Edelweiss.4261

Legendary equipment locks what should be a baseline or easily accessible feature behind a gold/time-sink that most players will never get beyond. The implication that having legendary equipment shows more investment(be it time, "dedication", or "commitment") is nonsense. I don't waste my time with raids/fractals because I find them less enjoyable than watching paint dry. This does not mean I have invested less in the game in any meaningful measure. That someone may stay under the illusion that their investment is more valuable than mine is exemplified by a number of posts in this thread. Simply put, this thread highlights why implementing legendary equipment was a terrible decision.

Completing the story instances is a chore. If there weren't incentives for doing so, I'd probably ignore most story instances. Requiring the story be completed before unlocking the tp scroll means completing a lot of boring content in sequence. Why was this considered a positive change?

Strike missions lean more towards raids/fractals/etc, so I view them as ignoring GW2's strengths, free-form cooperation with strangers. Content similar to raids exist in other MMOs. Content like GW2's open world, however, is unique to GW2. If they truly want to design difficult content, they should design it within the context of the open world. Personally, I place value on the connection between a large group of strangers more than I do on so-called "difficulty".

None of the above.

For my part, I don't like when we create problems for solutions rather than solutions for problems. The problem that we need to retrain to use mounts in the cold comes from the solution that is to regrant access to mounts. The solution comes before the problem. The problem is, thus, contrived. Mounts, on the other hand, solved an existing perceived issue among certain players(what fraction I could not say) that our characters were too immobile. I remember many builds pre-PoF would include utilities just to help you traverse maps a bit faster.

I don't find much content that I play difficult, but I'm glad for it. I don't care about challenge, I want to have fun. Having to blow my cooldowns on a random mob just sounds wasteful. For me, this would just make core Tyria significantly more tedious and time consuming. Given that recent balance patches feel like unfun nerfs for most classes, I think OP might get their wish eventually. =(

I'd pay for new weapons or new elite specs. Just putting that out there.

Making legendary equipment when you have 18 avatars is tiresome. I'm doing my best to get ascended on some of them.

While this is certainly true to an extent, I don't think clamming up is the best course of action. Communication needs to also effectively manage expectations. If you say you are working on something with the disclaimer that it might get canned, communicating that the idea was canned and why needs to be done sooner than later. There are those who will complain no matter how well you manage expectations(and they will be loud about it), but these people(or others) will complain just the same from silence. The claims of lies will sting more than the claims of silence and, I think, will feature more prominently in the minds of the developers. I think this is why silence is opted for over communication. Unfortunately, communication generates a lot of goodwill from more understanding fans while silence generates anxiety. Still, developer mental health is important, so silence may be better for more fragile people like myself.

I don't have issue with power creep, but all of these things are just so kitten expensive. I have 18 avatars. Getting all of them ascended everything is a pain without consideration for changes when I want to try different builds. If I have to worry about ascended runes too, I'll never finish.

I'm talking about the marketing. The game was originally marketed using a female 'V'. That changed as the process moved along. This probably happened because a male 'V' was more marketable. If someone has an issue with pandering, they should have an issue with that. I think an issue here is that people use too simplistic heuristics about what is or isn't pandering. Is the character a minority? Must be pandering. I don't know about others, but I find stories about people different than myself interesting. Maybe the creators think similarly.

Okay, well I guess that seems fair. They've been treating the elder dragons as human since Mordremoth, though, so I think they abandoned the "sentient forces of nature" idea. I'm betting this is the real reason. What makes you think people aren't making games as they want without caring about politics? Just because you wouldn't include them in your stories does not mean the same of others. Do you get upset about the blatant pandering to cishet white males in the vast majority of video games? Did you get upset when 'V' from Cyberpunk was changed to be a man on the cover so as to better sell to men? I doubt it. Our mere existence shouldn't be considered political.

New weapon types is, in my opinion, the best change that can be made for the game. Let these new weapon types break some of the general rules for weapons. Maybe let them hit more than 5 targets or maybe give us a weapon that turns 1 instance of damage into 2 instances of a little over half damage. Let weapons be tactical options over just picking the best weapon for a given build.

I would very much like another expansion. Glad to hear it isn't ruled out.

I'm waiting until someone posts a video showing some of the skins with dyes. I saw one go up today that briefly shows the lithosol, but it was kind of difficult to see. I don't want to get a skin that looks good in only one color.

You jest, but I think that'd be kind of fun. I'd definitely get a pair for one of my characters.

Gender dysphoria would be, in grossly oversimplified terms, negative feelings about your assigned gender. What you are suggesting sounds either genderfluid or something like the two-spirit. This could be an interesting topic for exploration if it is handled carefully.

I agree on QoL, but I have reservations about the rest. From what I've experienced and read from others, "balance" wasn't any better before elite specs. Increasing the elite specs will bring new nodes that devs can tweak to alter balance as well as new tools that players can use to counter strong builds in PvP. I'm in support of more options. Elder dragons have, so far, been the best threat Anet have provided outside of the original personal story. Scarlet, Joko, and Balthazar have all been uninteresting to me. Joko was amusing in GW1 for a little while, but I got sick of him quickly. GW2 doesn't handle its villains well, in my opinion, so having an enemy with at least some interesting lore and speculation is the best path(again, in my opinion). I'd kill for some Innsmouth-type content, though. Racial storylines are nice, in theory, but I don't think the devs are in a good place to execute them after the layoffs. If things improve, then I'd go for this. I'd like dungeons more if they weren't instanced. Instanced content moves away from what I view to be GW2's strength - community. They seemed like a strange holdover from GW1 at launch. Hype is unnecessary if you have good content. I'd like new playable races, but the work required based on dev responses makes this seem not worthwhile. In SWtOR, this works because races are basically the same armor-wise, but GW2 races seem to require too much work.

Primarily health. I come to the forum occasionally to torment entertain myself.

This was, if nothing else, an interesting read. Each dragon having a domain of magic and domain of control could be an interesting alteration. Mordremoth controls through the mind. Zhaitan controls through turning subjects into shadows of themselves. This could open things up to things like your take on Kralk's control by "order". I would be glad to see an element of this at some point, but I suspect things will be much simpler. One thing to note is that things can change. I vaguely remember something about Zhaitan's second domain being thought of after death. Perhaps, I'm mistaken? Edit: I just realized "controls through the mind" and "turning subjects into shadows of themselves" kind of sounds the same. I mean that Mord seems to ["implant thoughts"](https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/points-of-interest-episode-18-summary/ ""implant thoughts"") whereas Zhaitan made most "mindless" according to the wiki page on Risen. This seems distinct in (primary)method of control. As an aside, the concept art on that page makes me want more Risen.

As someone that likes cute things, I don't consider it cute at all. My raptor with a santa hat is cute.

Zhaitan has been my favorite so far. I found Joko and Scarlet completely uninteresting. Joko wore out his welcome in GW1 and Scarlet's best moments were in season 2 after her death.

Can't seem to get spoilers working, so skip my last paragraph to avoid season 3 spoilers. This is actually really difficult because I've had so many great moments interacting with other players. My first time fighting the Shatterer(before the update) was a great feeling. I remember playing a staff guardian that focused on healing. In terms of the story, I really liked that moment after Also, I think I'll always remember joining an order(it took me a while to decide) and experiencing Claw Island. I wish I got to make other choices that let me express my characters even if they don't change the larger plot. There was one such occasion in season 4's Long Live the Lich that I really appreciated. I was very grateful for the roleplay it provided. Kudos to whoever worked on that.