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Difficulty of Raids


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Personally, I find raids challenging but not terribly difficult, overall. Once you understand a thing... It's not hard.

But I see lots of discussion about raid difficulty, and how editing it, would (or would not) open the door for new players.

I'm curious if the idea has been discussed, of adding multiple difficulty layers?

Something like-Easy mode- reduced mechanics and dps check, challenge mote turns the boss to normal mode. Reduced magnitite. Gain random living world currency.

Normal- as is now, zero changes.

Heroic- All bosses on Chalenge Mote mode. Chalenge mote adds, changes boss timing and phasing. Additional mechanics. Pulsing arena damage, and disabling of combo fields, boon corruption, pulsing conditions... Etc. Greatly increased magnitite, etc.

This would... I'd imagine, expand the meta, by extending it into more things. As the game demands more variance in specialists, more classes get buffed to the occasion.

I've read the community's discussion on harder raids, and I'm diving into the discussion on easier ones now. But it just seems that you have to do both. Like, if you release new stuff that's to easy... To get new people... The old hands get bored. And if you make hard stuff that new people can't do, only the old hands play. So, why not introduce climbing difficulty, that's controllable... Just like fractals. All the elitism collects at the top, and you have a long time to learn why it's that way before you get there.

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It's been discussed on an almost weekly basis but raids have been designed to be the most challenging content in the game. Strikes will be the stepping point to getting into raids once they've added some more that actually pose a challenge. Players will be focused on completing the easy raids in the most effortless way and won't learn the mechanics. Most of the raids are not all that difficult to learn except for the few that are mechanics heavy.

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We already have different difficulty lvls for raids, however they are made by community.Vale Guardian:Hard:solo healer mid tanking, this has a huge dps check and every1 needs to do their best to complete the encounter.

Medium:solo heal edge tanking, easier and less punishing version of mid tanking.

Easy. Double healer edge tanking where druid is an other healer and alacrity renegade is the second healer.

Cheese: double chrono setup where you have atleast one healer with huge heals/rezzez like tempest or scourge, usually druid is an other healer but it can be swapped for more cheese.

Every single boss has their own try hard, normal and cheese strats aswell. Many times when players say that raids are too hard its coz they try to use kill strat that is above their skill lvl, but that doesn't mean that the encounter is too hard.

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@Ayrilana.1396 said:It's been discussed on an almost weekly basis but raids have been designed to be the most challenging content in the game. Strikes will be the stepping point to getting into raids once they've added some more that actually pose a challenge. Players will be focused on completing the easy raids in the most effortless way and won't learn the mechanics. Most of the raids are not all that difficult to learn except for the few that are mechanics heavy.

Its not a stepping point because casual players have no interest in the current raiding culture and gameplay style, i. E forced into certain builds, minimax dmg meter peer pressure etc.

Op post gives something to everyone, the only people that are unhappy are those that like the idea that their chosen content is 'exlusive', its a pretty selfish pov that is self defeating, low uptake = low value for money = low release cadence and population stagnation.

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@vesica tempestas.1563 said:

@Ayrilana.1396 said:It's been discussed on an almost weekly basis but raids have been designed to be the most challenging content in the game. Strikes will be the stepping point to getting into raids once they've added some more that actually pose a challenge. Players will be focused on completing the easy raids in the most effortless way and won't learn the mechanics. Most of the raids are not all that difficult to learn except for the few that are mechanics heavy.

Its not a stepping point because casual players have no interest in the current raiding culture and gameplay style, i. E forced into certain builds, minimax dmg meter peer pressure etc.

If players are not interested in specific content, there is no point in designing that content for them.

I'll assume what you want to get at is:Casual players who are currently not interested in raids due to the issues you mentioned, would be interested in raids if those issue were gone.

I disagree. I don't think the amount of players who are not interested in raids currently would be magically interested in raids if they were easier is very big.

I think the biggest group of players not interested in raids would remain uninterested in raids no matter their difficulty. Ths current strike mission, which is basically a raid boss in super super easy, is a perfect example of where easy raid rewards would be. Even for that mission, some less skilled players have issues completing it. The skill ceiling drops infinately low.

@vesica tempestas.1563 said:Op post gives something to everyone, the only people that are unhappy are those that like the idea that their chosen content is 'exlusive', its a pretty selfish pov that is self defeating, low uptake = low value for money = low release cadence and population stagnation.

I think the selfish pov on this issue is people who argue that they want content to fit THEIR personal skill level and desire. This counts for both, hardcore players who demand harder open world content, as well as less skilled players demanding easier instanced content.

You are never going to meet every ones skill level or desire. There will always be more skilled players and less skilled players, no matter how hard or easy you make content. What is left, is the question of: is it worth chasing this non achievable goal? Or doesn't it make more sense to deisgn different types of content for different skill levels, as is the case right now.

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@BrokenGlass.9356 said:I've read the community's discussion on harder raids, and I'm diving into the discussion on easier ones now.

Use the search function of the forums, easy modes for Raids have been discussed multiple times, way more than harder difficulties.

So, why not introduce climbing difficulty, that's controllable... Just like fractals.

Because the difficulty tiers in Fractals aren't really working. It's bad to base the game design on Fractals

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@maddoctor.2738 said:

@"BrokenGlass.9356" said:I've read the community's discussion on harder raids, and I'm diving into the discussion on easier ones now.

Use the search function of the forums, easy modes for Raids have been discussed multiple times, way more than harder difficulties.

So, why not introduce climbing difficulty, that's controllable... Just like fractals.

Because the difficulty tiers in Fractals aren't really working. It's bad to base the game design on Fractals

I haven't had the experience that fractal difficulty scaling doesn't work. Maybe there's stuff about it I don't know... Sure, always possible. But in my experience, low tier fractals really are, join on whatever class, and whatever build, even if you get 4 of 5 players in trash random builds and gear, the 5th can carry. By tier 2, you only require that some folks know what's up, and not be complete total dead weight. By tier three, folks would be asking for kill proofs if there were any to link. And by tier 4, everyone expects you to just know, where to skip mobs, the optimum boss starts and so on. Tier 4 is the only place where I can expect pugs to offer to switch characters to make a better comp.

So, if raids were easier, but you can challenge mote them to normal.... That does a few thing strike missions don't do.A- they let you fight the same bosses and encounters with less difficulty.B- they allow a group to put the bosses they are confident in fighting on CM, to be normal mode. This allows for skilled play to increase. If Strike missions are always as easy as a tier 1 fractal... Then training they are not. Tier 1's just don't train you for tier 4. And that's what the strike mission to raid skill jump is.C- it allows players resistant to soaking up the meta, time to understand WHY it matters. Yes, maybe they will blitz through eazy. But if they did that, and cleared VG a bunch of times with no teleport circles, and no rotating floor phase.... Now you know how to fight VG. By and large anyways. And when it gets harder, you just update what you already know.D- could also add a KP wallet, and differing levels of KP. So I can show you I've beaten Sabetha on easy, normal, and heroic, but not heroic CM... Or whatever. People would know where you stand by what kp's you have. And, they'd be able to ask for the skill level you actually want to match your group. 'LFM W1 fc, please ping easy mode KP. Higher modes preferred' or something like that.

By leaving a middle difficulty, this preserves the existing meta, and prevents old meta builds from going stale during the transition. Means that adding the easier mode doesn't step on a single toe of the old hands.

Heroic mode offers ways to cheese the meta. Now the guide writers take longer to get bored.

So, I feel like while each subset will get its own little corner of meta-h-e-double-hockey-sticks... But you'd have to learn the changes as you go.

We all had a hard time the first like three fractal runs after going up a tier. Then you figure it out. The fact that this does not exist in raids, creates a chicken and egg problem.

We only want chickens. Post a group looking for chickens. Mention that we don't want eggs. What's left to do when 500 eggs and 1 chicken are all looking at the same LFG? Help some eggs hatch? How do you do this? Allow for longer incubation. How do you do this? Let them simmer in easier content for longer, so the learning doesn't feel rushed or forced.

The primary reason not to want an easy mode is simple. "damn it! I didn't need an easy mode! So you weaklings who can't hack it deserve the pain you're putting on yourselves."

And the primary reason to want an easy mode is "I can't do it, help me please!?"

Which is the classic red vs blue political war. No wonder we can't agree.

This is why I'm suggesting a place that the old hands can climb to AND a place the new guys can climb from.

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@Cyninja.2954 said:

@Ayrilana.1396 said:It's been discussed on an almost weekly basis but raids have been designed to be the most challenging content in the game. Strikes will be the stepping point to getting into raids once they've added some more that actually pose a challenge. Players will be focused on completing the easy raids in the most effortless way and won't learn the mechanics. Most of the raids are not all that difficult to learn except for the few that are mechanics heavy.

Its not a stepping point because casual players have no interest in the current raiding culture and gameplay style, i. E forced into certain builds, minimax dmg meter peer pressure etc.

If players are not interested in specific content, there is no point in designing that content for them.

I'll assume what you want to get at is:Casual players who are currently not interested in raids due to the issues you mentioned, would be interested in raids if those issue were gone.

I disagree. I don't think the amount of players who are not interested in raids currently would be magically interested in raids if they were easier is very big.

I think the biggest group of players not interested in raids would remain uninterested in raids no matter their difficulty. Ths current strike mission, which is basically a raid boss in super super easy, is a perfect example of where easy raid rewards would be. Even for that mission, some less skilled players have issues completing it. The skill ceiling drops infinately low.

@vesica tempestas.1563 said:Op post gives something to everyone, the only people that are unhappy are those that like the idea that their chosen content is 'exlusive', its a pretty selfish pov that is self defeating, low uptake = low value for money = low release cadence and population stagnation.

I think the selfish pov on this issue is people who argue that they want content to fit THEIR personal skill level and desire. This counts for both, hardcore players who demand harder open world content, as well as less skilled players demanding easier instanced content.

You are never going to meet every ones skill level or desire. There will always be more skilled players and less skilled players, no matter how hard or easy you make content. What is left, is the question of: is it worth chasing this non achievable goal? Or doesn't it make more sense to deisgn different types of content for different skill levels, as is the case right now.

Actually no, arguing for content for the majority is not selfish its mearly a want, customers are allowed to want stuff. What's selfish is wanting others to Not have stuff, that's simply destructive.

Op was arguing for something for all, that's a positive attitude, and covers a stance that is already supported by the other big aaa.

Put it this way, if gw2 had raiding in its current form as the core game content, gw2 would be another wildstar, dead.

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Like, I totally understand both sides of the argument. Which makes it harder to talk about... Because I'm trying to make them both happy with my suggestions. So, I'm really not trying to give you guys a red vs blue choice. I'm trying to offer the yellow, don't tread on me, live and let live, compassionate to everyone, including the elitists, answer.

And kitten, I don't even know if I'm right. I'm just trying anyway. I'm hoping someone else likes the glass half full centrist vibe and decides that the other threads already have enough complaining. Mayhap we can come together to find a middle where everyone can begrudgingly accept it?

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@vesica tempestas.1563 said:

@Ayrilana.1396 said:It's been discussed on an almost weekly basis but raids have been designed to be the most challenging content in the game. Strikes will be the stepping point to getting into raids once they've added some more that actually pose a challenge. Players will be focused on completing the easy raids in the most effortless way and won't learn the mechanics. Most of the raids are not all that difficult to learn except for the few that are mechanics heavy.

Its not a stepping point because casual players have no interest in the current raiding culture and gameplay style, i. E forced into certain builds, minimax dmg meter peer pressure etc.

If players are not interested in specific content, there is no point in designing that content for them.

I'll assume what you want to get at is:Casual players who are currently not interested in raids due to the issues you mentioned, would be interested in raids if those issue were gone.

I disagree. I don't think the amount of players who are not interested in raids currently would be magically interested in raids if they were easier is very big.

I think the biggest group of players not interested in raids would remain uninterested in raids no matter their difficulty. Ths current strike mission, which is basically a raid boss in super super easy, is a perfect example of where easy raid rewards would be. Even for that mission, some less skilled players have issues completing it. The skill ceiling drops infinately low.

@vesica tempestas.1563 said:Op post gives something to everyone, the only people that are unhappy are those that like the idea that their chosen content is 'exlusive', its a pretty selfish pov that is self defeating, low uptake = low value for money = low release cadence and population stagnation.

I think the selfish pov on this issue is people who argue that they want content to fit THEIR personal skill level and desire. This counts for both, hardcore players who demand harder open world content, as well as less skilled players demanding easier instanced content.

You are never going to meet every ones skill level or desire. There will always be more skilled players and less skilled players, no matter how hard or easy you make content. What is left, is the question of: is it worth chasing this non achievable goal? Or doesn't it make more sense to deisgn different types of content for different skill levels, as is the case right now.

Actually no, arguing for content for the majority is not selfish its mearly a want, customers are allowed to want stuff. What's selfish is wanting others to Not have stuff, that's simply destructive.

Sure, every body is allowed to want stuff. Given the big content disparity between easy and difficult content added into this game, which one do you believe would be currently overrepresented and developed currently? Raids with their 1 release per year of 1 raid wing, or the remaining pve content with multiple releases per year?

@vesica tempestas.1563 said:Op was arguing for something for all, that's a positive attitude, and covers a stance that is already supported by the other big aaa.

Op is argueing an idea which has been argued to death multiple times by now: and once again, in a world of endless resrouces we could develope everything for all audiences.

Not going to reengage the time old faulty argument of: every one else provides content for all skill levels. I've explained how this does not related to GW2 and not true.

Also again, I disagree that your assumption that a vast majority of players currently not raiding are in any way interested in raids. That might be your personal situation (how often have you completed that new strike? Have you been playing it daily, weekly, more than 1-2 times yet?) but even there I'd argue that you are a fringe case. Most people who want to raid are raiding.

@vesica tempestas.1563 said:Put it this way, if gw2 had raiding in its current form as the core game content, gw2 would be another wildstar, dead.

Could you clarify?

Are you talking about the fact that Wildstar had it's majority of endgame content and rewards designed behind raid like endgame content (which GW2 does not have currently since the vast majority of content is for a very low skill ceiling audience).

That's not even getting into any of the other details which lead to Wildstars failure, but we'll just ignore those for now since they do not fit your argument, shall we?

@vesica tempestas.1563 said:Here's a different slant on this.

People want hard raids for people that want tightly tuned fights

Other people want less tuned 10 man instances that gives pve players dungeons with more interesting dynamics.

Both seems fair, why would you not do both, all customers are equal.

Sounds fair, so let's get to a somewhat more equal distribution of content for different groups, then start balancing in favor of 1 group. Would that not be most fair?

In that case, let's start with giving the pvp and wvw crowd some more content, they have been content starved for ages. Then after that let's get a fix on some challenging endgame content, since that too has seen a steep decline in developement (notice how there was no fractal with this release and there might very well not be one for a long time, not to mention a new raid wing).

Then once those niche groups have seen content, we can get back to develope more content of the similar 90% which is currently developed predomninantly.

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@"BrokenGlass.9356" said:I haven't had the experience that fractal difficulty scaling doesn't work.

Someone runs Fractals because they have some of the gold farms in the gameSomeone runs Fractals because they are the only way to finish legendary precursor collectionsSomeone runs Fractals for the extra daily rewards recommended rewardsSomeone runs Fractals for the Ad InfinitumSomeone runs Fractals for the extra chance at Ascended items

The difficulty tiers have little to no effect in Fractal popularity, there are loads of rewards that keep them alive in the long run and now that lots of players finished their precursors and Ad infinitum and are swimming in easy ascended gear, Fractal running gets slower and slower.

Because I'm trying to make them both happy with my suggestions.

You are only trying to make happy one particular group, those that can't run current Raids and want the shinnies, all while ruining the experience for anyone else. That's all I read in your suggestions, so try again with something actually useful if you want to make "both groups" happy.

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@Ayrilana.1396 said:Raids were designed to be the most challenging content in the game and that’s unlikely to change.

Out of curiosity, of those who want easier difficulty levels, how many primarily want it because they want the legendary armor and ring?

lol just cannnnnot see beyond 'people want my special loot'. People want 10 man content because its interesting pve and don't care about min maxing numbers and wiping until things are burnt into muscle memory. in the 80's it was pacman, in the early 2000's it was winning the dmg wars on meters. The world has moved on, but a niche group grapples desperately for their self importance while their preferred content rots away as less and less players take an interest, but they just cannot change.....

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@vesica tempestas.1563 said:

@Ayrilana.1396 said:Raids were designed to be the most challenging content in the game and that’s unlikely to change.

Out of curiosity, of those who want easier difficulty levels, how many
primarily
want it because they want the legendary armor and ring?

lol just cannnnnot see beyond 'people want my special loot'. People want 10 man content because its interesting pve and don't care about min maxing numbers and wiping until things are burnt into muscle memory. in the 80's it was pacman, in the early 2000's it was winning the dmg wars on meters. The world has moved on, but a niche group grapples desperately for their self importance while their preferred content rots away as less and less players take an interest, but they just cannot change.....

Out of curiosity I'm interested in your reply: What is your desire?Easy 10 men content for everyone or the shiny reward a.k.a. legendary raid armor/ring?

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@vesica tempestas.1563 said:

@Ayrilana.1396 said:Raids were designed to be the most challenging content in the game and that’s unlikely to change.

Out of curiosity, of those who want easier difficulty levels, how many
primarily
want it because they want the legendary armor and ring?

lol just cannnnnot see beyond 'people want my special loot'. People want 10 man content because its interesting pve and don't care about min maxing numbers and wiping until things are burnt into muscle memory. in the 80's it was pacman, in the early 2000's it was winning the dmg wars on meters. The world has moved on, but a niche group grapples desperately for their self importance while their preferred content rots away as less and less players take an interest, but they just cannot change.....

So if they made an easy mode, but players could not get legendary armor from it, how popular do you think it'd be?

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@vesica tempestas.1563 said:

@Ayrilana.1396 said:Raids were designed to be the most challenging content in the game and that’s unlikely to change.

Out of curiosity, of those who want easier difficulty levels, how many
primarily
want it because they want the legendary armor and ring?

lol just cannnnnot see beyond 'people want my special loot'. People want 10 man content because its interesting pve and don't care about min maxing numbers and wiping until things are burnt into muscle memory. in the 80's it was pacman, in the early 2000's it was winning the dmg wars on meters. The world has moved on, but a niche group grapples desperately for their self importance while their preferred content rots away as less and less players take an interest, but they just cannot change.....

So back to my question:How often have you played the new strike?

Because it literally is what you are asking for: easy 10 mann content.

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@Cyninja.2954 said:

@Ayrilana.1396 said:It's been discussed on an almost weekly basis but raids have been designed to be the most challenging content in the game. Strikes will be the stepping point to getting into raids once they've added some more that actually pose a challenge. Players will be focused on completing the easy raids in the most effortless way and won't learn the mechanics. Most of the raids are not all that difficult to learn except for the few that are mechanics heavy.

Its not a stepping point because casual players have no interest in the current raiding culture and gameplay style, i. E forced into certain builds, minimax dmg meter peer pressure etc.

If players are not interested in specific content, there is no point in designing that content for them.

I'll assume what you want to get at is:Casual players who are currently not interested in raids due to the issues you mentioned, would be interested in raids if those issue were gone.

I disagree. I don't think the amount of players who are not interested in raids currently would be magically interested in raids if they were easier is very big.

I think the biggest group of players not interested in raids would remain uninterested in raids no matter their difficulty. Ths current strike mission, which is basically a raid boss in super super easy, is a perfect example of where easy raid rewards would be. Even for that mission, some less skilled players have issues completing it. The skill ceiling drops infinately low.

@vesica tempestas.1563 said:Op post gives something to everyone, the only people that are unhappy are those that like the idea that their chosen content is 'exlusive', its a pretty selfish pov that is self defeating, low uptake = low value for money = low release cadence and population stagnation.

I think the selfish pov on this issue is people who argue that they want content to fit THEIR personal skill level and desire. This counts for both, hardcore players who demand harder open world content, as well as less skilled players demanding easier instanced content.

You are never going to meet every ones skill level or desire. There will always be more skilled players and less skilled players, no matter how hard or easy you make content. What is left, is the question of: is it worth chasing this non achievable goal? Or doesn't it make more sense to deisgn different types of content for different skill levels, as is the case right now.

Actually no, arguing for content for the majority is not selfish its mearly a want, customers are allowed to want stuff. What's selfish is wanting others to Not have stuff, that's simply destructive.

Sure, every body is allowed to want stuff. Given the big content disparity between easy and difficult content added into this game, which one do you believe would be currently overrepresented and developed currently? Raids with their 1 release per year of 1 raid wing, or the remaining pve content with multiple releases per year?

@vesica tempestas.1563 said:Op was arguing for something for all, that's a positive attitude, and covers a stance that is already supported by the other big aaa.

Op is argueing an idea which has been argued to death multiple times by now: and once again, in a world of endless resrouces we could develope everything for all audiences.

Not going to reengage the time old faulty argument of: every one else provides content for all skill levels. I've explained how this does not related to GW2 and not true.

Also again, I disagree that your assumption that a vast majority of players currently not raiding are in any way interested in raids. That might be your personal situation (how often have you completed that new strike? Have you been playing it daily, weekly, more than 1-2 times yet?) but even there I'd argue that you are a fringe case. Most people who want to raid are raiding.

@vesica tempestas.1563 said:Put it this way, if gw2 had raiding in its current form as the core game content, gw2 would be another wildstar, dead.

Could you clarify?

Are you talking about the fact that Wildstar had it's majority of endgame content and rewards designed behind raid like endgame content (which GW2 does not have currently since the vast majority of content is for a very low skill ceiling audience).

That's not even getting into any of the other details which lead to Wildstars failure, but we'll just ignore those for now since they do not fit your argument, shall we?

@vesica tempestas.1563 said:Here's a different slant on this.

People want hard raids for people that want tightly tuned fights

Other people want less tuned 10 man instances that gives pve players dungeons with more interesting dynamics.

Both seems fair, why would you not do both, all customers are equal.

Sounds fair, so let's get to a somewhat more equal distribution of content for different groups, then start balancing in favor of 1 group. Would that not be most fair?

In that case, let's start with giving the pvp and wvw crowd some more content, they have been content starved for ages. Then after that let's get a fix on some challenging endgame content, since that too has seen a steep decline in developement (notice how there was no fractal with this release and there might very well not be one for a long time, not to mention a new raid wing).

Then once those niche groups have seen content, we can get back to develope more content of the similar 90% which is currently developed predomninantly.

Raiding in GW2 is much more a cultural problem then a design problem. Most players want to see increases in effective power, and will take steps learn things they need to in order to accomplish it...... but the push back has always been a clash of Egos. Hardcore Raiders and Speed runners want to be gate keepers, and will push anyone who doesn't conform to what they see as the ONLY right way to play. Low Stress/Anxiety ridden players avoid effort or interactions that tug at their insecurities, often deflecting the reasons and dismissing things. Egocentric players blame shift any perceived failure onto everything else, and try to fervently defend things that feed into them. And then you have a huge chunk of players who don't like dealing with other people's problems, but otherwise have no issues getting into a wide range of content if they can find a compatible group.

The conflict, like nearly every other MMO, comes from the community self-segregating to the point of mutual exclusion...... and the inevitable stagnation that comes from that. Where GW2 differs from most is how the game is serviceable to a much wider range of players then normal, and has no mechanism to "force" players into specific content, which in turn doesn't forces them to socialize with the majority. WoW funnels you into Raids as the main social activity- thus players are forced to deal with its existence (even if its total avoidance). Rust and Ark are open PvP, so guild conflicts and territory wars are integral to the game itself. The key difference is that most other games have ONE thing it wants all its players to do, and most will force that path in its design. As a result, players are force to choose between dealing with that direction or find a different game more suited to what they want.

I know many WvW guilds that straight up look down on PvE as if it was a cancer. Most of PvP is so caught up in its toxicity, its practically wallowing it. Most of the casual sector is Path of Least resistance, and thus never bother to address challenges. Some are so caught up in their own personal bubble, they antagonize everyone else as being the problem.

Yet, in spite all of this, the game is regularly decried as being both "too easy" and "stupidly hard" by players all experiencing the same level of difficulty. Its also no surprise that newer content gets praised for the first week or two, but eventually devolves into complaints once that novelty wears off, and the bulk no longer care either way. But one trend always seems to stand out, regardless of the state of everything else...... when the community is most cooperative are also the times they're most productive, and able to solve most problems. New content, like when the expansions hit, gives them something to rally around.

But that cooperation falls off in proportion to how cohesive that blob of the community sticks. PvP breaks down immediately because of the inherent competitive nature, and forced solo/duo queues. PvE breaks down based on player concentrations (which repeatable metas tend to be beacons for). WvW is probably the slowest burner, based mostly on how match ups go. All of these areas of the game were at their strongest when Community put in the effort to foster improvement. But as the community gets more lazy and less tolerant over time, it distills down to the kind of issues we're seeing right now across the board. Open world farmers are done with Grothmar, and thus less effort is put in to make things go smoothly. Metas in HOT suffered that same problem, AB in particular, as people started exploiting loop holes in the reward system to avoid doing work.... or selling other people's effort for personal gain. Raids were strongest when guilds were willing to help train new players; yet now even training raids are getting incredibly abrasive when new players aren't successful enough. WvW Pugmanders are demanding levels of discipline from randos as if they were hardcore fight guilds, and then get frustrated when they aren't performing perfectly. Everyone "expects", but too few are putting in the effort needed to be better, or help other players get better.

Fact of the matter is, GW2's game design has always had problems.... as did WoW for all of its life. And in both cases, the one thing that managed to hold things together IS the state of the Community. With the community so sick of itself right now, its no surprise the game design has to carry more weight then its ever been capable of supporting.

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@starlinvf.1358 said:snip

What I disagree with:

  • the forum drama community is not representative of the games overall community and tends to extremes
  • many of the community issues mentioned disapear once people join like minded guilds and players to play with

You've basically summarized the worst of every game modes forum content. That's neither the state of the game, nor the predominant opinion/interaction of most players in the game modes.

I fail to see how this entire analysis relates to adding easy modes accross the board for raids.

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I'm pretty happy with the way raids are now. it might be nice if they gave all the encounters a challenge mote and increased rewards from doing CM. Some encounters like Gorseval are far too easy with a decent group. I think players who want to get into raids should just watch youtube videos, read guides, join low LI groups, and spend a day on the golem practicing their rotation. The resources and players willing to help are out there, I don't consider an easy mode necessary.

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@maddoctor.2738 said:

@"BrokenGlass.9356" said:I haven't had the experience that fractal difficulty scaling doesn't work.

Someone runs Fractals because they have some of the gold farms in the gameSomeone runs Fractals because they are the only way to finish legendary precursor collectionsSomeone runs Fractals for the extra daily rewards recommended rewardsSomeone runs Fractals for the Ad InfinitumSomeone runs Fractals for the extra chance at Ascended items

The difficulty tiers have little to no effect in Fractal popularity, there are loads of rewards that keep them alive in the long run and now that lots of players finished their precursors and Ad infinitum and are swimming in easy ascended gear, Fractal running gets slower and slower.

Because I'm trying to make them both happy with my suggestions.

You are only trying to make happy one particular group, those that can't run current Raids and want the shinnies, all while ruining the experience for anyone else. That's all I read in your suggestions, so try again with something actually useful if you want to make "both groups" happy.

How does my suggestion hurt anyone? I'm not even convinced that my idea is good.... But man does everyone hate it.

How exactly does adding modes for other people ruin the experience? And also, how does it ruin the experience to also make harder content... This just allows the spectrum of skill levels to stratify... Which does happen in fractals. Don't try to claim there aren't more noobs in tier 1 than tier 4.

If you perceive me to be fighting for one side or the other, then you simply doubt my altruism.

I don't want any changes if they won't make folks happy.

But there's a reason why the topic keeps coming up. And the old hands refusing to believe in the idea of new players getting run off by elitism is hilarious, because there's a CHORUS of new players on this forum trying to say that "it's what's happening to me!" and they only get met with "no, it's not just you, get gud"... And they get understandably upset at the lack of compassion.

Like, if you can't see the point raised by the other side, is because you want to be right, and are having a failure of imagination and compassion.

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@BrokenGlass.9356 said:I don't want any changes if they won't make folks happy.

Then stop asking for easier modes, that alone ruins the experience and hurts everyone that plays the current content.

Arenanet already asked the Raid team to make the Strike Missions, as if the release rate wasn't already abysmal, and now you want to add so much extra burden on them? Until what? Until we get 1 Raid every 3 years? The higher ups clearly spread the team thin all over the place, they don't need the extra work. Remove the living world completely and only release Raids and Fractals, with the entire team working on them, and you can have 14 difficulty modes. But while the game is so focused on the living/open world, that is never an option. They need to redesign the entire game to be mostly about raiding and realign their resources appropriately before any such difficulty expansion can realistically happen. And that kind of change will never happen so asking for an easy mode is an impossibility.

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@maddoctor.2738 said:

@BrokenGlass.9356 said:I don't want any changes if they won't make folks happy.

Then stop asking for easier modes, that alone ruins the experience and hurts everyone that plays the current content.Oh please, don't speak for everyone. You already know that, for example, i disagree with you here. And i know i am not the only one.

No, it definitely doesn't hurt everyone. It may hurt you, and your friends (i am not sure how, but i will take your word for it), it might also ruin your experience (again, not sure how, but won't argue with your feelings), but you are most definitely not everyone.

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@Astralporing.1957 said:

@BrokenGlass.9356 said:I don't want any changes if they won't make folks happy.

Then stop asking for easier modes, that alone ruins the experience and hurts everyone that plays the current content.Oh please, don't speak for everyone. You already know that, for example, i disagree with you here. And i know i am not the only one.

No, it definitely doesn't hurt
everyone
. It may hurt you, and your friends (i am not sure how, but i will take your word for it), it might also ruin your experience (again, not sure how, but won't argue with your feelings), but you are most definitely not everyone.

Well that is feigning a bit ignorance.

maddoctor was pretty clear on why he believes that easy mode hurts current raid content: the further division of already minimal resouces spent on developing this content.

He even gave a suggestion:Take resources from other content like open world, given how the vast majority of content developed is easy.

While we can only assume where resources for easy modes would come from, recent and past developments also support the theory that the instance/raid/fractal team will not get increased in size. Thus all additional content would tax the already far between releases.

Is it so hard to understand why players who enjoy challenging content are against further division of resources? Especially since it is questionable if this will result in more players for the content (versus simply increasing content deployment).

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@Cyninja.2954 said:

@BrokenGlass.9356 said:I don't want any changes if they won't make folks happy.

Then stop asking for easier modes, that alone ruins the experience and hurts everyone that plays the current content.Oh please, don't speak for everyone. You already know that, for example, i disagree with you here. And i know i am not the only one.

No, it definitely doesn't hurt
everyone
. It may hurt you, and your friends (i am not sure how, but i will take your word for it), it might also ruin your experience (again, not sure how, but won't argue with your feelings), but you are most definitely not everyone.

Well that is feigning a bit ignorance.

maddoctor was pretty clear on why he believes that easy mode hurts current raid content: the further division of already minimal resouces spent on developing this content.Ah, this. At this moment i think that introducing easy mode, while in theory dividing resources allocated to raids, in fact would not have that effect. Why? Because raids are already in danger of getting their resources limited. After they reformed the teams, there isn't even a raid/fractal team anymore - only 3 LS teams and one QoL/general content team. So, if anything, easy mode might make the raid content more widely applicable, and that might stop anet from further reducing their efforts spent on it.

But that's only my guess.

Still, that doesn't change the main point of my post you quoted - that he was not speaking for everyone.

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