stat progression and becoming stronger.

You guys are arguing about the genre, not about the game.

It would be nice if you noticed the difference for yourselves. If you want a game devoid of stats and difference in stats, you are playing the wrong genre. Wake up.

Guild Wars 2 was promised to be different from the rest of games in the genre. You wake up.

[Vayra86]

Draugadan, on 20 November 2012 - 03:57 PM, said:

Guild Wars 2 was promised to be different from the rest of games in the genre. You wake up.

Then why oh why still classify it as an RPG?

I am wide awake, my friend. And actual daily practice is also working against you.

Edited by Vayra86, 20 November 2012 - 04:10 PM.

[Ghostwing]

Vayra86, on 20 November 2012 - 04:07 PM, said:

Then why oh why still classify it as an RPG?

I am wide awake, my friend. And actual daily practice is also working against you.

It can still be a RPG even with a power plateau.

[raspberry jam]

Vayra86, on 20 November 2012 - 03:55 PM, said:

I have noticed something pretty shocking in this thread - people expecting an MMORPG to be devoid of any kind of statistics, level progression and other things that 'increase with progress'.

Did it never occur to you (Raspberry Jam - talking to you here - "Levelling an artificial mechanic that doesn't belong in GW2", WTF ?) that an RPG is actually all about numbers, stat progression and becoming stronger.

You guys are arguing about the genre, not about the game.

It would be nice if you noticed the difference for yourselves. If you want a game devoid of stats and difference in stats, you are playing the wrong genre. Wake up.

No, RPG isn't all about numbers and stat progression. It's about playing a role in a world and having magical adventures and such things. The stats progression and numbers is just there to keep track of your character's growth within that world, but it's not what the game is about.

Take any Final Fantasy game. Numbers and stats progression? Yes for sure. But the game is about living through a (rather contrived) story about saving the world or some such.
Take Skyrim. Game is about killing dragons and stuff. Numbers and stats progression? They are there, but it's not about that.

Leveling is artificial, but that's not why it doesn't belong in a game like this. The reasons are much more practical than that: it keeps players from playing with each other (partially solved in GW2, but they *ed it up in other ways), and it makes players play content that they don't think is fun just to get stats. On a deeper level, it enforces a reward-driven gameplay instead of a content-driven one, ensuring that the game simply isn't as fun as it could be.