Henry.5713

Reminds me of one fun evening I had during that "squad-merge-abuse" phase before it got fixed.A friend and I decided to do a full TA run out of some dungeon nostalgia. We were going to Aether Path first, don't even remember why. But that choice was the the main reason why this even happened as you require more than two people for one of the rooms.Anyways, we got one person joining instantly. Only requirement we set was for people having done the dungeon before. He had something like 3k AP and was obviously quite new. We decided to take him anyways as it really doesn't matter as long as he follows us. But of course he didn't even do that. He instead decided to "afk" at the entrance for the first then minutes but, interestingly enough, answered instantly "Sorry, need 10 more minutes" when asked if he was coming. We then told him that we don't intend to give people a free ride like that as he is taking up a possible spot of someone who actually wants to play right now. He doesn't answer this time. We wait a bit, we kick him. Should have been the end of that story and it would have been a boring evening if not for the said bug.We got to the room with the four platforms a few minutes later, opened an LFG and guess who joins instantly to merge squads and thus kick us out? Neither of us had seen the thing in action so we laughed about it. Went in again to start from scratch and guess who merges us again once our LFG pops up? That guy of course. Tried to talk to him, got blocked. We decided to duo everything up to the platform room again as he can't possibly be waiting there for half an hour in LFG to screw with us again. But he actually did do just that. We were so amused by how much effort he put into it that we decided to clear everything one more time, then wait for another half an hour while just chatting discord and then open another LFG. We were lucky to get three players quickly then and that that person seemed to have given up. Took about two hours in total. Not sure if people actually believe this story since it does sound rather farfetched but trust me I couldn't make up shit like that even if I wanted to. All I can say is to not give people the tools to screw you over whenever they feel they lost out on something they should be entitled to. You'd be surprised how much more effort and energy they are willing to put into screwing you over than they are willing to put into completing whatever they got kicked from in the first place. I kind of wonder if those in favour of removing any means to get rid of some people think he should have done as he did or should indeed have been able to just full "afk" that run.

1) Why wouldn't they have a right to see what's going on if you are a part of their team?2) Nobody is entitled to get anything, no matter what gear they wear.3) The fact that your own rotation and gear gave you far worse results kind of negates this point unless all you care about is being special4) They could do that and you'd still continue to underperform if you continued to refuse the use of efficient builds and gear In any case, you joined in full knowledge that you do not fullfill the requirements they set but you decided to join anyways?Pretty much disrespecting the wishes of the majority of the squad over your own selfish ideas and now you are pissed that there is a toolwhich makes said thing obvious to everyone? That says more about you than it says about those you complain about or ArcDPS.

Ascended gear was introduced to add more depth to gearing in this game. It hardly turned anything into WoW. There was literally nothing to do in PvE after we had acquired our first exotic sets in pretty much no time. There needs to be something people can work towards, especially right after the release, or they'll simply move on to the next game. They added new stats, infusions and other things but nothing else has been done in over six years as they seem to deem ascended gear to be quite sufficient as far as gearing and gear depth is concerned. Agony may have been a mistake, ascended gear certainly was not.

It has been years (2012-2013, possibly 2014) since the Fractal tier design actually worked as intended - as a proper ways of progression.People either jump into the high tiers instantly given the current infusion/AR system or they decide to stay on T2 or T3 as that is where they belong(or they think they belong). There might be exceptions to this where people play their way up each tier and even each Fractal level but they are a tiny group. No amount of practice in T3 will fully prepare you for T4 and neither will any amount of practice in T4s fully prepare you for CMs if that is simply not where you belong. Neither would anyone already in T4 and CMs bother with the lower tiers upon the introduction of a new Fractal. Okay. And It's a literally fact that despite the new raid taking too long, adding easy mode would make it take even longer. If it takes that, then I am all for it. I've been waiting years for raids that I can play. You guys merely waited for months for a new wing.What nonsense. That's like saying they need to introduce a hardcore Open World Boss along the lines of a 50 men Dhuum CM to please those like us who have been waiting for something like that since release. There is a reason why there are different modes for different groups of players. PvP is for PvP players, Open World PvE is for the casuals and Competitive PvE is for those into challenging group content.

Sounds a bit like a detour to be able to come up with a crazy raid design given the magical setting. Looking forward to it.

Why wouldn't people be sad about this current and sadly continuous trend to have games play themselves for you while you end up being nothing more than a watcher with a creditcard in their hand? This entire bible sized topic comes down to nothing more than one group wanting rewards they can't be bothered to obtain by actually playing the game and all of their ideas to make it happen. It is however funny that a tool (ArcDPS), which was fought against so vigorously, with it's very idea that someone might be forced to play the game not exactly as they want as it clearly shows the inefficiency of some of these playstyles, is now supposed to be used to play the game for you completely. Seems more than just a little ironic to me.

Yah.. it'as almost as stupid as the DPS meters, kill proofs, using discord and all the other things people do to ensure the content is easy.. oh wait. No really your objection to making things easier is silly at this point. Might be rather shocking to you but many of us actually enjoy using voice communication and DPS meters with all of the data and additional information they provide through websites like dps.report. The fact that you put voice communication software and statistics/analytics tools on the same level as autoplay features is pretty laughable.

But why stop there... How about autowalk, autoevent, autoworldcompletion, autodailies, autoistanfarm, autoTP, autoWvW, autoPvP? The lenghts people would be willing to go through to be able to complete content without actually having to play said content never seizes to amaze me.

Try to grind max rank in WvW (10000). Going to keep you busy for a few years.

Moving away from what it once was - an interesting thing to say. The game once was far more challenging and reliant on your personal performance in dodging and positioning than it is right now. All of the Power, and worse, Defense Creep saw to that.The entire point of the Queen's Gauntlet is to provide challenging solo content for those interested. Not that it is anywhere close to being as challenging as it was in 2013 when first introduced.

Wish they removed any messaging limitations on anything send to those on your friend list. Can't even send out gifts properly on Christmas without surpression.

The CA1, CA2, CA3 changes would make me rather sad, especially turning the beautiful Lunar Blast into yet another boring and rather limited AoE or conal shaped support skill. A huge nerf in quite a few scenarios, even a nerf in WvW skirmishes as these CA changes are only focused on turning druids into a 'Firebrand 0.5' to possibly give them a spot in blobs. Everything else sounds like a good idea. Making CA transformations less limiting would be a start.

This big talk of 'communities' and how they are going to be ripped apart... The real communities - guilds, open tags, handholding guilds and the very rare cases of unified (mostly small) servers are the ones who will benefit the most here.The current system, with it's waves of bandwagoners, overstacked top tier servers and nonsensical links is a mess in comparison. Hardly enjoyable to anyone but those few loners already stacked on the winning side.

The debate between Discipline and Tactics has always been an interesting one. Remember people frequently proposing similar builds back when PoF first released until things eventually settled to the current META.While I always was and continue to be more inclined towards Discipline and thus towards the offensive GS/Hammer or possibly Sword/Shield/GS builds myself and whileI don't really struggle to place spot on bubbles or compete in damage numbers even during the current heavy focus on scourges and corrupts in general, I can still see the merit in the good condition removal and additional support.Might try the build this weekend. Just not sure if I would go with your choice of stats. Though, it might be quite situational - depending on what you face.

I'm doing Fractals, rarely doing 4 tho but i have done them, mostly t3s. See it's not planning I juts go with pugs from lfg. Now how is that gonna help me to get a raid done? Fractals mech are different from what i see on raid bosses on tube videos. General dodging? Alright, I think I can manage that.I wanna see the content, simle and I can't. Tho my toon is geared in ascended (wvw and raid) and has a good arsenal of ascended wepons. But the game offered no progression whatsoever. Than content is close to me and that isn't nice. I done everything on my part, that i had to do, how I can go do raids? P.S. I would like to state this again. I'm not asking for one shot bosses. Maybe less damage, perhaps 80% -85% of current one, so pugs won't be walking away from raids. I'm in biggest guild 2k members only 2-3 person i know do raiding, rest are avoiding it as plague. Simply none has time for preparation and planning and dedicated time to go into raids for 4 hours. That's like asking "why are dungeons 5-man, I want to see the content solo". Because that's was the original idea. The game gives exactly the same requirement for anyone. If you're not doing the content, seek the problem in yourself, not the game. You need to take into consideration that biggest gate for raiding is its "community" :) Game puts requirement in terms of content mechanics and timer however it's the "community" that stricts the content beyond proportions.The community is truely an issue here. Don't forget about those who actually gate themselves from raids by not even trying them once or by completely refusing to listen to the many helpful voices I see on a regular basis. It is indeed so much easier to just blame everyone but yourself for your problems.

Not everything revolves around bringing in new players. An incentive to stick around after you finished your third set of legendary armor would be nice.Something like new challenges, weekly achievements or anything else they or even the community could think of.On the contrary, the supposed survival of the mode is far more dependant on keeping the actual raiders interested rather than on bringing in new players in droves.Fresh blood is healthy but it needs to have time to mingle with the old. It should not come as a flood and turn the entire place in a mess.Not to mention that many new players do actually come in no matter what people claim here. I know two dozen of them who recently started raiding. Those are just the few who I ended up lending a hand to. There are many more out there. The guys who actually put in the effort to start raiding rather than jumping on the forums to complain about how hard it is to do just that.

This has become my favorite topic to visit whenever I check the forums. The clash of personal phylosophies is quite interesting to read.All though, arguing phylosophy is almost as silly as arguing religion. The clash between the idea of true inclusion of the less fortunate or less profitable versus the full freedom of choice to decide on who you want to deal with to achieve your goals will not get you anywhere.This is as true in games as it is in real life or sports.There are also the subjective visions people have for the community and it's direction which in the end are just that "subjective".

The players are the ones at fault. People are more likely to spend money if they feel like it is out of free will or if they feel like the game is actually free nowadays.Nothing new in the MMORPG genre. Also, there are already complaints about having to pay for the expansions at all and everyone hates subscriptions and would rather see mount skins sold for $20 than pay of either of these.Not something I perticularly agree with. Would prefer to pay $100 for each expansion given the amount of hours of playtime they provided me with. Even a sub sounds fine to me if that it means that we no longer have to deal with lootboxes and overpriced skins but each their own. I am probably a minority in this.

You can't do decent damage without support. It is simply not possible, you're missing way too many damage boosts. You can do your best, but as a rule of thumb you'll be doing about 1/3rd of your potential, and that's not counting dps downtime due to having to dodge, use heals or change to defensive utilities. Oh, I certainly agree with you. Was actually talking about players maintaining that 1/3rd of their potential or any decent numbers given the circumstances they are in.A lot of them are far from reaching that 1/3, however. Something they should work on even if they insist on not having the popular supports.I am fully aware of the huge difference a druid can make by allowing everyone, and especially the weavers, to fully unload without having to dodge or move around needlessly. Pretty much why I am always on my druid. Raids made people realize how good these supports actually are rather than give anyone a wrong impression.

Don't think either of you is wrong here.You should be able to handle both situations - be able to survive as a glass cannon without support while ditching out a decent or even a good amount of damage BUT also be to able squeeze out every little drop of damage without needless defensive play if your supports allow you to do so.The real loss of efficiency happens when people misjudge the situation which results in them playing needlessly defensive at a loss of damage or they end dying constantly while being too stubborn to move away from their golem rotation even slightly.

Raiders didn't suddenly appear out of nowhere right before raids got introduced to this game. Most of these players were running Fractals frequently or even daily and dungeons before even that. They have always been interested in efficiently clearing instanced content.Things were figured out, METAs formed around these ideas, others started to follow them blindly without thinking as always. Nothing new and nothing that started with the raids. People seem to forget about the old dungeon LFG and all of that supposed elitism.This will turn into nothing more than yet another discussion people will join in on to shit on raids in their bias to blame all evil on the content they do not like. All though, I agree with you on how stubbornly close minded people can be and especially those in pugs.Attitudes on both sides of this arguement can be rather ridiculous. Those who'd rather waste an hour of their time than go without the exact copy-pasted composition while thinking they must be absolutely right about everything and those who outright refuse to run anything that is popular, so they can feel special while acting so smug and superior that even their own guilds soon refuse to play with them.

Which would actually mean that we do not need different modes here considering how raids are not part of the major content. They are nothing more than a small addition to the vast and rather casual friendly PvE content this game offers. There was, is and never will be a focus on raid content.Besides, the majority of raiders are active PvX players. Most spend the least amount of their playing hours actually raiding unless we are talking about the most hardcore who will do multiple clears over different accounts per week and take part in record runs. They are only a tiny group of an already small group of players. Everyone else in the raiding community can be seen in other PvE content, PvP or WvW far more frequently.

They are a business in the end and trying to milk MMORPG players is certainly nothing new. They'd sell us a gilded turd () for the price of pure gold if people deemed it worth that price. Skins are just skins in the end. It could be much worse.Boycot them if you like, I for one would never spend money on loot boxes or outfits for various reasons, but it will do very little to change any practices as long as the common mindset feels differently. You can complain about the value of any trinket and how stupid it is to spend that kind of money on it but that will never stop those able to afford them from doing so. Money rules even in gaming.

They'd have to delete the game all together if they intended to remove absolutely everything that can be used to discriminate other players one way or another.

Saw some players who have complained in length about the pricing of the expansion before jump in instantly to buy these Licenses. Kind of makes me chuckle. Though, I am not sure why people are so surprised about this after the recent cash shop additions. Don't support it if you do not like it.