Redefining the new game experience

[Obtena.7952]

@Ailuro.2780 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:

there shouldn't be SOME level of effort on the player to learn how the game works.The point is the player learn how the game works IN the game, with both a better integration to find guildmates and just friendsANDA better

training

system.

I get the point. Training IN the game for the details you are talking about just don't make sense ... it's literally a duplication of information that is ALREADY available to review at your leisure WITHOUT going through some clunky game interface to do it. If you want to know what stats do, you can look it up outside the game, which is actually a reasonable and preferred method.

[Obtena.7952]

@Oxstar.7643 said:I've found enough small errors in the base game to make me pretty convinced that they don't care enough to put the effort into redefining it.

Or those errors are so insignificant they don't matter compared to the other issues that need to be addressed. I mean, to say they don't care ... that's pretty obviously untrue. The patch notes are pretty clear about what is fixed and they still go in and address 'base game' things. If Anet didn't care about how the game worked, they wouldn't bother patching and changing it.

[Oxstar.7643]

These "insignificant things" are part of what's called polish. Something I see come up a lot lately.

[Obtena.7952]

@"Oxstar.7643" said:These "insignificant things" are part of what's called polish. Something I see come up a lot lately.

So in your opinion, lack of polish indicates not caring? That's rather sensational considering there are more important things to deal with wouldn't you agree?

[Oxstar.7643]

@Obtena.7952 said:

@"Oxstar.7643" said:These "insignificant things" are part of what's called polish. Something I see come up a lot lately.

So in your opinion, lack of polish indicates not caring? That's rather sensational considering there are more important things to deal with wouldn't you agree?I never said not caring. I said not caring enough to redfine the base game, as the OP suggests. Of course they are going to fix game breaking stuff.Also, can you please stop misquoting me? Again - never said they don't care.

[Ailuro.2780]

@Astyrah.4015 said:

@"Oxstar.7643" said:I doubt we need an instanced training area.

one thing i wish they'd add to the starter zones, though not really an instanced area is a "CC-this-thing corner" with a chest on it kinda like the "dodge-the-spikes corner" with a chest on it. it wont be part of map completion, it would be super optional but it's a very small mini tutorial that could entice players to do it as soon as they can or come back for it later because it's a chest they haven't opened before. a tool tip popup would appear just like the one on the dodge-the-spikes informing the player for the first time how to get to the chest.

it can be as simple as a stone pedestal (breakable object with a CC breakbar) with a chest on top that you have to use CC skills/abilities on in order to get the chest down and opened. maybe it's a good and friendly way to introduce breakbars and CC abilities to new players that in the future level 80 content they'd do, they'll get reminded of this "breakbar"

That's actually a great idea! Things that promote the incentive to actually understand the essential skills in the game to prepare for end-game content is really needed in GW2.

It'd be far simpler adding that than the instructor idea. The only benefit I see with an instanced training area is the fact that it allows the possible integration of playing around with different weapons easier and changing of stats easier as you can also put this in a home instance possibly with a bank.

[Ailuro.2780]

@"Oxstar.7643" said:These "insignificant things" are part of what's called polish. Something I see come up a lot lately.

Exactly, players who are dismissive and called it insignificant simply just learn to live with it. That's not the right attitude. A game, especially an MMORPG should always be focused on improving its gameplay, especially the minor inadequacies when they cumulate to the hundreds.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

I believe there are plenty of players that prefer the Wiki to asking in-game.
Asking in-game can be a crap shoot. At least the Wiki is almost always accurate.

[Obtena.7952]

@Ailuro.2780 said:

@"Oxstar.7643" said:These "insignificant things" are part of what's called polish. Something I see come up a lot lately.

Exactly, players who are dismissive and called it insignificant simply just learn to live with it. That's not the right attitude. A game, especially an MMORPG should always be focused on improving its gameplay, especially the minor inadequacies when they cumulate to the hundreds.

Not at the expense of other activities it shouldn't. This really isn't a problem; people have been learning about the details you are talking about outside of computer games since they existed, whether it's a written manual or it's internet counterparts.

[Astralporing.1957]

@Obtena.7952 said:

@"Oxstar.7643" said:These "insignificant things" are part of what's called polish. Something I see come up a lot lately.

So in your opinion, lack of polish indicates not caring? That's rather sensational considering there are more important things to deal with wouldn't you agree?That's a general problem with this game. Apparently, there are

always

"more important" and more recent things to deal with instead of polishing old content. Which is why the game is covered with carcasses of abandoned content and mechanics. Nobody wants to fix/tweak older stuff because it is a drudge work. It's far more glamorous to work on new things, and keep throwing stuff at the wall hoping this time it will stick.

In the end, that "we have more important stuff to do" approach is hurting the game longterm.

[Oxstar.7643]

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:

@"Oxstar.7643" said:These "insignificant things" are part of what's called polish. Something I see come up a lot lately.

So in your opinion, lack of polish indicates not caring? That's rather sensational considering there are more important things to deal with wouldn't you agree?That's a general problem with this game. Apparently, there are

always

"more important" and more recent things to deal with instead of polishing old content. Which is why the game is covered with carcasses of abandoned content and mechanics. Nobody wants to fix/tweak older stuff because it is a drudge work. It's far more glamorous to work on new things, and keep throwing stuff at the wall hoping this time it will stick.

In the end, that "we have more important stuff to do" approach is hurting the game longterm.

To be fair, AreaNet is owned by NCsoft, and all the founders of the company are gone. They sold their ability to have the final word on what to do with the game and disillusioned important members and suffered layoffs. I am of the opinion that if they had gone with a slow and steady approach then they would not have had to sell themselves to NCsoft, could have devoted much more time to making a game with less but much more polished content, and kept their founders onboard to this day.Rushing is bad.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

ArenaNet 'sold' to NCSoft long before they ever released any game, much less Guild Wars 2. Not sure what 'slow and steady approach' is being referenced.

Also, as to 'nobody wants to fix/tweak older stuff because it is a drudge work. It's far more glamorous to work on new things', I'm not sure that the Devs get to pick and choose what they want to work on, whether they think it drudge-like or glamorous.

[Seera.5916]

The problem is that type of content assumes everyone needs to be hand held through how to play the game and doesn't want to learn through other means.

I would hate having to go through the tutorial stuff you mentioned. Tutorial sessions are never like the actual game. They're boring and players will just use skill until they find the one that works and won't figure out why it works vs why others won't. Players want to get to the game or get back to the game. Not play a mandatory tutorial.

The game would be better served by having actual missions or quests in game have new mechanics put into them that organically teach things that players need to know.

Like the first mission that has a break bar, make it so that players need to use some CC to break the bar to make the enemy defeatable and have a weapon on hand that the player can pick up that has that. And make NPC's mention the fact that it needs some crowd control and they can use the "CC weapon" to apply some if too much time goes by without progress. At this point, they would need something like the dodge roll thing in order to achieve the same purpose as it's probably not worth it to modify the story to fix that and you'd need a way to get players who have played through the story on all of their characters that they intend to take through the story.

I hate tutorial things that take me out of the story in order to complete it unless I'm going for like advanced tactics. But basic stuff like you're mentioning, needs to be weaved into the story or missions in an organic way.

The mission Hidden Arcana in LS2 does this perfectly. Each of the mini-bosses teaches a mechanic that's needed to defeat the final boss.

[Ailuro.2780]

@"Seera.5916" said:The problem is that type of content assumes everyone needs to be hand held through how to play the game and doesn't want to learn through other means.I would hate having to go through the tutorial stuff you mentioned. Tutorial sessions are never like the actual game. They're boring and players will just use skill until they find the one that works and won't figure out why it works vs why others won't. Players want to get to the game or get back to the game. Not play a mandatory tutorial.

As described through the pre-existing examples of the "tutorials" in town and around the beginner maps, those are completely optional. I do not support the idea of mandatory tutorials. That would go against the nature of the hands-off approach in the levelling process of guild wars2.

The game would be better served by having actual missions or quests in game have new mechanics put into them that organically teach things that players need to know.

The mission you described is a great idea, and like another person commented on an incentive to get a chest. Here you said:

make NPC's mention the fact that it needs some crowd control and they can use the "CC weapon" to apply some if too much time goes by without progress.

It would be very easy to weave in either the story or around the maps bosses having critical weaknesses and the NPCs saying something. As you already know, the training golems exist and are great to practise rotations with however from my experience, most players never know they exist till they're mentioned by another player.

doesn't want to learn through other means.

Bringing back what you said, this is the essential thing. There should be the freedom of choice to the player that they can go to either the wiki OR in the game with an NPC OR learn with friends OR learn with friends and they can practise alone when they want but the integration of the idea of practising skills and being conscious of what they actually do is not a well made option in my opinion.

Players who prefer the wiki and videos can do that, but not everyone wants to learn this way.

[Seera.5916]

@Ailuro.2780 said:

@"Seera.5916" said:The problem is that type of content assumes everyone needs to be hand held through how to play the game and doesn't want to learn through other means.I would hate having to go through the tutorial stuff you mentioned. Tutorial sessions are never like the actual game. They're boring and players will just use skill until they find the one that works and won't figure out why it works vs why others won't. Players want to get to the game or get back to the game. Not play a mandatory tutorial.

As described through the pre-existing examples of the "tutorials" in town and around the beginner maps, those are completely optional. I do not support the idea of mandatory tutorials. That would go against the nature of the hands-off approach in the levelling process of guild wars2.

The game would be better served by having actual missions or quests in game have new mechanics put into them that organically teach things that players need to know.

The mission you described is a great idea, and like another person commented on an incentive to get a chest. Here you said:

make NPC's mention the fact that it needs some crowd control and they can use the "CC weapon" to apply some if too much time goes by without progress.

It would be very easy to weave in either the story or around the maps bosses having critical weaknesses and the NPCs saying something. As you already know, the training golems exist and are great to practise rotations with however from my experience, most players never know they exist till they're mentioned by another player.

doesn't want to learn through other means.

Bringing back what you said, this is the essential thing. There should be the freedom of choice to the player that they can go to either the wiki OR in the game with an NPC OR learn with friends OR learn with friends and they can practise alone when they want but the integration of the idea of practising skills and being conscious of what they actually do is not a well made option in my opinion.

Players who prefer the wiki and videos can do that, but not everyone wants to learn this way.

If it's optional, players will by and large most likely not do it. Leaving the same problem you're describing in place.

The major basic stuff should have means in game to teach it near when it would be appropriate.

Don't need in game tutorial sessions to learn that the higher DPS you have the faster you kill things. That most would call the game insulting their intelligence.

To me, short of CC usage, the game does a good job of teaching the necessary skills for the game and does not need any major overhaul.

[Ailuro.2780]

If it's optional, players will by and large most likely not do it. Leaving the same problem you're describing in place.

Why would they not do it? It's the choice of between reading text and not playing the game, versus engaging in the game.

Here the argument that "if it's optional" doesn't really work considering if you weigh the two, it is way more fun to actually learn in the game than read the wiki.Sure, it's subjective but speaking from my own experience, more people would choose to learn it in the game than read from the wiki.

Don't need in game tutorial sessions to learn that the higher DPS you have the faster you kill things. That most would call the game insulting their intelligence.

There are different ways of achieving this due to the difference in weapons and professions.Letting the players understand exactly how to achieve a higher DPS from a specific combo and understanding their trait lines is not something insulting.

I'll say this again, many players come to end-game content with no clue what is the right weapons for them to achieve a high dps, much less knowing about combo effects in their chosen profession. The argument I'm coming from is there is more than enough evidence of people simply having to copy template builds and just forget about everything they've played with prior, it shows that they have poor understanding of the game mechanics. This is exactly why I disagree with:

the game does a good job of teaching the necessary skills

At the very least, if the game did a good job of teaching the necessary skills, then players would have to change a couple chosen traits in their specialization because learning that is pretty time-consuming. As far as I'm aware, a majority of new players who reach lvl 80 don't even understand why they should use a greatsword over axe/mace as as a warrior in PvE modes.

[Sobx.1758]

@Ailuro.2780 said:

the game does a good job of teaching the necessary skills

At the very least, if the game did a good job of teaching the necessary skills, then players would have to change a couple chosen traits in their specialization because learning that is pretty time-consuming. As far as I'm aware, a majority of new players who reach lvl 80 don't even understand why they should use a greatsword over axe/mace as as a warrior in PvE modes.

I agree with @"Seera.5916" that the game does a good job when teaching most of the key elements that each player should understand while making their own build. The additional explanation for cc usage against breakbars would obviously be useful, but it was already discussed many times in the past.It's weird that you seem to base your opinion about players "not understanding how the game/build works" on the fact that they don't run the builds you want them to run. There's nothing wrong about running axes or maces in pve modes. I don't run gs in pve on warrior because I don't want/need to (won't even try to argue with you why you're wrong about gs in pve imo, because I guess that's not the main point anyways) and it by far doesn't make me somehow confused about the game mechanics or optimal/meta builds.

[Obtena.7952]

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:

@"Oxstar.7643" said:These "insignificant things" are part of what's called polish. Something I see come up a lot lately.

So in your opinion, lack of polish indicates not caring? That's rather sensational considering there are more important things to deal with wouldn't you agree?Nobody wants to fix/tweak older stuff because it is a drudge work.

Or because it's not as important as other things.

[Astralporing.1957]

@Obtena.7952 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:Nobody wants to fix/tweak older stuff because it is a drudge work.

Or because it's not as important as other things.Dungeons were not important. Duly noted.

[Obtena.7952]

@Ailuro.2780 said:

If it's optional, players will by and large most likely not do it. Leaving the same problem you're describing in place.

Why would they not do it? It's the choice of between reading text and not playing the game, versus engaging in the game.

I don't get this mentality ... like somehow if the information that is available outside the game isn't put IN it, people just won't play it? That doesn't make sense. No one is quitting the game because it's too much of a burden for them to read the information they want to know about the game somewhere online. Contrary to what you are saying, doing tutorials and reading information is actually NOT a very engaging aspect of gameplay, if at all.

Also, what necessary skills is the game NOT teaching people? I mean, how many skills do you actually need to play this game? WASD, your skill buttons and dodging. The mechanics to actually play the game aren't hard or overwhelming.

[Obtena.7952]

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:Nobody wants to fix/tweak older stuff because it is a drudge work.

Or because it's not as important as other things.Dungeons were not important. Duly noted.

Honestly, I think dungeons were not important because for some reason, Anet coupled them to a specific part of the leveling storyline. I mean, your point is that dungeons don't work or something? What 'tweak' do you think they need that's so important that it gets done over other things?

[Astralporing.1957]

@Obtena.7952 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:Nobody wants to fix/tweak older stuff because it is a drudge work.

Or because it's not as important as other things.Dungeons were not important. Duly noted.

Honestly, I think dungeons were not important because for some reason, Anet coupled them to a specific part of the leveling storyline. I mean, your point is that dungeons don't work or something? What 'tweak' do you think they need that's so important that it gets done over other things?You seem to forget that they abandoned dungeons specifically because

they didn't want to fix all the bugs they were riddled with

. Nor were they wiling to rewrite their code to something that would make further work on them easier.

But i will give you another example: underwater combat.

[Oxstar.7643]

@Obtena.7952 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:

@"Oxstar.7643" said:These "insignificant things" are part of what's called polish. Something I see come up a lot lately.

So in your opinion, lack of polish indicates not caring? That's rather sensational considering there are more important things to deal with wouldn't you agree?Nobody wants to fix/tweak older stuff because it is a drudge work.

Or because it's not as important as other things.

I agree with what astralporing said. If you constantly say that there are more important things then a lot of little thing accumulate to become actual problems.

[Obtena.7952]

@Oxstar.7643 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:

@Oxstar.7643 said:These "insignificant things" are part of what's called polish. Something I see come up a lot lately.

So in your opinion, lack of polish indicates not caring? That's rather sensational considering there are more important things to deal with wouldn't you agree?Nobody wants to fix/tweak older stuff because it is a drudge work.

Or because it's not as important as other things.

I agree with what astralporing said. If you constantly say that there are more important things then a lot of little thing accumulate to become actual problems.

Except information that is available for players to learn about the game NOT being in the game isn't a problem contrary to the OP. Games have worked like that since the being of their existence. Written manuals typically told you how to play or gave details about the game that weren't critical to playing it ... and that's no different with how the internet provides players with information now.

You can agree with whatever he says ... but there is nothing that suggests the information the OP thinks should be in the game isn't there because it's 'drudge work'. It's simply available (and reasonably so) elsewhere.

[Oxstar.7643]

@Obtena.7952 said:

@Oxstar.7643 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:

@Oxstar.7643 said:These "insignificant things" are part of what's called polish. Something I see come up a lot lately.

So in your opinion, lack of polish indicates not caring? That's rather sensational considering there are more important things to deal with wouldn't you agree?Nobody wants to fix/tweak older stuff because it is a drudge work.

Or because it's not as important as other things.

I agree with what astralporing said. If you constantly say that there are more important things then a lot of little thing accumulate to become actual problems.

Except information that is available for players to learn about the game NOT being in the game isn't a problem. Games have worked like that since the being of their existence.

Actually, that is a common complaint across many games for many people. You shouldn't have to go open the wiki just because the game doesn't explain how things work well enough. And just because its a common thing doesn't mean it isn't a bad thing.