4921

AFAIK this is the first time they have been clear about it.

4922

They’ve been pretty bad about communicating. It’s not from lack of effort - they send out a fair bit of information. It’s splintered between their forums, blogs, twitter and facebook, though, and nobody seems to be in charge of consistency.

4923

You know something that bothers me? Lion’s Arch being the only active city. Seriously, Anet has 5 other beautiful, sprawling cities and they might as well be ghost towns!

Anet just announced that Wintersday will be held in surprise surprise Lion’s Arch. Wouldn’t the Norn capital be the ideal place to host a Christmas festival, I mean c’mon.

And then there’s the whole chat thing. Why on earth don’t the major cities share chat? Or better yet, give us a damn LFG channel if you’re not going to give us a dungeon finder.

A simple change to the chat system would do wonders in dispersing the population away from LA while reducing lag/fps issues and the high reliance on overflow servers.

4924

I want to have BIS gear so I can continue enjoying WvW and unwilling to grind it in dungeons.

As to in more general terms, as someone with very little inclination to grind dungeons I feel “LFM FoTM Level x”, where x>1 is fairly restrictive mechanic. It may test your skill at some point, but before that point it forces you to grind x-1 times 3 dungeons.

Overall - I find dungeon content in GW2 rather lackluster. It is admirable that Anet attempted to move away from healer/tank/dps but they have not succeeded in it. From what I have seen all dungeons have annoyance mechanics, trash that harder than bosses (but at least it is skippable) and a number of broken mechanics (e.g. CC chains that lock you out for 10+ seconds). Plus tons and tons of bugs.

As a result I am less than excited at the prospect of grinding PvE so I can feel competitive in WvW.

4925

That’s why GW2 shipped with a higher level cap, and with a hard separation between PvE and PvP.

What they call “PvP” is a DOTA-like ‘sPvP’ that is all but dead and abandoned. Most people PvP in WvW, and developers do not count it as “PvP”.

4926

What planet are you living on? The sPvP is like DOTA? Then I must be really confused as to what DOTA is. Dead and abandoned? Every time I’ve tried to do some pvp, there are at least dozens of games going on. Are we even playing the same game?

4927

Please do not be taking Sinij seriously. Thanking you kindly.

4928

Agreed. But to be fair, it’s still early yet and perhaps some of the things they have planned will involve the other cities.

4929

I hate the Grove. It has some pretty sections but it’s god awful to navigate.

4930

Time for one of my four annual posts:

To echo what has been said - you really, really don’t know what you’re talking about. They’re starting to have actual tournaments and whatnot for this, and sPVP is a very, very popular form of PvP in GW2. People like having a level playing field to win based solely on skill, and there continues to be a boatload of people in the Mists every day playing this.

The only DOTA-esque thing Anet has done was one of the limited-time Halloween maps, and even that was popular.

In summation: you, sir, are talking out of your sphincter.

4931

Well, from other posters, it’s already pretty clear how much value your posts have (at least lately and in this thread, who knows maybe you are saying cool insightful things in other threads I don’t follow), I just wanted to point out that this paragraph is also full of bullshit.

You demonstrate pretty remarkable lack of knowledge about basic stuff in this game, the only thing you are doing is re-posting stupid stuff some stupid people posted on some other forums.

“broken mechanics like CC chains that lock you out for 10+ seconds”, jeez. How do you even respond to a person that pulls his arguments out of his ass?

4932

From the WvW front…

For those that enjoy a good back and forth romp, this week’s matchup with Crystal Desert and Maguuma has been fairly entertaining, although zerg-a-licious. And it appears that we will we have a re-match with these servers next week.

4933

Wow, would that be the first time we ended up facing the exact same two realms in back to back weeks?

Also, doesn’t Maguuma normally whoop us?

4934

Some of the earlier weeks of WvW are a bit of a blur now, but I think this will be our first rematch.

Since our last tango with Maguuma, we have benefited from some folks transfering to Ehmry Bay. The real factor in this match has been the robust numbers fielded by CD. Before, Maguuma was able to gain a significant advantage over us during off hours. But in this match CD is holding the upperhand in territory, which has levelled the playing field somewhat for a spirited fight for 2nd place with Maguuma.

4935

This happened to me more than once, even once in STORY mode, that supposedly tuned as sub-max level content.

Twilight Arbor Story, 2 well necro pull in a small chamber. They fear, they also drop wells. Got stuck running into the wall feared and in the well, dead from full to zero before CC finished.

Ascalonian Catacombs Explore mode - packs of gravelings. Chain knock-down, dead full to zero before get out of it.

Those are from top of my head. I had similar experiences in Mannor, Arah and other dungeons I have done.

GW2 dungeons are not all that. Comparing to WoW they feel unpolished. Bugs that prevent you from progressing (examples - doing Mannor in story mode, got stuck on last fight because counter said kill 3 mobs, only 2 were there! doing Twilight in story mode - boss that turns you into cats was broken, killing pups or boss did not turn you back) are very common. Even when it all works as intended trash has way too much hit points and for not having tanks hits way too hard. It is not uncommon to have to graveyard zerg content just to finish it.

TL;DR Tank-less, healer-less CC-light design doesn’t work when mobs are tanks with tons of CC.

4936

L2p??

4937

I see Tom got through some of the registration backlog. So here’s my contribution to this.

I’ve done all explores and story modes except for Arah/Crucible/Sorrow’s explore, and it really does come down to party and individual skill. Even exchanging one bad player for a good one can completely 180 the difficulty of a run. For example, my first AC explore run, I had such a misfortune. We had enormous difficulty getting past the spider at the start due to just me and one other having any dodging or target prioritization ability (heck, this was my first run and I quickly realized the gargoyles needed to die first). After one guy ragequit, I pulled in another QTTer and the rest of the dungeon was a breeze. I finished the other two paths a few days later with another public group, where no one even went down except to the howling king’s attack at the end of that path.

Reading the text under the mobs names really pays dividends. It is true that some don’t have all the relevant information, but a ton of what you’re complaining about is easily mitigated by some preparation. Though the gaps that are there definitely should be filled in.

For example, the necro pull in TA story. See “Fear”. Use stability.

The gravelings (and wolves in HOTW) - they can do that if you get caught in the crosshairs of several at once. Thats why you shouldn’t let that happen. Root/cripple/knockbacks easily split the group apart so they can’t insta-burst someone. And the attack itself is pretty noticeable (if you’re not in melee range already, which you shouldn’t be). And they should never be able to kill, since once they blow that leap, they’re no danger to anyone else for awhile, so your party should have you back up immediately. Alternately, stability again. In that good AC party I mentioned above, me and another member even two-manned a pack of those due to the rest of the party afking for a bit.

TL;DR Tank-less, healer-less CC-light design doesn’t work when mobs are tanks with tons of CC.
Strongly disagree. If everyone uses the tools they have correctly, I’d say most of the dungeons are trivial.

That’s not to say there isn’t bullshit around (eg/ TA Path 3 and it’s triple knight pull at the end) or that some of the bosses couldn’t stand to lose some HP weight. But overall, I’ve yet to be frustrated by any of the dungeons. When I go down, it’s usually because I legitimately screwed up somewhere earlier, and I’m usually able to pinpoint where.

4938

Except there was no difference between the stats of legendary and exotic so the story they are trying to tell is misinformation.

4939

That would of course explain why Warners laid off a bunch of Turbine folks recently.

4940

Absolutely. Don’t get me wrong, I have got through these dungeons. I just find them annoying. Especially when you play with a close group of RL friends and have zero control over player quality.

That doesn’t change the fact that overall, with average players in your group, these dungeons are annoying.

With good players in your group - well, you just run past everything and 1-shot not-that-interesting boss fights.

I know Anet are trying, and I still like and play the game. I just don’t think they have any future competing with WoW. WoW PvE is just so much better, and on a ultra-casual level where you play with family and friends you can carry the group through stress-free runs where THEY feel like they are contributing.

What surprises me with GW2 dungeons is disconnect from the rest of the game. Rest of GW2 is ultra-casual, ultra-friendly. Anyone, any level, any activity. WvW? Uplevel. tPvP? Here is char with gear. Group with friends? Down-level to zone level.

Dungeons? Err. Ehh. Well. You got to be level 80 and geared to have smooth runs in what advertised as level-30 (or 40, or 50) content. Group of typical level 30s? They have to be world-class raiders to pull off smooth run in AC on the first try. Why such disconnected experience?