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Too “Nice” - Is GW2’s Community REALLY That Great?


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Yes, everyone is “nice.” But it’s the niceness that comes from being so distant from each other. You don’t act mean to people you don’t know that well. And no one on Guild Wars 2 really knows each other that well, it’s a solo effort done in groups you don’t have any real interaction with.

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Hey dude. What makes a community great in your opinion? If we knew a bit about what highlights great community from your perspective I'm sure we could offer a more insightful response.

@Mortifera.6138 said:Yes, everyone is “nice.” But it’s the niceness that comes from being so distant from each other. You don’t act mean to people you don’t know that well. And no one on Guild Wars 2 really knows each other that well, it’s a solo effort done in groups you don’t have any real interaction with.I would say that experience has proven to me that people you don't know are the most likely to abuse you. I have seen people conjure straight from the depths, some of the most horrible, insensitive, malevolent, violent, hurtful, wounding, destructive, twisted, caustic, ruinous sentiments and images toward others online. Totally bereft of empathy or patience, with the intent to render another person's self esteem as garbage, or harm them psychologically. The distance between people online is a major factor in nearly every case. After all, I don't know you, and likely never will, you don't know me, and likely never will.

Is the GuildWars community really that great? I think the answer lies in how people treat each other even at these distances. If I can value someone I don't even know, I feel that is a step in the right direction.

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@Mortifera.6138 said:Yes, everyone is “nice.” But it’s the niceness that comes from being so distant from each other. You don’t act mean to people you don’t know that well. And no one on Guild Wars 2 really knows each other that well, it’s a solo effort done in groups you don’t have any real interaction with.

Actually it’s the opposite. People are far more likely to be rude to a person they don’t know well. Being rude to people you know is apt to lead to repercussions and payback. The internet has a reputation for anonymous nastiness for just that reason.

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@Mortifera.6138 said:Yes, everyone is “nice.” But it’s the niceness that comes from being so distant from each other. You don’t act mean to people you don’t know that well. And no one on Guild Wars 2 really knows each other that well, it’s a solo effort done in groups you don’t have any real interaction with.

I think you have that wrong way around. People usually are nice to people they know, but can be mean to strangers.

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It's neither nicer nor worse than other communities. It's the same as every other online space pretty much. All kinds of people here. The game design itself doesn't even encourage being social, so what is being put out there is always very deliberate and might be reason why some rather prefer to show their good side, presenting and all.

Also God dang, the moment one of them young whippersnappers tries to badmouth I'll they get me mallet

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Nah, community is nice because ther is almost no "conflict potential".Metaevents hardly fail (i remember times when chack, ds, etc. where not a 100% win, there was a lot of salt going on, still is on serpents ;) )There is no mob/kill stealing.Nodes are also shared.Everyone gets the same rewards.

If you add a single fail status like in wvw/raids/fracs/pvp "nicest community" isn´t so nice anymore.So "we" are nice be design.i´ve seen this in a lot of other games as well. everyone is everyones best friend until someone messes up/gets loot you do not get now anymore.We are the best in praising ourself though, never seen that before.

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community really is that nice. always a freindly mesmer to help out at a jp.. someone to help with a sticky meta or champ.. even met some of my favourite people whilst pvping with or against them after a salty exchange, you chat and its cool.

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@Dami.5046 said:well the ingame community might be 'nice' same can't be said for the forums.

Because, as somebody mentioned above, it's all about clash of interests. There is that clash on forums - people compete for proving others their point, and disprove points of others. And not so much of that clash ingame, as it's designed to prevent any competition or source of dissent.

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@MoriMoriMori.5349 said:

@Dami.5046 said:well the ingame community might be 'nice' same can't be said for the forums.

Because, as somebody mentioned above, it's all about clash of interests. There is that clash on forums - people compete for proving others their point, and disprove points of others. And not so much of that clash ingame, as it's designed to prevent any competition or source of dissent.

Yeah I get it, this isn't the only forum I use or have used. Forums, however are not black and white.

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gw2 community is just normal. Some people are bad, some are saints and the rest 90% are somewhere in between as in the general population.

There is a lot of self-righteousness around by normal people thinking they are so amazing as a community because the game forces you to be decent to each other through its mechanics. This gives a bit of a bad image and you can see it sometimes online in the attitude of people. It can be a bit annoying but in the end of the day the gw2 community is just normal. I suppose this makes it much better than many communities out there that can be pretty awful but that should not be sth to be impressed by. Especially since it is basically imposed by the game.

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I've seen the same things in GW2 as many other MMORPG's - people raging for failing at HoT zone events, the usual racist/political/religious nonsense in Lion's arch, know of people being kicked from the final boss in dungeons for someone's guild members to be let in, let's not even go into raids/PvP/WvW and so on...

But probably the most damning thing about this game's community is the obsession with farming gold, which actually makes the community worse in certain respects than other MMORPGs. For example take dungeons (back when dungeons were still a thing), when I played LOTRO (long ago when it was sub based) there were a lot of guilds, even individuals who did events (or simply announce in chat) to teach people dungeons or run low levels through, etc. In GW2 on the other hand that sort of thing was a very rare occurrence, because people were obsessed with running through dungeons as fast as possible all the time for gold per hour. And God forbid people tried running a low level dungeon on a character that wasn't max level...

Overall the GW2 community reflects the game, shallow.

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@Mortifera.6138 said:Yes, everyone is “nice.” But it’s the niceness that comes from being so distant from each other. You don’t act mean to people you don’t know that well. And no one on Guild Wars 2 really knows each other that well, it’s a solo effort done in groups you don’t have any real interaction with.

I cant agree sorry. My interactions on here have been much more positive than on wow etc.

When i first started playing, i inadvertently did LB4 - apologised and just got replies on 'np' not a single bit of abuse

When i die in game, i frequently get revived even when it is risky for them (and i make a point of doing the same)

Newbies asking questions on map chat seem to get responses not abuse...

When doing events in HOT with only one other person ...we have ended up chatting

The forums seem much less toxic

Finally, i am newly joined to my guild - i could not for the life of me solo mordremoth, i didnt even ask for help- just asked if i could quit right before boss fight without losing progress. Five minutes later half the guild have turned up!! and walked me through it

Overall these are all positive experiences that have kept me playing despite personal gripes (paying for all the LS content, hating tangled depths)

The only MMO that might beat GW for friendliness is LOTRO - the guys there were so laid back it was unreal.

As always just my impressions and i havent dipped into PVP so that might be different.

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@Mortifera.6138 said:Yes, everyone is “nice.” But it’s the niceness that comes from being so distant from each other. You don’t act mean to people you don’t know that well. And no one on Guild Wars 2 really knows each other that well, it’s a solo effort done in groups you don’t have any real interaction with.

The in game community is fine.

It's the forums and reddit that are terrible.

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Never forget my first month in this game. I was in Ascalon doing map completion/exploring on the way to my personal story, and there was this vista way up top. I couldn't figure out how to get up there with no springer.

Then I get a whisper from a person who had just completed it, asking me if I was trying to get to the vista. I replied affirmatively, and they ran up to me and whispered that I should follow them. They then took me up and around and behind this convoluted path to get to the vista. I fell several times as I suck at jumping, but they patiently waited, and helped guide me to the vista.

It's easy to rush to a downed player / blue icon on the mini map, or even join a group asking for help to take down a champ. But take time out of your day to help a player for no reason and with no benefit to yourself? And in the year'ish since that happened, I've seen that happen time and time and time again

I had not even reached the point where I was asking for help - this player noticed me fumbling around and send me a whisper to find out if they could help.

That experience will always define the GW2 community for me.

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The 'distance' between players certainly isn't more of an issue than it is in any other game I've played, MMO or otherwise, and I do feel there are more niceties between random players than in, say, WoW. Examples: being downed usually draws at least a couple players to res you, questions in zone chat about content tends to get informative responses (and yes: "check the wiki" is informative too, since not everyone is aware of its quality), including asking for help on an HP (and again: "join the HP train" is informative too :-) ). But I realize I'm a purely casual players, who rarely even runs low tier fractals and doesn't PvP/WvW. So YMMV.

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