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Can you get better gear now or is it still only for graphics ?
Simsejensen
Member UncommonPosts: 51
in Guild Wars 2
Back in the days when i created my 2x 80 characters, you couldnt get any better gear. You did stuff for items that had a better graphic thing.
Has this changed?
Why do you still play this game ?
Comments
This is not an answer to your question, but more of an estimated guess from what ive read, they added ascended items, and I believe they are an upgrade.
Thinking about returning to the game myself, so ill hang around for someone to answer this.
not for progression but for everything else. I have WoW for when i want progression.
the other posts already answered your other concerns so ill just give you my personal answer to this question.
Ascended is better than exotic. So far they have rings, accessories, back pieces, amulets and weapons that are ascended. They're adding armor before the end of the year.
It's not HUGELY better, but it adds up when you have ALL the available pieces.
Okay, sounds good - for you ^^
Still interested though, if people dont play this to get better gear, to progress your character. Whats left to do ?
Puzzles, crafting im aware of.
But have they not added anything else?
Somekind of "treasure hunting" for the explorer type?
Housing?
If you're trying for complete BiS equipment, that can take you... a ridiculous amount of time AND gold. We're talking a few hundred gold to get the crafting up to the point you can make the weapons. Then you need bind on accquire items that you get from jumping puzzles, dungeons, various WvW activities and beating champions. You have to do a combination of various things, quite a bit of it, and heaven forbid you're a necromancer or guardian, where you end up needing all =3= kinds of crafting up to 500.
Just trying to beat all the dungeons, defeat all the world bosses and get a high fractal level can take a lot of time as well. There's a lot of ways you can spend time. I'm at 3,000 hours and still have some things I haven't finished up. :P
WvW for the PvP lovers.
Map Completion for the explorers.
Minigames and sPvP for the highly competitive types.
Achievements for the... well achievement junkies?
And on top, they now publish something new every two weeks, which tick one or more of the boxes above.
now: GW2 (11 80s).
Dark Souls 2.
future: Mount&Blade 2 BannerLord.
"Bro, do your even fractal?"
Recommends: Guild Wars 2, Dark Souls, Mount&Blade: Warband, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning.
If you feel that better gear = "progressing your character" GW2 may not be the game for you. Plenty of those games around - Some of us prefer GW2 because it has limited progression in numbers and percentages on our gear :-)
Achievements, achievement rewards, living story and most of all guild missions are some of the things I enjoy.
We dont need casuals in our games!!! Errm... Well we DO need casuals to fund and populate our games - But the games should be all about "hardcore" because: We dont need casuals in our games!!!
(repeat ad infinitum)
I just started playing again recently to check out the WvW changes.
It's pretty fun, although now with ascended items out I'm getting rofled in PvP. I need about 40 more laurels on my main... Which at one a day for the daily quests will take me quite a while.
I'm having a good time of it though and got a couple of my buddies playing again.
Now they are breaking WvW into seasons which could be interesting, and there is alot more crafting and such going on.
They also changed magic find and they seem to have adjusted the drop rates for things.
Plus all my chars had the birthday bonus for being 1 year old. Which is +100% XP, WXP, Karma, Magic Find, and Gold Gain which was awesome.
All in all i'm enjoying it again, but I doubt i'll be playing it 6 monthes from now.
To the OP -
New 'Ascended' level rarity has been added which provides increased stats. It is harder to get than the previous level (Exotic) - it has to be gotten through the repeatable scaling dungeons (fractals), or by getting your crafting high rank. There is a number of ways to get the various peices (jewlery and weapons - armor coming soon) - guild missions, daily / monthlies / fractals / wvw / expensive crafting.
There is progression in that way - but I would not say its tied to terrible hard content. Fractals can get challenging - but the rest is mostly consistency in time played and gathering the resources you need.
There is now a little bit of progression in ways of increasing account magic find, total achievement points (which unlocks rewards), and WvW ranks, though none of which really give character stats.
They have stayed true to minimizing hard stat progression. While I still massivley enjoy the game, if you are specifically looking for stat progression, maybe not the place to go.
I will say though, content has slowly been getting harder - more recently with new tequatl and dungeon. As much as I love the game and really enjoy the story cadence every 2 weeks, I am not oblivious to the fact that there is a lack of real difficult PvE. I guess I like PvP and WvW though, so it does not bother me as much
Leader of Knights Templar
GW2 IGN: Damarus
knights-templar.com
Sorry to hear your getting rofled in pvp but its not becouse your missing ascended items.
U just need practise at pvping like myself included.
Another tip i can give you is find a guild that WvW alot and stick to your commander, afew coordianted players can take out dubble their number with ease.
I play this game because it is still fun, I don't have the need to go on the gear grind to be relevant, but I also don't have the need to show off any shiny armor to impress others, because they are only pixels ofc.
"going into arguments with idiots is a lost cause, it requires you to stoop down to their level and you can't win"
Frankly I am with the OP... Most MMO's focus on gear and "flashy pixels" for the better gear so you can show off your achievements.
Most of the games I play and have preferred over the years from EQ1 to WOW had these trends. It may not seem as much like that in older games as graphics have evolved over the years as well.
I left GW2 because it lacked most of the things I looked for in an MMORPG. Sadly most MMOs that have what I want are either dead games, or do not fit what I want from an MMO.
Everquest 2 or Dark Age of Camelot are for the most part closest to what I look for in an MMO.
I do like EQ2's housing system, sadly like with WoW Sony is messing up the game more and more every expansion. Now they are selling the option to skip to level 85. Also the game does not have enough players.
In WoW there are so many issues. The player base is very immature (not the games fault specifically though.) Blizzard has babified the game more and more with each expansion destroying what made the game great. The lack of player housing is kinda a let down, but never stopped me from playing.
The problem with the MMO market is simple. There are too many games and not enough players. A few games dominate the market (mainly WoW.) In order to fix this trend the market needs a "WoW killer" game to change that trend. Unfortunately every game I go back to like EQ1 or EQ2 that were made for grouping, are unplayable because you cannot find a group with too few players.
Nirrtix
ALPHAs:
-Pantheon
-Shroud of the Avatar
-Camelot Unchained
BETAs:
-World of Warcraft
-City of Heroes
-Star Wars Galaxies
-Saga of Ryzom
-Homeworld
-Starcraft II
-Warcraft III
-Hearthstone
-Star Wars The Old Republic
-Vanguard Saga of Heroes
Why do I play this game? Fun.
Seriously. Back in WoW, I never cared about gear. There were times where I forgot to loot the last boss for the gear I won on roll. I ported out, and one of the guys said, "you forgot your loot dude!" Also, I wasn't hungry for better stats that I became vitriolic to other players. The only time that happened was when my husband urged me to do raid progressions with him along with his guild.
With GW2, better gear gives you a slight edge, but nothing big to give you the better hand. I'm talking PvP here though. Even with Rares, I can go toe-to-toe with other players who has better gear than me. Mastering a class takes time, but when you get the hang of it and learn the nuances of the class, it's really rewarding.
This is what I like about GW2 -- the thrill of the game comes from mastering a class. There's no gear chasing. No endgame. But with Ascended Armor on the horizon, that might change. Still... it would be a huge grind and a huge gold sink.
So whats the carrot that keeps people playing this?
As a WvWer, probably bragging rights and server pride. That's the only thing that keeps me glued to this game. Plus the community on my server for WvW is a great and amazing bunch.
I can't say much of sPvP and PvE on what keeps people playing them.