matthewr.3980

I never post on this forum, but I felt a need to communicate directly to ArenaNet on this topic. The problem, at least for me, isn't that maps aren't allowing enough players on them, but that there aren't enough players on the maps. It really takes the wind out of your sails when you finally get to Cantha and start exploring the first map and you see maybe one or two other players tops. It really hinders your fun when you come across events, but there aren't any other players around to help complete it, so you fail on your own. It really sucks a lot of the fun out of trying to experience a new expansion when you feel like you're playing a single player game. I understand and have been told that I can use the Looking for Group finder to jump to maps that are more populated. And I have used that feature many times in the past when doing Meta events like in HoT or PoF. But I don't want to have to keep my LFG finder up at all times when playing this expansion as the only way to play the new maps with other players. I just want to log-in and explore the new maps. In my many years of playing this game, I have been notified by the game many times that the map I'm playing on is running low on players and I can be escorted to a more populated map. But I haven't had this prompt appear for me one time while playing in Cantha. Why is that, when it clearly seems to me the maps are very under-populated. Please make this a main concern going forward. As we speak, I've trying to give this expansion more chances. The story is decent. The maps are beautiful. But Elden Ring is calling my name as well, and if I have to decide between playing it or a single-player MMORPG, I think we both know where I'll end up. I don't want this sole issue to ruin the expansion for me and others. Thank you for your continued work.

Okay I went back and did Ghosts of Fort Salma through Hidden Arcana and it worked fine. I guesss I didn't get them done a few days ago and somehow skipped past them. This was with a character that already completed it too.

I just went through Living World Season and followed every instruction it told me to do in the top right corner, and at the end, I had 3 chapters I didn't get credit for. Caithe's Reconnaissance Squad was one of them. Hidden Arcana was another. I can't remember the third. It wasn't in the same chapter as those 2. If it told me to do something in the top right, I did it. Now that I think about it and read the Wiki descriptions, I remember doing Hidden Arcana last night, but I don't remember doing Caithe's Reconnaissance Squad before it. I wonder if somehow I skipped it. I don't even remember doing The Ghosts of Fort Salma that came before it. I definitely did the World's Summit though. Well, I'll just replay from the start of Ghosts again and see what happens.

Hmm I didn't get any item, but I think it's because I didn't complete Forging Steel because it requires multiple players to play with the public instance requiring 5-10 players. That's pretty dumb for living world content. EDIT So I just tried it and was able to complete it on my first try with the help of a random other player. The infusion is cool but the Blood Legion Flamesaw skin I got out of the chest was almost the better prize! I love the rewards like when you can get Caladbolg.

I've been away from the game for probably a year and a half, but with the news on the expansion, I jumped back in and tried to catch up on the story. I binge played through the Icebrood Saga over the span of two weekends, and I just finished it tonight. The story was decent. But I'm left scratching my head wondering what I get for completing this story. There were a bunch of unlocked maps, and each map had a new currency. It was all a bit much. Many of the maps had achievements that were just insanely grindy, like 'do this' 50 times, 'do that' 50 times, now fly over to this area and 'do this' 50 times and 'do that' 50 times. I remember when achievements were more like 'defeat the boss without being hit by the AOE' or 'find 50 coins scattered across the map.' I probably won't go back and complete most of these achievements. I feel like I got more out of just pre-ordering End of Dragons than I did from playing through 8-10 chapters of Icebrood Saga. I got a special title, and a special cape from the pre-order. What did I get for the hours invested in the story? Map currencies? I was thinking perhaps we'd get that bow that Braham kept mentioning. Or we'd get Ryland's ice greatsword. Or since we're Aurene's champion, we'd get a special set of Aurene gear like how Braham and Ryland got cool new dudes for their champion status. But I didn't even get a title for my hard work. I didn't like the last chapter or two of Icebrood Saga where you were just porting to battleground after battleground, clearing trash and fighting a boss. It was really boring. I didn't like all the map currencies. And I didn't like how my character has nothing to show that he finished a saga. I really hope End of Dragons is more than this. I hope the story rewards you with souvenirs that you can embrace and remember it with. I hope the maps aren't designed around having achievements that need to be grinded 7 days a week in order to finish.

Please add a way for my characters to track achievements unique between themselves. My WvW character doesn't need to see Living World achievements, and my lv10 character re-exploring the starting zones doesn't need to see WvW achievements. It is also such a hassle to have to untrack and retrack achievements every time I log into a character. Please add this functionality to the game so I can get the most out of all of my characters. Thank you!

I have a character for each profession, and I try to use them in different areas of the game, like one in WvW and one in Living World, etc. But I keep having issues tracking achievements related to their areas. I'll set up a bunch of living world achievements to track, and then log into my WvW character, and will have to untrack all the Living World achievements and start tracking WvW-related achievements. If I'm bouncing between 9 characters, this can get really frustrating. Is there any way for me to set achievements to be tracked by a single character, and for those achievements to not show up on all my other characters?

I'll be honest, I didn't know of this trait in Wilderness Survival called Wilderness Knowledge. I'll miss using Shouts but at least Survival Skills can be used to remove conditions.

Rangers should at least get a trait that offers the same functionality of condition removal on shout/command skill use.

I used Runes of the Trooper specifically with my Ranger because of his shouts. You've now removed that functionality. What compensation does my character get for an unanticipated core change? You already made runes so much more expensive to craft. I'm very upset.

Why should people be forced to join a guild so that they can more easily play with the people they often enjoy playing with? Because that is a basic mechanic of most MMOs? :# How were people playing with others on the same server without being in the same guild currently? Communicating over facebook or something? :o

Let them have tier 1 then. It makes no difference if your in tier 1 or tier 2 or tier 3. If it means there is more wvw going on at all times, then it's a good thing! Let the try hards have their own tier and let other people have plenty of fun more often in the lower tiers.

If you want to guarantee you continue to play with your WvW friends, it's very simple. For the people that don't want to be broken up from their WvW friends, make a WvW guild! And you can still be a part of other PvE guilds, and the people from those PvE guilds that want to WvW with you can also join your WvW guild. I don't see how it's going to be impossible to play with the same people you're playing with right now. Yes, you won't be Team Yak's Bend or Team Blackgate. But you can make a guild named Team Yak's Bend and still play together.

I would limit Alliance sizes to the maximum size of a Guild (500 players). That way the biggest guild can be contested with an alliance of smaller ones. Limit the alliance based on number of players, not number of guilds.

I would be willing to pay $30 for an optional WvW DLC pack so that more staff could be paid to work on the restructuring plans. What would I like to see in the pack? wvw-themed outfitwvw-themed glidernew guild hall decorswvw xp potionsnew char slot

If implemented correctly, this could be the greatest change to GW2 in the history of the game, and likely would be for the rest of the game's life. It's hard for me to put into words all the amazing feelings I have after reading this blueprint. No longer having to worry about huge transfer fees in order to find the right server for WvW or to play with my new friends in WvW would mean so much to me, and I'm sure a ton of players. Being able to set a guild as a WvW guild and knowing that you'll always be together each season in WvW is just amazing. Please take this seriously, please put a lot of time into this, please make this a priority. Because this is the change WvW needs, and has needed for a long time. And I would pay extra money to make this happen quicker, I would be willing to pay $29.99 for a WvW DLC pack if that would allow more staff to work on this. These changes are just that important to the game.

I succumbed and bought the Halloween Mount Skin Pack. It was $20, which is a little expensive, but it was for 5 skins. Each skin had 4 dye channels, even if only two of them really stood out. I liked the look the skeleton designs on the mounts. Now when it comes to the Mount Adoption cash shop item. It's 400 gems ($5 right?) each, and there are 30 different ones to randomly collect. Although I saw a few that looked cool, I don't have any plans to purchase any because I don't like RNG. I feel like if I'm spending actual money -- because most players don't have the gold to convert into gems -- I want to know exactly what I'm getting and already be happy with the purchase. RNG cash shop items is the antithesis of that. I'm cool with 'themed sets' for mount skins. I'm sure ya'll will put out a Wintersday set, and I might succumb and buy that too. But like randomly adding random designs doesn't excite me as much. Like the Jackal skin that was added (for $20 might I add -- way too expensive). Other than it looking cool, why am I compelled to purchase it? See the difference between random glider skins and random mount skins is that if you get that cool arcane looking Raptor skin, you want a cool arcane version for your Hare and your other mounts. With a glider, all you need is that one skin, and a lot of the time, you don't even need a matching back piece. (see: meteor) I also think having Griffon skins drop without checking to see if the player has unlocked the Griffon is pretty rude. I mean you purposefully put in a 250 gold sink to get the Griffon. I personally had to buy gems to convert into gold in order to purchase the Griffon. So someone spends some money on the Mount Adoption and gets a cool Griffon skin but can't use it and is then forced to probably spend more money to buy gems in order to purchase the Griffon. Not nice. The gold sink for the Griffon was a stupid move too by the way. You could have put more achievements/collections into the system, instead you chose the laziest option. People will burn out on Mount Skins though. And I think Mount Adoption hurt you in the long run. Because you could have sold a Flaming set of skins down the road, but you can get Flaming skins from this. You could have sold a Celestial set, but you can get some in this stuff. It makes me think ya'll had some skins ready but not others and decided to just lump them all together into a RNG piece of mess and hope people throw away their money. Some people will, and I'm sure you've made plenty of money on Mount skins already. But it wasn't the courteous thing to do. It was speaking from the wallet more than from the heart (or brain imho). So those are my honest thoughts on the mount skins so far. The halloween set was a big success in my opinion. The mount adoption idea was poorly thought out, likely rushed, and will probably turn a lot of players away from the cash shop all together. You win some, you lose some.