EoD expansion - buy or not to buy

[Baldovin.1392]

I'm on edge to buy the upcoming EoD. More of leaning towards not buying it.

 

Although I love the content, the lack of engine upgrade since the original GW2 release is a deal breaker for me. 

 

[AgentMoore.9453]

If you just want new maps, masteries, specs, and achievements, then it'll probably be worth the base price even if you don't like parts of those elements. As for pre-ordering, it only matters if you care about the bonuses that come with each tier. I still haven't decided whether or not to buy myself, but I also feel no urgency to do so.

[Danikat.8537]

Do you want the pre-order items? (Flame serpent weapon, Shing Jea cape and Prodigy of Shing Jea title.)

If not then there's no need to decide now, you can buy EoD later if you want to. Maybe wait and see what happens as a result of the move to DX11 and what other performance upgrades are planned after that.

Playing a game with an older engine doesn't bother me, it still works well on my PC, but if it's causing you problems then I can understand why you'd be wary of spending more money.

[Thelgar.7214]

I bought it. I'm happy with the engine though. It runs great at 4k on my old GTX 1080 and the game still looks and plays great to me.  

[Baldovin.1392]

The content and preorder bonus are ok, but I found the lack of performance with the old game engine is the deal breaker. 

 

Does anyone know will they improve the game engine, performance and visuals with the EoD expansion? 

[kharmin.7683]

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/directx11-support-is-coming-to-guild-wars-2/

[AliamRationem.5172]

It's a game nearly a decade old at this point.  They're making performance enhancements with the DX11 update, but if what you really want are big graphical upgrades that seems unlikely.  You just have to accept GW2 for what it is and what it isn't. 

In my opinion, if you play the game regularly and you intend to keep playing, that's justification enough for the purchase.  You support the game you enjoy and it's a small price to pay for a ton of new things to see and do.

[Omega.6801]

Wait for it to come out, see if you like it, then buy it or don't.

[Goettel.4389]

If it's a deal breaker for you, just don't buy it.

[Crackmonster.2790]

to buy or to bye

that is the question.

But is it not a question, unless too broke.

[Baldovin.1392]

43 minutes ago, kharmin.7683 said:

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/directx11-support-is-coming-to-guild-wars-2/

So upon reading this it was like Christmas present. I went strait to the graphic options to enable it and test the new DX11, restart the game and the disappointment was immeasurable. My FPS was till low. 😔

 

So just for the reference, my FPS is 15 at medium configuration, and if I chose the best performance option it is around 25-30 which is still to low compared to the ugly settings I get.

 

My hardware configuration is:

* CPU: AMD 8350 Eight core-OC to 4.51 GHz

* GPU: Sapphire R9 290X OC TRI-X

* RAM: Corsair Vengeance Pro Series-16GB DDR3 1800MHz

* MBO:ASUS M5A99X EVO R2.0

* Operating on Windows 10 Pro x64

* All drivers up to date, just for reference GPU driver is Radeon 21.3.2

 

So as you can see I have a decant PC, but GW2 is barely playable for me. So one can understand the need for extremely beater upgrade on their game engine and performance, since other games run flawlessly for me, and unfortunately GW2 does not.

[otto.5684]

If you are an active player, buying it is no brainer. If you have been away from the game considering to come back, wait till it is out.

[kharmin.7683]

IMO it really depends on the content.  I usually run around 30fps in open world with spikes in the low 40s unless it's a world boss event like Frozen Maw where I drop to 12fps.   30fps works just fine for me, but then if I were playing something more competitive like WvW or PvP I would probably want a much higher fps.   /shrug

[Xanadrine.4352]

I really think you should listen to Wooden Potatoes getting the best look out of the game without causing fps issues. If you have a decent pc then you should be able to make it look like his does. But remember fps isnt everything in an mmorpg. Even great pcs never fully hit the top with these kinds of games, because the game is constantly in flux with players world render npcs spells

Oh and hit the settings button on the video below, because you tube puts it in low res but its actually much higher If you want to see what he sees when he plays.

 

Edited October 5, 2021 by Zuldari.3940

[Danikat.8537]

3 hours ago, Baldovin.1392 said:

So upon reading this it was like Christmas present. I went strait to the graphic options to enable it and test the new DX11, restart the game and the disappointment was immeasurable. My FPS was till low. 😔

 

So just for the reference, my FPS is 15 at medium configuration, and if I chose the best performance option it is around 25-30 which is still to low compared to the ugly settings I get.

 

My hardware configuration is:

* CPU: AMD 8350 Eight core-OC to 4.51 GHz

* GPU: Sapphire R9 290X OC TRI-X

* RAM: Corsair Vengeance Pro Series-16GB DDR3 1800MHz

* MBO:ASUS M5A99X EVO R2.0

* Operating on Windows 10 Pro x64

* All drivers up to date, just for reference GPU driver is Radeon 21.3.2

 

So as you can see I have a decant PC, but GW2 is barely playable for me. So one can understand the need for extremely beater upgrade on their game engine and performance, since other games run flawlessly for me, and unfortunately GW2 does not.

I'm not an expert on PC builds, but your graphics card is 8 years old now and since it's the one I used to have I can confidently say you would see an improvement if you upgraded it. I'm using a Radeon RX 480 and I can set everything to high and typically get between 30 and 60 FPS, sometimes higher.

 

(Weirdly the other thing which really helped my FPS was opening up the computer and giving it a thorough clean. I expected that to make it run cooler and maybe the fans would be quieter, but I was surprised when my FPS in several games went up as well.)

[Veprovina.4876]

4 hours ago, Baldovin.1392 said:

So upon reading this it was like Christmas present. I went strait to the graphic options to enable it and test the new DX11, restart the game and the disappointment was immeasurable. My FPS was till low. 😔

 

So just for the reference, my FPS is 15 at medium configuration, and if I chose the best performance option it is around 25-30 which is still to low compared to the ugly settings I get.

 

My hardware configuration is:

* CPU: AMD 8350 Eight core-OC to 4.51 GHz

* GPU: Sapphire R9 290X OC TRI-X

* RAM: Corsair Vengeance Pro Series-16GB DDR3 1800MHz

* MBO:ASUS M5A99X EVO R2.0

* Operating on Windows 10 Pro x64

* All drivers up to date, just for reference GPU driver is Radeon 21.3.2

 

So as you can see I have a decant PC, but GW2 is barely playable for me. So one can understand the need for extremely beater upgrade on their game engine and performance, since other games run flawlessly for me, and unfortunately GW2 does not.

If i were you i'd wait. Seems performance is very important to you, and a 10 year old game should by all accounts run at 200+ FPS on your specs, so wait til you see what they do with DX11 and how well they implement performance upgrades, and once they're up to your satisfaction, then buy the expansion if you really want to. 

 

My theory is that they're going to give it all in to DX11 now so that it's "out of beta" by the time expansion is released. That way, new people and people coming back will all have a better experience and if they didn't will want to buy the expansion for sure.

No one will want to buy an expansion when their game runs on 10 FPS. So i think performance will now be a priority.

 

This is Anet so i could be totally wrong, they don't always go towards the most obvious move - for better and for worse - so just wait and see. If you don't care about the few bonus skins, then you're losing nothing by just chilling and seeing what happens. 

[Bookah pls.9352]

As it currently stands i'm buying it purely because i love this game and it's gonna be new maps and story.

I will enjoy the new scenery but not overly excited or caring about any of the other features so far sadly.

[firedragon.8953]

Isn't this post weird? I mean, you're asking on an official forums filled mostly with fans of the game. I mean, I know the point of the post was to say that the engine isn't optimized well and performs worse than other games, but it's just a bizarre passive aggressive post.

I don't know why you get such low FPS. I play on a laptop and usually get 45fps - 60fps unless there are a ton of other players on screen, and then yes, it can dip to 20fps. Is that great? No. Does it effect my overall enjoyment of the game, meh, usually not. I'm guessing your graphics card is outdated, and I've heard that GW2 performs worse on AMD graphics cards and better with Nvidia, although I don't know if that's accurate or not.

If you're having so much performance issues that you're not having fun, then yeah, don't buy the expansion until either the engine is optimized better to run on your hardware, or you get hardware that can run the game well in it's current state. That's the most neutral and honest answer you can get.

[Faridah.8431]

On 10/5/2021 at 10:42 AM, Baldovin.1392 said:

So upon reading this it was like Christmas present. I went strait to the graphic options to enable it and test the new DX11, restart the game and the disappointment was immeasurable. My FPS was till low. 😔

 

So just for the reference, my FPS is 15 at medium configuration, and if I chose the best performance option it is around 25-30 which is still to low compared to the ugly settings I get.

 

My hardware configuration is:

* CPU: AMD 8350 Eight core-OC to 4.51 GHz

* GPU: Sapphire R9 290X OC TRI-X

* RAM: Corsair Vengeance Pro Series-16GB DDR3 1800MHz

* MBO:ASUS M5A99X EVO R2.0

* Operating on Windows 10 Pro x64

* All drivers up to date, just for reference GPU driver is Radeon 21.3.2

 

So as you can see I have a decant PC, but GW2 is barely playable for me. So one can understand the need for extremely beater upgrade on their game engine and performance, since other games run flawlessly for me, and unfortunately GW2 does not.

Considering how the GW engine works, I think you'd probably greatly benefit from moving off of AMD Bulldozer which was frankly an awful CPU arch. I had a big increase in performance going from an i7-960 to a i7-4790k in 2014. I imagine once I move to my 5600X, that should help too. Graphics cards seem much less important to this game's performance.

[Baldovin.1392]

On 10/5/2021 at 10:54 PM, Veprovina.4876 said:

If i were you i'd wait. Seems performance is very important to you, and a 10 year old game should by all accounts run at 200+ FPS on your specs, so wait til you see what they do with DX11 and how well they implement performance upgrades, and once they're up to your satisfaction, then buy the expansion if you really want to. 

 

My theory is that they're going to give it all in to DX11 now so that it's "out of beta" by the time expansion is released. That way, new people and people coming back will all have a better experience and if they didn't will want to buy the expansion for sure.

No one will want to buy an expansion when their game runs on 10 FPS. So i think performance will now be a priority.

 

This is Anet so i could be totally wrong, they don't always go towards the most obvious move - for better and for worse - so just wait and see. If you don't care about the few bonus skins, then you're losing nothing by just chilling and seeing what happens. 

Yea, I have decided to wait and see if they will improve the engine or FPS with the new DX11 feature. 

 

At the current state, unfortunately, the game is unplayable for me and I'll have to sit this one out until this feature is fixed. 

 

Thank you all!

[Sir Arigius.6294]

Anything Guild Wars 2 content related is worth it to me, in my opinion. Getting Path of Fire and Living Story Season 4 with the mounts really paid off. 

[Freygea.3620]

I was never able to get the last mount in the last expansion due to health reasons. Chemotherapy has caused permanent numbness in my hands so i am a klutz. I did enjoy the s tory up to the point I was able to complete. (Stuck on the departing).

 

Have they spoke of what pve solo players will be limited to in the new expansion? Are mounts or anything advertised limited to group only quests?

[Faridah.8431]

6 minutes ago, Freygea.3620 said:

I was never able to get the last mount in the last expansion due to health reasons. Chemotherapy has caused permanent numbness in my hands so i am a klutz. I did enjoy the s tory up to the point I was able to complete. (Stuck on the departing).

 

Have they spoke of what pve solo players will be limited to in the new expansion? Are mounts or anything advertised limited to group only quests?

Sorry to hear about that. If you ever see me on, happy to try to help you with that story. I agree its a tough one, and I'll have to remember what I did to get past it. I think it had something to do with getting that mob stuck on the cage or something like that. I might not be much better, but happy to try to help.

Edited October 7, 2021 by Faridah.8431

[Freygea.3620]

Thank you. I created a new thread because i felt like I was stealing the op topic. I am thinking there will be new players arriving once the expansion hits and I will bumble along in a group and maybe get it . after they revive me about a zillion times. : )

[voltaicbore.8012]

1 hour ago, Baldovin.1392 said:

Yea, I have decided to wait and see if they will improve the engine or FPS with the new DX11 feature. 

 

At the current state, unfortunately, the game is unplayable for me and I'll have to sit this one out until this feature is fixed. 

 

Thank you all!

I hope it gets sorted out for you.

In the meantime, I second the suggestion that you look into tweaking various settings (power consumption is a big one). I have a laptop that's quite weak by many standards, and I get 60 fps in most places, and it drops to 20 (with downspikes and some stuttering) in the usual giant-blob-of-players-and-effects situations. I also run the vast majority of settings on max quality, except for reflections (off) and the number of players rendered (medium). My "rig" as it were, is this:

1. i7-7700HQ, 8 cores at 2.8 GHz (yeah, it's a mobile i7), no overclocking
2. 16GB RAM
3. 111 GB SSD (LOL this was an emergency HDD replacement that I've kept for way too long. GW2 alone takes over half of the space I can use)
4. NVidia MX150 GPU (pretty much the weakest, most entry-level discrete mobile GeForce card you can get)
5. Good ol Windows 7 x64... Home Premium Edition lol

This is a potato system for modern gaming. Yet, with my power settings in both Windows and the NVidia control panel to prefer max performance over power efficiency, this system runs the game quite well at (mostly) max settings. Before I got this laptop, I played GW2 on an even more potato system (AMD A6 CPU at 1.6 GHz, integrated Radeon graphics, same SSD, same OS, 8 GB RAM) and got 30-40 FPS everywhere on medium settings. Sure, the game is old, but it runs quite well if you make sure your computer is doing it right.