Whats preventing you from coming back to play Guild Wars 2 ?

This question to some of you who is only here lurking in forums but no longer play the game

Content.....................

I Work from 8 to 6 . Sometimes i log for daily then thats it. Growing up be adult sucks. I want to be 12 again and play game all day :'(

Bordem.. & when i play get even more bored.

the end game content is too spreaded and little linear: fractals, achievments, farms, dungeons, wvw, pvp none of them motivates me. i pvped for 1~2 yers, and WvWed for 2~3 years, im saturated.

last week i created a new guardian(i had like 12 characters slots) and playing personal history, normally less than 1 hour day. playing PE history at low pace is atm more interesting. i will probably gonna replay all LSWs and expansions history again.

Messed-up effort-reward ratio

I haven't left, I'm not playing anywhere near as much - I used to play daily even when I had little to do in game.

• Combination of there not being much to do beyond repeating content on alts. And the story is too poor for that
• Episodic content is generally weaker than large scale content drops. And that applies to most games I've played as well as GW2
• A directional shift by a team different from launch who seem to want to take the World of Tyria away from its roots. ( incl the ruination of Joko, the over-pushing of Aurene (who is now the central character according to the devs), a focus on touchy feely and so called shock factors which are adversely deteriorating the story)
• Over reliance on unsuitable skins and effects which aren't marrying up well with the GW2 World.
• A general lack of consistent comms by the devs or at least Game Directors who seem unwilling to engage with their community unlike most games I play or follow
• Being worn down by the over reliance on rng, gambling mechanics and gem store. Sure these have always existed in the game and they need to fund the game, but eventually it becomes wearisome. I feel more and more we are less treated like gamers and more like something they can squeeze money from
• A complete loss of every single friend who has played the game since launch
• A realisation that I am missing out on too many other great games by focussing on one. Given how low the story has sunk, I've started to get back into a wider range of RPG's. So far almost all of which have been better at narrative and world building within their own contexts.

The last point is perhaps the biggest for me since it is what is pulling me away the most right now. It is unlikely I will ever truly leave GW2 behind, but I can't see me playing like I used to without significant change or large scale content drop

I’m obviously no longer the target audience which is a shame since I used to be a fervent supporter of theirs, but it’s harder to do that 7 years on. If S5 is more of the same of what we have had in terms of low content, poor quality story and sketchy rewards well that only frees up more of my time

I still log in and play from time to time. What does prevent me from, or at least second-guess, logging in is too much exposure to the forums. Playing the game reminds me that these people continue to exist, and I can't stomach the possibility of actually meeting any of them in-game. Kitten kitten waffle-melons.

Also, I'm taking a moral stand against gambling and exploitation, but nobody cares about that.

I’m not completely gone, yet, but I play significantly less. This game is an orgy of unhealthily bright flashing effects (I cannot even play Holosmith due to all the flashing effects) and an incomprehensible mess of visual clutter (despite having killed them dozens of times, I still don’t know what many of the champions even look like). And there’s the ridiculously long aggro range of PoF and beyond (600 pre PoF compared to 900 and 1200 in PoF and beyond) that makes it annoying to explore open world.

@Arzurag.7506 said:Messed-up effort-reward ratio

Follow-up question: if you don't play the game, what's the point of still being on the forum?

Primarily health. I come to the forum occasionally to torment entertain myself.

@Vieux P.1238 said:Bordem.. & when i play get even more bored.

Im a new player and even i am ready to call it quits . The focus of this game is buy buy buy, nothing good goes into the game as a reward. And there is no real replay value, the content is boring outside of a few things. I dont think anything new will be added and what people call content is outfits and gem store stuff. I dont have fun when playing outside of raids with my guild, everything is a same old grind.

@Trise.2865 said:I still log in and play from time to time. What does prevent me from, or at least second-guess, logging in is too much exposure to the forums. Playing the game reminds me that these people continue to exist, and I can't stomach the possibility of actually meeting any of them in-game. Kitten kitten waffle-melons.

Also, I'm taking a moral stand against gambling and exploitation, but nobody cares about that.

I hear ya, its crazy how manipulative it all is, but the people that live in lala land are blind to it, and even promote it.

Grind,Grind,Grind and more Grinding...I am fed up with grinding,I grind items to get gold to buy Gem Store item at a garbage conversion rate...I killed world bosses more times than I can count,it was like a second job,daily routine...Nothing valuable ever dropped,nothing...with maximal magic find boosted.I finished the story(story is the only thing I come back for)with warrior,because other classes I like are way too squishy even with the warrior the instant die rate is exponential...but with more grinding toward points you can unlock second weapons for a better gameplay,like Daredevil.Then after all the kittykittenkittenedkittenning grind for years with no valuable drops than Spoons,from a chest from the story I got a pant from a set which I sold for 250G...Now really?Years of time invested and nothing then suddenly BUMM...?No boosts,no farm,nothing just playing...Beside the kittymitty grinding these drop rates ,the lack of new non-gem store items and the same non-innovative mechanics(usually everything just pushes you from cliffs or instant kills you) are keeping me away.For example:When you fight something on a cliff you can be sure that the creature up there have a push skill(yes stability solves),boring.

The personal story and living season was mind numbingly boring to me after first couplehundres hrs. Rewards are usually garbage unless u grind like u have no job or family. Mmo's to me are a older genre surviving somewhat by older players who dont have all day anymore to grind. Lack of fun content that has replayability. Poor balance and finally horizontal progression only offering cosmetic upgrades for the most part leaves little incentive to do the grinds and/or boring pve content.

Playing GW2 nowadays feels like fooling myself that I like the game as much as I did 4 years ago. I'm starting to lower my expectations a lot when it comes to fixing main game issues. I'll just list some of my reasons why I feel like this.

• Buy-reward system. There is no actual reward that drops. You either buy everything off TP or grind materials to craft the skin.
• Total overloot of junk, green, blue items that hol no value on their own. They are straight salvaged to get the materials since you can't really farm them specifically.
• The skill-cap in PvP is lowered by the overloaded class mechanics.
• E-Specs design is a complete failure when it comes to Class Balance and it's been worse since PoF.
• Visual Clutter, Flashy effects, flashy skins, unfitting skins, Legendary-quaility skins being thrown behind Gems making Legendaries less interesting to me.
• The story direction. It bothers me that there is such a disconnection between writers and community. Devs focusing on 50 plots at once instead of telling a strong story. I hate the fact that we always have to be the one, and everything depends on us. Commander is undefeatable, unshakable, pure, glorious, good, always making the best decisions. We are forced to be the one and only saving the world as if we knew how. Aurene is a whole another reason why I enjoy the story less.
• Future. There is no stream of information about the future of this game. The lack of what is to be expected is bad. I want to know whether Devs are happy with the current state of game or if they want to change some things.
• The only missing thing in GW2 is an auto-play button. The current business model and gameplay scream for it.

Expectations. I don't see any issues game Has being addressed. I'm starting to feel like I'm not the target audience and instead of leaving I am always expecting and waiting for the changes.I love GW2 as a world, but the game itself is getting less enjoyable for me.

Ooooh. I hate, HATE nearly every change they have done since launch. Removal of town clothes, the NPE, and megaserver being some of the most awful ones.(there was one point where I really liked the daily achievement but I can't recall details, only that I liked it at the time).

Now I got energy and inspiration for some reason (seventh birthday, even without the new level scrolls) so I'm hurrying to sort of finalize my characters with current makeover kit options.

Before they change even more things.

My crew will stand there and look pretty.

I left 1.5 years ago. I lurk in the forums to see if something has changed since. My last login was half a year ago I think, for a few minutes. I didn't return, because the things I left for were unchanged or got even worse. I quit in the middle of the Palawa Joko story.

• I mainly left because of the increasing grind. More and more repetitive play. Things introduced especially as time wasters. The original game was mostly ok, with HoT grind was installed as game mechanic, and the living story after PoF was too much. With every new episode it got worse. PoF itself was ok, to my surprise.
• The ridiculously expensive shop with its increasingly unfair and unethical RNG mechanics for skins in addition to the lootboxes.
• The huge cost of some later game items. You give your whole inventory to get some small convenience item that is not worth spending the whole inventory for.
• The difficulty level and time investment for some endgame content, especially raids. I am absolutely fan of organized instanced content, but I was unable to get into raids. Getting into raids was not fun, only a huge waste of precious time, so I wasn't able to get into it. The closed raids made me angry: there was content I very much wanted to do, but it was closed for me.
• The fractals that were added sporadically that time were not fun, either. They were too mechanics-loaded, too much raid-like. The established fractals were fun, since they were simple but still challenging (I played up to level 100). For the new fractals, you had to learn the mechanics by heart, then replay the mechanics and dance in the rhythm of the mechanics. This feels forced and is not fun.

But the main reason was the grind. I think the final tiny push to leave the game was the newly introduced items and achievements you were able to buy for a ridiculously high amount of fractal relics.

What's the point of playing Gw2? What is there to strive for? Is it gear like legendary? What am I using that gear for? Is it raids, 5 man? Content that gets refreshed every 9 months? Is it for pvp or wvw? Content that's completed neglected? Do I grind so I can look cool? I can swipe a card for that. The only content that gets developed is living story that's designed so you can't fail and open world that doesn't challenge you so there's no reason to progress your character like normal mmos. So why play a game that doesn't challenge you and trade rewarding you for playing the game for swiping a card so you don't have to play the game? It's like Gw2 is designed to not be played.

@Sobx.1758 said:

@Arzurag.7506 said:Messed-up effort-reward ratio

hope

@Arzurag.7506 said:

@Sobx.1758 said:

@Arzurag.7506 said:Messed-up effort-reward ratio

It's safe to say there won't suddenly be meaningful changes to effort/reward ratio after 7 years, so if you still have hope... you might as well abandon it. :D

But thanks for the answer :)

@"Randulf.7614" said:

• A directional shift by a team different from launch who seem to want to take the World of Tyria away from its roots. ( incl the ruination of Joko, the over-pushing of Aurene (who is now the central character according to the devs), a focus on touchy feely and so called shock factors which are adversely deteriorating the story)

The overpush of a "cute friend" or a "iluminated baby" in the story is another point that makes me turn down. i dislike Taimi a lot also.

@Sobx.1758 said:

@Arzurag.7506 said:Messed-up effort-reward ratio

Follow-up question: what does your response have to do with the point Arzurag made? People can still be interested in the development of things they no longer participate in actively. Perhaps they are hoping for something to change in a positive way?

@Ashantara.8731 said:

@Sobx.1758 said:

@"Arzurag.7506" said:Messed-up effort-reward ratio

What he made is not "a point", it's "an opinion". What my question had to do with his post? Literally everything, it was a direct followup to what he wrote, not sure I understand what you're looking for here.When I stop playing a game for one reason or the other, I stop following the boards and news about it, because it's pointless to me, hence the question.

@ugrakarma.9416 said:

@"Randulf.7614" said:

• A directional shift by a team different from launch who seem to want to take the World of Tyria away from its roots. ( incl the ruination of Joko, the over-pushing of Aurene (who is now the central character according to the devs), a focus on touchy feely and so called shock factors which are adversely deteriorating the story)

Surprisingly, she never bothered me. They pulled back on her a lot in ls4 though and there were by far worse things in the season

Having the game be unable to launch without crashing for the past week has done a good job of keeping me away. I could technically play on my secondary desktop, but that one's not really set up to be a gaming machine and swapping around my nice keyboard and mouse and stuff between two machines all the tine would be a pain. Normally I'd try to fix the issue, but a reinstall didn't help and I can't be bothered to try anything more in-depth since I'm going to be doing some hardware upgrades in the near future anyways.

On the bright side, this has given me more time to play other things, so I'm not too terribly upset.