The Guild Wars 2 Thread

[Black]

Black went from funny troll to ignore list.

Tycn I am still interested in reading from.

Unname me!

 

[fizzelopeguss]

Fucking hell, forgot it was this week.

 

[Cowboy Moment]

Is it just me or does it take an inordinate amount of effort to make a human male look not gay?

Anyway, I'm Cuban Pete.2541 on Desolation EU.

 

[Berekän]

I never played GW1 but so far GW2 underwhelms me. Character skills seem very boring and limited, character system in general doesn't look like it holds much promise. I like how the quest zone is just an open area that you explore and you stumble upon various in-progress quests that you can complete along with 50+ other people. However, the combat itself is boring, not tactical at all, and it's pretty tough to even see what's going on half the time.

I'm only level 4 though so I'll put in a bit more time before a final verdict.

At level 4 you haven't even unlocked the skills allocation, how can you give an impression of the skill system if you haven't used it yet.

Also, to people concerned about the history, don't get your hopes tol high, the history in the original game was cringeworthy, it has never been their strong point.

Is it just me or does it take an inordinate amount of effort to make a human male look not gay?

That's why real men roll a Norn

 

[fizzelopeguss]

Hmm, i'm a bit bored already. norn guardian (their starter zone sucks), and human mage (better). And is it just me or does the engine perform like an absolute dog?

 

[Berekän]

It seems like it's still CPU bound, might be part of the problem, some people are suggesting upgrading to the latest Nvidia beta drivers which has given them some FPS increase.

 

[Tigranes]

I'm overseas at the moment and (1) it won't accept my credit card, and (2) it looks like the game is region-locked anyway?

 

[fizzelopeguss]

Better performance by setting reflection down a notch

 

[Excidium]

I got into a big fight against some shadow behemoth on the swamps with other people. There was no strategy, no tactics involved at all. People were just jumping around spamming their skills that weren't on cooldown. As was I, because it seemed to be the best way of taking it down.

This reminds me of a Boss on the Norn area, he turned on a shield that reflected damage from time to time, it was just too hilarious seeing all those ranged guys go down like flies one after the other. I kinda gave up trying to kill it because I was apparently the only one smart enough to stop auto attacking when the shield was up. Also yes there are no cast bars, you have to track animations and memorize what they do, isn't that harder and more rewarding?

That sort of thing really varies a lot, of course if you have a giant zergfest it's all about mashing buttons dealing the most damage before everyone dies and the boss reset but there was an World Event on the Norn ~level 10 zone that unorganized goons just couldn't beat at all, it was also most hilarious to watch, people would respawn and run all the way back just to get insta-gibbed again by his PBAoE, that or they would dodge out of his blizzard shit right into another one.

It's something that always amazed me about MMO players, people are all organized and shit on their guilds but when they're with random people, moving away from an fire on the ground is a challenging concept.

 

[Stabwound]

My first impression of the game is that it's like GW 1: casual and a bit shallow but a lot of fun if you play with friends.

I wonder if my GW1 guild is going to be playing GW2. I'm kind of on the fence about buying the game, mostly because I don't really want to play solo and I don't know anyone who's going to buy it.

And I was surprised at how demanding the game is as far as computer specs go. I was falling into 10-15fps range on medium settings in my starter area.

 

[Black]

Played a bit of WvW, it's a giant clusterfuck, not much else. The only difference between this and mega supa boss fights is that there are more people in this one. Headless chickens running around, lags everywhere, fps close to 0.

I miss Alliance Battles from GW1.

 

[Mangoose]

Spamming every skill that's not on cooldown will do buttfuck DPS for many weapons, btw. Because besides Skill 1, usually only one or two other skills will do good damage off cooldown. The other skills either do less damage while doing an additional effect, or are situationally defensive, or are just situationally unique.

If you are a Warrior using a longbow with a bunch of people taking one a single boss, you are wasting your damage if you use skill 3 or skill 5. Because what good would an AOE or an immobilize (that does less damage than Skill 1) do on a single boss while you have a zerg?

Thieves don't have cooldowns. What are you gonna spam?

Guardian with Hammer, have fun spamming Skill 5 that does no damage, Skill 4 does less dmg than Skill 1 and launches your enemy (and probably won't budge the boss), keep spamming that Skill 3 immobilizing that boss that's not moving in the first place, again doing less damage than Skill 1.

Also, mega supa boss fights truly have various siege weapons, destructible walls, destructible doors, open area supply camps, suppy caravans that move supplies from camps to keeps. Yeah.

This reminds me of a Boss on the Norn area, he turned on a shield that reflected damage from time to time, it was just too hilarious seeing all those ranged guys go down like flies one after the other.

There's a Mesmer utility skill that puts a reflecting shield around your enemy. Lulz.

 

[CrimsonAngel]

The Guardion have a reflection utility also.

Nothing like watching WvW army fry them self.

 

[Excidium]

If a player has retaliation, does he take the retaliaton damage from his own reflected projectiles?

 

[Castanova]

Played the game some more. Got Engineer to level 6, did some WvW, etc. Additional time did not help me start to like this game. It's pretty terrible. Not worth $60.

 

[made]

Certainly not worth 60 bucks, no. I like it overall though, will probably buy later this year when they've hopefully worked out some quirks (camera ffs) and price has dropped a bit.

 

[garren]

Yes, the camera. Is horrible.

 

[Hoaxmetal]

What's your problem with it? Scrolling out further would be very nice, didn't see anything else wrong.

 

[made]

FoV and mouse smoothing personally. They did increase the zoom a little bit in this build.

Good post explaining in detail:

https://forum-en.guildwars2.com/for...amera-Issues-Compilation-and-Wish-List/page/1

 

[Excidium]

Remove the acceleration associated with the turn-left/turn-right keys (A and D by default), so they turn at full speed as soon as they’re pressed rather than getting progressively faster as they are held down.

Keyboard turning noobs.

 

[Berekän]

Heh, I've let my brother play a bit today and it was a pain watching him struggle with the turning, he insisted on using the keyboard because he couldn't control very well the camera. I dunno, I've got a smooth control of the camera, though I've never had any major problems with cameras in videogames, don't know what the fuzz is all about.

 

[Mangoose]

I really didn't notice anything about the camera. Well, BWE1 felt a little off, but they tweaked a little in BWE2. I'm not talking objectively - just saying subjectively the problems described I haven't even thought about. FOV maybe I got used to playing console ports, or it doesn't matter to me, but note I did grow up playing Q3 all day. As for mouse smoothing, I personally hate it in general, and turn it off whenever I can. Even downloaded some guy's program to make sure I get 1:1 mouse movement in Windows. But I didn't notice any mouse smoothing in GW2 - I think because I notice it much more in a shooter, and much less in this type of game where you have to right click to change camera view anyway.

Not that I disagree objectively with the problems and suggestions. If mouse smoothing bothers other players, fix it. I'd support fixing it just out of principle. Turning off mouse acceleration/smoothing is often even in console ports, so I assume it's something they can throw in very easily. If they don't... that's quite a big oversight or mistake, I admit.

Mouse-look lock would be really nice. But it takes a little tweaking and the crosshair must be context sensitive. See DDO as an example. Just having plain mouse-look lock without the extra work will be pointless. So even if they want to add it, it's probably quite low on the priority chain pre-launch.

Also I scripted a macro on my G13 to toggle mouse-look on and off in Age of Conan because it's an 'action-y' MMO (for some reason it used to be there and they fuckign too it off - fuck you, Funcom). But that's what showed me that you need the extra context work - I constantly had to toggle it off to interact with non-hostile NPCs, do stuff with my inventory, etc. But DDO does it right - the function of the mouse keys change depending what you're aiming at - but that takes work. Champions Online has a very bare-bones context-sensitive mouselook toggle; it works but feels awkward (maybe more of an engine problem, or camera smoothing).

And fuck the keyboard turners. This is also an especially stupid suggestion in that list of points when mouse-look lock is in the same list. There are bigger problems and bugs to fix before launch. Fuckin hell.

 

[Mastermind]

My first impression of the game is that it's like GW 1: casual and a bit shallow but a lot of fun if you play with friends.

How is GW1 "casual" and "shallow"? It had one of (if not the) best combat systems out of any rpg ever made, which is quite an achievement for a MMO.

GW2 on the other hand is just WOW without a monthly fee and better art direction.

 

[made]

I assume it's something they can throw in very easily. If they don't... that's quite a big oversight or mistake, I admit.

Yes, or intentional. Since the game is planned for consoles and it's supposed to be about competitive PVP (though I don't see it in its current state) maybe they don't want to implement features that would give PC players an advantage.

 

[Stabwound]

Casual and shallow compared to other RPGs, I mean. I don't really play MMORPGs ever; GW was the the only one I've ever played extensively. And I meant shallow/casual in that the loot/equipment/levelling hits a hard ceiling very early and getting new shit has the same stats but just looks different.

GW PVP was pretty complex and involved but I wouldn't say that the PvE game was very in depth.

 

[Ulminati]

So did you play PvP yet Stabwound? PVP characters start with all skills unlocked and all gear has the same stats but can be altered cosmetically. and it's way more complex and involved than GW1 PvP.

Or did you just blunder around the overpopulated starting zones and draw all your conclusions from that experience?

 

[Stabwound]

You're right; I didn't play outside of the starter area. I'm basing my opinion on about 3-4 hours of play over a few different characters and reading about the game online.

All I'm saying is that in these kinds of games, I like to feel my character getting stronger and have cool/better equipment and that kind of stuff to strive for. GW1 didn't do this very well if you ask me, since you hit the max level and got the best stuff when you were less than 1/4 through the content. I actually didn't even purchase the expansions because playing more content without feeling like my character is getting any stronger isn't appealing to me. The main appeal of these kinds of games is getting better loot and skills so you can kill tougher monsters and get better loot and skills.

Maybe GW2 has the level curve done better, as in stretches level 1-80 over all of the content rather than hitting a max level quickly and having nothing to strive for except shit with a different name and appearance. I guess no one can really say that at this point?

But what I'm reading is that the whole game is level scaled and everyone hits the same cap on equipment and skills and then the only point of continuing on in the game is to dress your character up like a Sims game. I'm not saying that the GW/GW2 anti-grind and equal playing field philosophy is bad; I'm just saying that it's not that appealing to people that like loot whoring games.

I will say that I'm sure the game is a lot of fun with friends despite not having your character progress in strength after a certain point, though. I had fun doing shit like the Underworld in GW even though it was mostly pointless in regards to improving your character.

 

[Tycn]

it's way more complex and involved than GW1 PvP