Baldur The Bold

Di-Dorval, on 18 May 2013 - 01:16 PM, said:

This is what is missing from GW2. I might start playing GW1 again. I really hope they don't shut the game down anytime soon.

Finally, after months of questioning the fate of the Elder Undead Dragon, I've found Zhaitan's body!

After killing the Elder Dragon (with sparkle cannons =P), my party and I decided to check-off skydiving over Orr from our Things-To-Do-After-Level-80 List. Well, amazingly, we all forgot our parachutes on the ship and fell tragically to our deaths.

We found we ended up where our first gunship had fallen, still running along with various other Pact soldiers (who we hope weren't ghosts @_@) Fortunately, I brought a revive orb and thus we began our exploration, or so we thought. Unfortunately though, I was the only one not stuck with the ship (curse those invisible walls!) so I had to venture alone. From this point it was all just empty space and swimming in nothingness for a long while which I will not bore you with a thorough retelling of.

After long periods of swimming and moving around invisible walls, I found Zhaitan! Here are the screens =3
(The dead elder dragon!)


(Mee and muh buddae, Zhaitan. Say Hi Zhaitan!)


(First Person to Touch an Elder Dragon ^^)


(Mystery Cloud! O_O)


EDIT: Forgot to also mention, found Zhaitan's tails that were cut/beamed off which actually led me to Zhaitan, so I guess those are also included in the model.

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Am I the only person who read that statement as being so unbelievely sarcastic that it couldn't possibly be taken seriously, not even to the "person" who implimented it?

ben911993, on 21 May 2013 - 07:33 PM, said:

Indeed. I generally shrug it off because I don't regard it as any skin off my teeth if I don't get the stuff in RNG boxes and so I don't bother even trying.

However, they're hiding behind a very thin veil to avoid the anti-gambling laws. If there was any legal way to convert stuff from boxes into real-world currency, they WOULD need a license to do what they're doing. Because there isn't, though, they (and Valve - the keys for boxes in TF2 was basically exactly the same principle as BLCs now) get away with it because the laws in Western countries don't view virtual goods as being real - you're not gambling because regardless of what you get, in the eyes of the law it's worth nothing, and it's not the law's concern if the worthless thing you get isn't the worthless thing you were hoping for.

Just because the law doesn't regard it as gambling doesn't change what it is, though.

MazingerZ, on 21 May 2013 - 12:45 PM, said:

For any that are defending the practice of RNG in their game PLEASE take the time to read this post:
https://forum-en.gui...RNG-Boxes/first
One of the best posts I've ever read, even if I don't agree 100% with it.

Lordkrall, on 21 May 2013 - 08:07 PM, said:

The problem is that it's only a promotion for more gem store items. There's not even any content to go with it, just stuff to buy. In GW1, the only time they released cash shop items was when a new arc of content was released. But the cash shop in GW2 is now starting to overshadow the actual content players are supposed to be coming back for, which is exactly what I had mentioned before. GW2 is headed down a very profit-focused path.

I'm all for releasing a couple cosmetic items in promotion of new, quality content. But this Living Story is far from what I'd call quality, and soon the cash shop items may be outshining it.

Guild Wars 2 was going to be a worthy successor to the original gem and at the same time Anet was planning revolutionize MMORPGS forever more. This was going to be a gamechanger that would shift the paradigm so dramatically that all major MMOs released after GW 2 launched would have to take note. This game was going to rewrite the mother♥♥♥♥ing playbook. Has it? It's not even deserving of the name Guild Wars let alone even coming close to any of the expectations placed on it. I love how some people have been reduced to trying to drag threads off-topic or merely telling people that the game is not quite as bad as they think it is. How low the messiah has fallen that the fanboys are reduced to the statement: "Well, it's not complete shit!"

Azure Skye, on 16 May 2013 - 02:14 PM, said:

Strawman argument. You can't just change the argument by saying that they exist in other games so they are OK.

This has nothing to do with how to stop these practices or whether other games have these practices, but whether these practices are good and ethical.

I mean, did you even watch the video you posted about microtransactions? There are a good and bad way to handle micro-transactions. DO YOU THINK THIS ONE IS A GOOD ONE?

I mean, I hope you aren't seriously saying that because "Lotteries are a tax on the stupid." That you think it is OK to use predatory practices in a game that don't even conform to the same kind of regulations as a lottery. (What % chance do you have to win these items? I'm guess you don't know because they aren't published.)

You can try and change the argument all you want to make it OK to exploit the psychological mindset of the average gamer, but it is still exploitative, unless you want to argue that it isn't.

And, I'm still waiting for someone who wants to argue that this is good simply because it adds revenue to the game that the ends always justify the means and it doesn't matter how you make revenue.

It's smart psychology by ArenaNet to pad their own pockets. I mean, let's face it, no matter how many people here want to disagree, the accumulation of in game "gear" as it represents a status symbol, especially in a socially focused game like an MMO, is perhaps the biggest competition between PvE players.

So now take the psychological DESIRE for status and couple that with the psychological aspect of gambling, both as it relates to behaviorism (see: Skinner Box) and the fact that gambling addiction is a disease - and you have what amounts to a full fledged ethical dilemma.

Yes, people don't have to buy the boxes. But, that is not the question. The question is whether it is ethical to incorporate two giant psychological attractions to basically take advantage of the weak willed players in the game merely for profit.

Also, let's not assume that just because a company needs to profit, that is the answer to that question. There are plenty of ways to create profit without lowering oneself to exploiting your player base.

I just imagine the developers thinking "a fool and his money are soon parted" right as they hit the button to launch the new update.

Come celebrate Guild Wars 2 first birthday with exciting new items in the Black Lion Chest! For just 500gems per birthday key you can have a 1 in 98634863246732864873246 chance of getting an anniversary mini or weapon skin!

A 1st year birthday present that isn't linked to the gem store.

Dasryn, on 10 May 2013 - 12:15 PM, said:

I think we DO want the holy trinity...but I think the change we need most at the time being are some well revised condition mechanics.

chullster, on 10 May 2013 - 11:30 AM, said:

Everything this man says is correct. (Except for rangers being useless. I don't agree.)

Conditions VS DPS("slash slash slash," etc.)

DPS currently destroys condition damage. Thus why everyone goes full berserker. We have no use for conditions, EXCEPT poison.

I don't think ArenaNet gives a damn about that. But CONDITIONS is what they need to address directly, in order to have some interesting builds coming out instead of, "GLF3M WARRIOR FULL ZERKER ONLY!!!" as well as full zerker being the ONLY viable gear build in PvE... i'd say, PvP as well.

My two mains, ranger and mesmer, I both had at full condition damage for at least 4 months, carrion sets. I just recently made the change to ALL zerker sets last month and saw how much more damage I was dealing on a constant basis. Condition damage is far from viable. Thus players ONLY have one choice at the moment: "The Zerker Build." This is a strict "holy build" that everyone must follow and it's not creativity or fun at all.

Or it could allow them to do what they did with it for the last couple months - pretty much nothing of significance. Either get a bigger team to provide content that actually matters, or leave the bread-bits out of overblown announcements to begin with, that way - nobody gets their hopes up.

He's been saying the same garbage for YEARS.

Arenanet needs a new game director...

Everything he says is geared towards "THE FUTURE." Every month the community asks hundreds of questions and all the devs give us is:

"We're developing new ideas that we will continue to work on in the distant future! Our ideas are unique and innovative and exciting! Players will be going through an entirely new experience never before seen in an MMORPG!"  

"We're trying new things."
"We're trying something unique and different."
"We're looking at what we can do."
"You have not seen what we will do in the future."

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etc...

Christ, isn't this what the development & planning stage was for?

8 months after release and they still don't know what they're doing...Can we just get development for an official expansion started already?... we barely have anything to do in the current game...

Is it just me, or does Colin seem more and more out of touch with the player base lately?  Comparing the living story to a T.V. show is pretty silly, especially since TV shows can be watched repeatedly (and more often than not these days it can be done on-demand).  One thing that should have been abundantly clear after the fiasco that was the Karka event is that temporary or one time content does not sit well with players, especially when it means resources were devoted to such content when there are still many bugs needing to be fixed and improvements that should have been made to the permanent content.