Raiding is on the verge of destroying huge segments of the GW2 community, if it hasn't already
qwerty.8943
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I wish I could post this anonymously....
I write this as a semi-casual, semi-serious player. I've played GW2 off-and-on since launch. I've also raided regularly, in other games, at "competent" levels, but never at top-tier / world-first / competitive levels....In those times, I loved raiding....I loved figuring out that last 1% of mechanics, or positioning. or build....that let us finally beat that "impossible" boss.....and I never gave 2 kitten about the gear! Gear was only a means to an end....to allow us to kill that boss, and have more fun.
But in GW2....I see such a huge rift between raiders and not-raiders.....a rift that grows with every update, every raid...
Even in my own guilds, when recruiting for their raid team(s)....they are only interested in "experienced" raiders. I understand their view...they did their time in PUG raids back in 2016 and 2017, learning mechanics and classes and how to build a raid team. They don't want to waste infinitely - 1 sec training others! But at the same time, when I look in LFG, every raid wants me to ping a trophy count...to prove to them that I have tons of kill experience, in every raid.. Or they want to sell me boss kills.....something I'd never, ever, consider paying for!
So what is a 'semi-casual', "competent-but-not-uber DPS", though "wants-to-learn" supposed to do?
Comments
The answer is: No. There is no problem, but a whole lot of people not willing to put in the required work + people being fed up with that attitude.
See: The dozen other threads on this topic.
They leave training to the training guilds and prefer to simply do quick and easy clears without having to worry about carrying other people. This rift you're seeing is nothing more than people who despise raids being very loud and people who despise casuals being very loud, endless yelling at each other.
I rather choose death.
Don't worry. The next Guild Wars will come out on mobile, and have such a bad/limited interface that everybody can be an elite raider by the end of a week! But for now... why don't you join the raid-training discord, and group up with other people in the same boat?
I disagree, there is a rift growing and as raiders drop off in raiding guilds because of time, lack of interest other games they wont be replaced with anyone.
Where can I find this raid-training Discord? I've been wanting to try them out now that my Weaver is geared.
its fairly easy actually. you just could start where everyone else started. form a group. fail a lot, laugh a lot, get better, beat the content.
you "fresh folks" even have more tools to use than we had back in ancient times.
or if you get lucky you will find a willing group that will show you around and give you time to learn everything.
That is incorrect.
As blocki says join training raids or put up your own training, or new people learning lfgs.
Just dont expect to kill all the bosses you train on the first day mate.
You must be on some bad "raiding guilds" if they only recruit people to take into their runs, after all you are a guild member aren't you?
What my guild is doing is taking inexperienced guild members into Raids too, after all the rest of us are experienced and can 9-man most bosses easily, even lower-man the easier bosses, so having one, or two, inexperienced members with us won't affect success or failure. Further, you need to tell your guild leaders that taking a guild member with you, instead of recruiting another random person, is an investment. You will train with them and become better and better at playing Raids and in the end they will end up winning too. I don't understand why a guild would say no to their own members, unless the rest of the people on the guild raid team are bad enough and can't carry, or they have nobody that can teach (not everyone is qualified to teach) in that case you need to find a better guild.
So, first the OP states that: Raiding is on the verge of destroying huge segments of the GW2 community. You seem to agree with him at first - See: The dozen other threads on this topic. Yes, indeed, the DOZEN of treads on this topic signals that A LOT of players from the GW2 Community are not happy.
And, finally you conclude: There is no problem. Still, according to your statement, A LOT of people are so stubborn that they refuse to put the required work.
Well, this is the problem: If you are forced to perform a required work in a game in order to obtain something. Performing that work at your free will is not a reason to be discontent. The problem is when you are forced to do this. Don't tell me nobody forces you to do this - until few months ago the raiding was gating even the XP gained from the game. And an armor is something everybody wants. Not forced to do this is when the rewards from raid are not different to what you can obtain from other content. You can decide if you raid or not in that condition. This is something not forced. But when you hide something everybody wants behind a content that according to the developers "only the best, the most dedicated and skillful part of the community, a small minority" can complete, then the things changes.
LOL - and this: "This rift you're seeing is nothing more than people who despise raids being very loud and **people who despise casuals **being very loud, endless yelling at each other."
I think we indeed have a problem - according to your statement (and I believe you, you seem to be an experienced raider), the casuals only despise the raids. But the raiders have no problem with the raids, they despise the casuals.
I think that you see now the other problem the GW2 community have - a part of it (the small part) despise the other (larger) part.
And you say we have no problems - HM!
So the minority of casuals are larger then the minority of the raiders that yell at eachother.
Were is the numbers to back that up Cristalyan
Lol, since that attitude has been a part of the game since dungeons I can't see the whole game vanishing because of it.
I remember people who would wait 10 to 15 min for the perfect group so they would have a 5 min run, they could have joined a random pug and done it in 8 but hey attitude.
Are you going to seriously claim here that raiders outnumber casuals?
The whole point of a social game is to play with the people you want to play with, not be forced to play with the people you don't.
i think the important part of her/his sentence was "that yell at each other". as a comment on "I think that you see now the other problem the GW2 community have - a part of it (the small part) despise the other (larger) part." but the discussion is going nowhere anyway.
You got it man.
The small part of both commuities are yelling at eachother noone knows how big either of those parts are so saying that one is larger then the other is wrong.
Statistically the casual group is bigger but how many of them really engaging the raiding people?
Tearing apart the community? Really? I'm all over the place in this game and I've rarely ever seen people even talk about raids. I usually see it only on here and very rarely. Raids is optional content. I'm not required to do it to do end-game. I do fractals for that and I plan on taking my guild to raid training regardless just to actually do it. Whether we beat it or not or continue it or not is up to them, but they will never be forced nor do they need to complete anything to enjoy the vast amount of content at end-game.
I don't get people like the OP. I guess I never will.
I Rev, therefore I am. Don't ruin my favorite class, please and thank you.
I'll say this as nice as I can so you do not get upset. Based on this part:
You have a kitten guild. Find one that is filled with decent people and you'll be invited to training runs in no time, plenty to go around and also advertising regularly.
EDIT:
Actually no, all this signals is that there is a vocal group of players unable to access raids coming from the very casual pve segment of this game. I'd wager that this group is:
A. a lot smaller than the entire pve community
B. very likely smaller than the active raid community
That does not break the game in a significant way. We could probably get rid of raids all together and GW2 would survive (and that is me as a raider saying this).
Yes. It has already happened. I have seen firsthand several guilds that completely disintegrated over the issue, and some more that survived, but were hit really hard and never really recovered.
Sure. that's because the rift has already happened. There was a lot of talking within first year or two after raids were inroduced. It stopped, because the rift has grown so big there's nothing even to talk about. Talk requires some common ground, after all, and those split communities have now almost nothing in common with each other.
In short, introducing raids caused some really negative impact on the community. Whether the end result was a net negative or not may be up to debate, but the fact that some negative consequences did happen isn't.
The whole point of a social game is to play with the people you want to play with, not be forced to play with the people you don't.
Disagree completely. Maybe between dedicated players (who also frequent the forums more) but the vast majority of players in this game do not care about raids, do not care about the drama in raids and have never heard of raid guilds like snowcrows or sites like metabattle.
Let's not grow something out of proportion which is a forum drama favorite.
Agreed. I was going to pretty much say this exact thing, but you beat me to it. When people talk about raiding, they don't screech about it. They want to know more. I have never really seen raiders talking garbage to others because they have better things to do or they tell people to join a guild that does raid training.
Tearing apart the community? Sorry, I'm not buying it.
I Rev, therefore I am. Don't ruin my favorite class, please and thank you.
I guess we're playing completely different games then. Which, by the way, just proves my point about the split existing and being really massive. It's apparently so big that you can't even see the other side anymore.
The whole point of a social game is to play with the people you want to play with, not be forced to play with the people you don't.
i agree with Cyninja, the only time I see hear anything at all about this mystical split is by a handful of forum posters. Never ever in game. I don't raid, I haven't the patience, but I know I could find a training guild without a problem.
Considering I am in 3 guilds with a wide mix of players from hardcore raiders, to casual raiders, to no raiders, not sure I'm the one not seeing the other side.
Raids are a niche, just as spvp and wvw. 80% of the player base don't give 1 cent about those game modes.
I do agree though that to the small group of "want to raid players but I don't have a raid yet or entered raids", there is nothing more challenging or toxic. That's based on the very nature of a desire not fulfilled.
Half the new players I've talked to wanted to try raids before they found out that it was basically impossible. Most players I've met wanted to try raids, but they could never find an entry point into the raid community.
The reason why most players don't talk about raids is because they have given up on the raid community.
PvP? What's that? Never heard of it.
Point them to the guild or raid forums where they advertise teaching guild runs?
Yet most training runs are devoid of new players. What an oxymoron.
May I ask, what effort was invested from those said players? Did any of them join a guild which did training runs or a discord channel dedicated to raids? Or was it more of a: I'll join random experienced groups and hope no one notices?
I've found that in-game, players who are interested in raiding and when pointed to join a training run, usually succeed. That is subjective experience though.
Some people simply want to see a rift in the community and huge game breaking problems. As those might justify the removal or rework of content they personally dislike or more like having raid exclusive rewards avaible in content they like.
The majority of pro-raiding and anti-raiding talk does indeed seem to happen on the forums. Most people in the game care as much about raids as they do about Esports, which is basically not at all. Nor do they quit the game over the existence of niche content.
Progress isn't made by early risers. It's made by lazy men trying to find easier ways to do something. ~ Robert Heinlein
Speaking as a ten year WoW player, if you think the end game environment in GW2 is toxic and "tearing the community apart", then you need to go over there a bit and see what elitist end-gamer toxicity really is. In WoW, the end game is tiered raiding or PVP, and you can either keep up or shut up. In GW2, the end game is much more open and up to the individual player. People in GW2 are much more free to treat the game as a game, and not an unpaid job like WoW raiding was. As a result, GW2 arguably has the best community I have ever seen anywhere in any game. Yes, raider elitism is annoying. But in this game, those people are a minority, so ignore them. If they're tearing apart the community, which I don't see, it's only because people are giving them more attention than they're due.
Ive had some practise with guilds, a few friendly raidpugs that could take me as a support allthough i lack experience and joined some few callouts in aerodome that invites new raiders into their groups.
Only thing that is required is really that you got some basic PvE mechanics, prefferably some experience from t3-t4 fracs, maybe done some harder worldbosses/bountys and stuff so you recognize animations/channels/effects to a certain extent and bring a decent profession with a decent build to the encounter.
AAND most important of all is probably that you are positive, alert and actually listen to what your more experienced squaddies have to say.
I really dont see anything wrong with raids or fractals.
I'd say the same thing about ESO, and DCUO. Those three games' end game communities. Make GW2's look like innocent toddlers. GW2 by far has one of the most relaxing and chill communities, out of the many MMOs I've played over the past 19 years.
To me, the PVPers constantly whining about "balance" with resulting over-reactions by ANet, are a much bigger threat to the GW2 community than raiders.
Speaking for EU here:
Training runs fill pretty fast and I doubt that any training guild has problems recruiting people. At least the ones I have been in.
Most players that complain about it don't spend the time and actually research. I do agree, that its not their job to go out of their way and look for a raiding guild outside of the game. The game could definitely do a better job at advertising this stuff. However, if you don't want to go out of your way and look for a raiding guild via a quick google search, don't expect the raiding community to go around and ask everyone if they would be interested in a raiding guild.
I'd consider myself pretty helpful ingame. If someone has a question, ill answer it. Hell, id even run dungeons/fractals/raids with you if I have the time, simply because this person is asking questions and probably wants to learn something. Just don't expect me to tell you everything if you are not even asking. If people aren't asking, I won't consider them worth my time.
The reason why most players don't talk about raids is that they simply don't care. I see a lot of people claiming to be casual, yet they are engaging in a lot of topics on this forum. Wake up dude. If you engage in a lot of topics in this forum, you're not really casual. The actual casuals that play the game don't bother with raids since they have a lot to do. They simply dont need them.
While I agree that some negative probably happened, this is true for every update.
Anet doesn't realize ppl don't even bother doing raids because of these kind of players. If you know how to play your character and whack at one target for hours it might be fun but thats not fun to me.
Might need to elaborate on that, but try to help and guide them till the end if you're really up to it. Don't take this in a bad way; Guide them on how to register for discord and how to use it get into raids. I do know a handful a friends of mine that's not bothered to look up on how to setup for a raid training/ new player's raid. (They got confused and give up trying on how to join using discord). While a new player just started 2 months ago (a random player I met while teaching fractal, in-game friend now) is having 4 pieces of legendary armor from training runs. And nope, never helped him with any raids. He joined the raid training group on his own after he found out about it. If your friend is having a problem finding the entry point, the approach might be wrong.
If the player is interested, they won't just give up (imo). Patience is required, as you know there are roles-requirement to be filled in raids and this requires some organizing/setting up. Can't just gather 10 random and hope for a success, therefore new players will have problem gathering players to start an own group. Which is a problem for new players, you need to be experienced to lead and X amount of players.
True to a certain extend, unlikely someone will mention something they've let go. But honestly, there's nothing to talk about unless they're really involved. "I killed Boss" is no different from "I killed Bounty", pointless to share it out. Usually what happened in a raid, is experienced and stays among the members in the raid. I fought with Balthazar, no one will understand except for the person doing the story achievement with me. There will be limited talks between a raider and a non-raider, and there will be some talks between raiders to raiders (mostly screw ups or funny things that happened during raid).
It's not anets fault that it's destroying a section of the community.
I play all modes, how is there a massive split?
To the starter people can choose with whom they play and form communities. You can change your effort and fit in or find a group that accepts you right now. Alot of the game does not require you to play together raids are the exception. Which is why joining requires more effort.
It's not a split between modes. It's a split between players. The very fact that you can have here players arguing that something that for others is everyday occurence doesn't exist, while both are playing the same content is a proof enough.
The whole point of a social game is to play with the people you want to play with, not be forced to play with the people you don't.
While I get you're argument, it's not completely true in the sense that most people are arguing that the split is not affecting enough people to Warrant seeing it as a problem.
BTW if I start a random topic about "random thing" is causing a split I could use the same argument because most people would be arguing ING about it as long as enough people care about the topic
If it is about wanting experienced players, no, it isn't just raid. It is a widespread culture in gw2, people who are willing to train newbies are few in numbers. Even if there are people who will train newbies, not everyone are there because they want to help, some are they to look good. In the chinese culture, we call it realitas or 现实
In other words, it isn't something unique in gw2, it is something happening in the world but just happen to be downright obvious in gw2. As for how you gonna change that culture which is basically changing the personality or mentality of individuals. All I can say that is not possible. You can highlight it but you never gonna change it, you can only choose to be one not like them and band up like-minded players to create such environment for yourself and like-minded people.
Founder & Retired Leader of Equinox Solstice [TIME], a Singapore-Based International PvX Guild
Henge of Denravi
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as soon as I read the title of your post I couldn't resist... for some reason I couldn't get this image out of my head. after reading the post, your concerns seem legitimate.
What reason do you desire being anonymous here? If you cannot stand behind the comments you make one would question if you should be making them.
I can honestly say that even to get into a raid training group i had trouble, in the two guilds that im in that do raids simply due to lack of player interest in trying to learn raids, we barely have enough players to fill a raid training group. The only reason i get into the semi static group im with now is because im really good friends with the group leader, and he knows that im good at playing the game, if i didnt have that i wouldnt have ever gotten in.
Amana Silentchild; My Main
Ember Wandertooth; The Kingslayer, Kianda Redpaw; The Blazing Light
Why GW is Called Guildwars
Some of those guilds got destroyed becouse raids are released so slow not becouse raids entered the game Quantify as an example
It's pretty easy to ignore raids as a casual. Didn't they change it so that you aren't locked out of getting spirit shards if the raid mastery is still locked? I think that was maybe the only thing that bugged any substantial number of non-raiders. Unless you have your heart set on getting the PvE legendary armor, or really want to see the story of the raid, you aren't really penalized for not participating.
Or the dev's could just make it require way less effort and nerf it all or come out with an easier difficulty.
That will probably never happen, though an easier difficulty with accurate rewards for the easier fights would be nice to see for a training option.
Amana Silentchild; My Main
Ember Wandertooth; The Kingslayer, Kianda Redpaw; The Blazing Light
Why GW is Called Guildwars
If they didn't have raids, you'd have elitists in dungeons or fractals or whatnot. The good thing about raids is they're confined there now.
As for the rest, well, some people take this game way too seriously. And I am not talking about serious raiders. I'm talking about people who feel "compelled" to do content that requires a lot more effort, but aren't really willing to put the effort. They have the disadvantage of treating the game like a hardcore player, but can't play the game like one-- the worst of both worlds.
I've never given a kitten about raids since day one. I know it wasn't for me, and I wasn't able to put the effort. But it's never stopped me from playing the game.
I've seen people kitten about this game incessantly for years about not being able to do things. They don't seem to even enjoy playing the game. Games are for fun. If you constantly slave away in a game without joy, that's what we call an addiction. This is bad. Step away.
You are never actually locked out of spirit shards since you also get them as random drops.
There are probably enough videos around to cover the story.
I seriously dont think theyre confined anywhere. Its really just the content that both needs large amount of repitition for some of the interesting rewards and require some rather mild coordination.
Since most people dont have that much time putting requirements is just one way to filter ppl so their success chance is higher and take less time. They dont want to bother explaining the whole thing everytime and rather just play.
Wings 1-4 are easy to complete right now anyway, Since I no longer raid anymore I have heard W6 being easy aswell along with W5 aswell