Hey,
I'm a newish player, recently hit level 80. The journey to 80 is great, with the game having a lot going on for it. The combat, animations, and art are all well done. The dye system is excellent, and the monetization seems more than fair. I've been happy to spend some cash along the way.
Unfortunately, after hitting 80, my gameplay experience has gone downhill. You've locked both character progression and story progression behind points systems (hero and mastery points). In a vacuum, this is fine -- it would just be a bit of a grind to advance through the endgame. I've played games with experience loss on death and 8+ hours needed just to grind out a single level, so I'm okay with grinding.
What I have an issue with, though, is the points (particularly the mastery points) being located in areas that aren't necessarily accessible to the player, with the player not immediately knowing whether or not it's something that can be obtained at that moment. For example, I'll see a mastery point on the map, try to ride over to that location, inevitably end up encountering terrain that I can't manage to successfully navigate, begin to wonder whether that point-node is something I can even obtain with the travel forms that I currently have unlocked, get frustrated, and end up heading to YouTube for more information. This gameplay loop is now eating up the majority of my playing time. It provides greater friction than literally anything else I've encountered in the game, and it's a bigger obstacle than even the toughest enemies the game has thrown at me. I'm beginning to feel like YouTube is the end boss of GW2. Alphabet Company is currently making more revenue off of me than you are.
I'm okay with heavily relying on third-party resources for in-game information (I play a lot of Path of Exile), but typically this information involves items such as combat mechanics, character building, and proper skill use. Needing to look at a second screen constantly to determine whether I can climb up a hill or make a jump has grown really tiresome. My character is currently unable to progress in both HoT & PoF without more mastery points, and I unfortunately ran out of motivation to keep YouTubing them (particularly when I often discover they require unlocking something I haven't unlocked yet -- which would also require obtaining more mastery points).
The game itself is great. Hard-locking players out of progress with this system that was obviously going to have them constantly relying on YouTube or a Wiki -- that seems like a poor choice for an endgame.
Been experiencing this issue all weekend. I've tried a few of the solutions offered here. Nothing works. For the record: ▪︎ I've downloaded and played this game fine in the past. Never had this issue before. ▪︎ I still have the same computer as before. ▪︎ I still have the same internet service provider (Spectrum). ▪︎ I'm still in the same house. ▪︎ I still have the same modem/router. ▪︎ I still have no problems downloading and installing software from other companies, including Blizzard, Steam, Nvidia, Corsair, Logitech, Google, Microsoft, and dozens of others. ▪︎ The notion that the problem is on my end is clown-car logic. I've spent several hundred dollars on content in this game that I currently cannot access. It needs to be fixed.
