Bobby Stein (dev) comment on Raid

[voltaicbore.8012]

@Astralporing.1957 said:

Although i do agree, that Anet's methodology of throwing stuff at the wall and looking if it sticks, and abandonig content if they;re even a bit dissatisfied with it doesn't help the game in the long run. I know that it may seem easier (and more fun) to start working on new stuff than trying to fix old stuff trying to make it work better, but that tendency does make the game filled with carcasses of old abandoned ideas. Which isn't exactly showing anything positive to potential new players. Or even to many old ones.

I will upvote this kind of idea every time I see it. I doubt this thread is getting a lot of dev attention, but in the off chance it does.... I would very much like ANet to consider the mounting cost of the abandonment strategy over time. This is exactly what happens - the longer they keep doing that, the more abandoned half-baked stuff accumulates all over the game. It may initially be an intangible effect, but having a game littered with abandoned content feels incredibly different than a game that slowly gets rid of those 'carcasses' and replaces them with relevant, reworked versions of them.

GW2 has the makings of the single most superior player experience in the market today. The game is so supremely generous on most QoL matters (with a notable exception being the horribly executed build templates), and is deeply respectful of the time and effort players put in. ANet clearly cares about constructing a vibrant and lore-rich world. Yet for all this inherent strength, it struggles compared to games that, in comparison, spit in players' faces. I think the abandonment approach accounts for most of this struggle.

As for the topic of the thread... lemme just put it this way. I still run dungeon frequenter (much of the paths solo, for sheer convenience) twice a day. At this point I'm beyond caring if raids survive, or if they go the way of dungeons. So long as the reward structure remains in place and they remain doable for the life of the game, I'll live with that.

[Astralporing.1957]

@maddoctor.2738 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:You

expected

raids to be treated as something special, something similar to WvW and SPvP (but with far better dev support than those).

Never expected them to be treated as something special though, not really sure how you came up with that idea.

On one side, you get riled at people treating Raids differently than a lot of niche content that have no dedicated devs, and no set release schedule. On the other, you specifically bemoan the fact that raid devs were working also on other projects, and wanted them to have not only a set release schedule, but a

frequent

one at that.

Don't you see how these two approaches are in direct conflict with each other?

[Sykper.6583]

I can't help but feel this is yet another blow to GW2 as a whole. Another 'system' being shuddered, someone earlier put it best when describing the 'mounting cost' of the game.

Thinking back to HoT announcement and release I can't help but wonder if Arenanet 'baited' the veterans of the community, people who sought a challenge and were speedrunning Arah with something different. Raids might have been their answer, and having an expansion bring about all these features from Elite Specs, Gliding, post-leveling introduction of masteries, general difficulty spike and so forth were an initial drive for Anet.

My speculation now that Bobby's made it clear (or at least as clear as non-announcements are)? I think Arenanet didn't expect Raids to be so well-liked by a good participation, after the initial Forsaken Thicket Wings 1 to 3. They put themselves into a bind because they underestimated the investment into Raid development, and I suppose the Reputation of 'Raiding' in an MMO might have muddled their game's focuses in PvE which is odd since there wasn't anything outside of Open World other than Fractals.

100% believe that Arenanet can and should still try to make Raids. Because once they showed they know how to make such encounters, it opened a Pandora's box where they underestimated the number of players wanting it, and overestimated their capacity to deliver. And since there's no development the players in the game who aren't getting raids, whole guilds, whole segments of the population lost interest in GW2 as a whole.

And not for a lack of trying, the Community had definitely done everything we could to foster raiding but they won't spend anymore resources on it. This is something Arenanet did to themselves.