Are raids really gone in EoD?

[Borked.6824]

On 12/1/2021 at 10:40 AM, Zuldari.3940 said:

I raid with a few people from my guild we dont have enough people interested in raiding in guild so we pug most of the time. Sure we wipe some but we laugh and make jokes and carry on. We dont kick anyone unless they pull something utterly trollish, you can come in and do 5k dps we dont kick, because most of our members will make that up anyway. Im doing my envoy set you can too. Nothing is impossible you just have try a little, I think people take it personally when a boss kills them ingame. They dont want to wipe so they dont even try. Its a game you will die in it many times whether in raids or in open world, dont take it personal.

This is a socio-global issue that is not isolated to this game or even gaming in general.  I know because of my own experience.  A decade ago I was in a WoW top 100 raiding guild for quite a while.  Stuck a bunch of ace parses and was a dps officer in our guild, and so on and etc.  After taking a break from MMOs for a short while, and in that time I've become utterly terrified of grouping with folks after dipping my feet in again, despite having dozens of experiences of wiping on bosses 300+ times in a row.  Almost overnight something happened in the community that literally turned everyone sour.  To my point, why is the gaming community in all of its color collectively experiencing the same thing?  I wish it wasn't the case but it is, and has everything to do with feedback loops of how people are treated in non-organized modern raiding scenarios mixed with people having less time to invest in lost causes.  

 

We really have to look at things for what they are.  People don't like doing group content because they don't want to get hurt.  They accept that fact and subject themselves to missing out on said content because of it.  All resources and helplines say "nay you're fine," and they still don't do it.  Toxic elitists (keyword toxic.  elitism is healthy) continue to carry on, affirming any chance of reconsideration.  This IS the way, and cannot be conditioned out with community pleas and in-game incentives.  Why carry on with content that people are objectively scared to do?  Raiding and content of the like just needs to phase out because it's now firmly wading against the current rather than with it.

[Firebeard.1746]

3 hours ago, Borked.6824 said:

We really have to look at things for what they are.  People don't like doing group content because they don't want to get hurt.  They accept that fact and subject themselves to missing out on said content because of it.  All resources and helplines say "nay you're fine," and they still don't do it.  Toxic elitists (keyword toxic.  elitism is healthy) continue to carry on, affirming any chance of reconsideration.  This IS the way, and cannot be conditioned out with community pleas and in-game incentives.  Why carry on with content that people are objectively scared to do?  Raiding and content of the like just needs to phase out because it's now firmly wading against the current rather than with it.

This is so true. I don't think raiding woes are contained to GW2 and I feel raids have become far less effective as a community building activity than they were in the late 90s/early 2000s of MMO gaming. I mostly blame content creators for this, but I think you could be onto something about online culture changing. 

[Xanadrine.4352]

On 12/3/2021 at 4:31 PM, Borked.6824 said:

We really have to look at things for what they are.  People don't like doing group content because they don't want to get hurt.  They accept that fact and subject themselves to missing out on said content because of it.

Thats just crazy to me, I have never locked myself from content because im afraid of some guy hurting my feelings. I refused to let the bully mentality take over my life ingame or out. I think society is getting way too weak willed. I think its more an issue of people dont learn the skills they need to do raids and yes they dont want to be called on it. 

If I go into a boss in fracts or raids and I dont know it if I screw up I own it! Personal responsibility seems to be a thing of the past anymore.  I always come forward when I caused a wipe, sometimes they kick me sometimes they are like its alright dude we try again. But I never slink away from owning my mistakes 

[Wintermute.5408]

9 hours ago, Zuldari.3940 said:

Thats just crazy to me, I have never locked myself from content because im afraid of some guy hurting my feelings. I refused to let the bully mentality take over my life ingame or out. I think society is getting way too weak willed. I think its more an issue of people dont learn the skills they need to do raids and yes they dont want to be called on it. 

Here's a question though. What skill do you need to do raids, and how do you get it?

I've been maining necro for 6-7 years now, I don't remember. I'm by no means pro or a theorycrafter or anything, but I know the class and my possibilities on it. My DPS numbers aren't top-notch, but within accepted raid bracket. I stay alive well enough.

I've dutifully grinded my way through fractal tiers before even thinking of raids, all the way from T1 to T4, without skipping. Naturally, I've learned the mechanics presented there. I also gathered my ascended setups for pretty much everything PVE necro can do, and the only thing I lack at the moment are stat infusions. It's a work in progress though.

Does all of this  this help me, in any way, to get into raids? No, it doesn't. While fractals teach some basic stuff like "stand in greens" and "dodge kitten", absolutely by no means they prepare you for mechanics of - let's take something easy - Vale Guardian. And VG actually puts in an effort to introduce you to the fight - something almost no other boss does. The only way to learn and "git gud" at VG is to do VG. Several times, most definitely with wipes.

What, now you learned VG well enough, and got several kills of it (over the course of several weeks of course, because kitten you and your KP otherwise)? Too bad - you still aren't eligible to run with pugs, as most of them put out an asinine LI/KP requirement, and those that don't are few and far between. Keep grinding training runs, which can take up to 3 hours. Because, well, people are new there, there's nothing to demand from them.

And then there is a fact that nothing you've learned on VG is of any use on ANY other raid boss. Not within W1, not anywhere else. Each and every raid boss is a unique puzzle, that has almost literally nothing like it in the whole game, and the only way to learn it is to wipe with other noobs like yourself on it. Which is fine to some degree, but.

But then there are bosses like Dhuum. Or, gods save me, Qadim. It's borderline impossible to learn Dhuum or Qadim in training groups. Because the initial bunch of mechanics is so punishing that training run (assuming it even gets to the boss) barely makes it to second phase. I've attempted 6 training runs on Dhuum with different people, each took hours. Only ONCE I've made it to the soul split mechanic (that naturally wiped us, and that was it). The only reason I've ever cleared Dhuum is because I've begged my way into one of those 50KP groups, under promise and pressure of not kittening up. Now I have whooping 6 Dhuum KP out of 50 needed to run it. Nice. I won't even dare to attempt this kitten for Qadim, because, unlike Dhuum, that boss is actually hard, and I do need practice on just his combat mechanics. Which, in the course of 4 training runs so far, I got precisely 0 of. Because everybody instantly wipes on the second phase - forget the second miniboss. Your personal performance stops mattering quickly - other people can and will wipe you regardless of how well you kite or do the lamp. Again, this is fine, training and all. But how the kitten am I supposed to learn?

On a totally unrelated note - notice how Qadim LFGs, in contrast to everything else, have incredibly low KP requirements, like 10 or so? Could it be that nobody actually plays that kittening fight?

All of this combines into a wonderful cocktail of stress, need to organize and schedule myself around a videogame, and the fact that I spend more time looking at LFG or waiting for squad reshuffles than playing the actual raids and "gittin gud" at them. Those that I did "git gud" at I still can't run (unless I fake my KP of course), because you need 50Kp to DPS Xera for some godforsaken reason. And 250 LI for Gorseval. I can't join statics, because, again, KPs.

The only reasonable way to breach raids is to have 5-6 friends willing to suffer through that together with you. Personally, I can't even synch my work/off times with my friends to run dungeons, forget raids. Otherwise you'll need to put so much effort and time into just getting in the encounter, without clearing it, that it's not worth bothering. I did bother, and after going through all this, I'll just get my 300LI for legs, probably buy my Qadim run from raid sellers, and never touch raids again. Because kitten this.

[Linken.6345]

45 minutes ago, Wintermute.5408 said:

Here's a question though. What skill do you need to do raids, and how do you get it?

I've been maining necro for 6-7 years now, I don't remember. I'm by no means pro or a theorycrafter or anything, but I know the class and my possibilities on it. My DPS numbers aren't top-notch, but within accepted raid bracket. I stay alive well enough.

I've dutifully grinded my way through fractal tiers before even thinking of raids, all the way from T1 to T4, without skipping. Naturally, I've learned the mechanics presented there. I also gathered my ascended setups for pretty much everything PVE necro can do, and the only thing I lack at the moment are stat infusions. It's a work in progress though.

Does all of this  this help me, in any way, to get into raids? No, it doesn't. While fractals teach some basic stuff like "stand in greens" and "dodge kitten", absolutely by no means they prepare you for mechanics of - let's take something easy - Vale Guardian. And VG actually puts in an effort to introduce you to the fight - something almost no other boss does. The only way to learn and "git gud" at VG is to do VG. Several times, most definitely with wipes.

What, now you learned VG well enough, and got several kills of it (over the course of several weeks of course, because kitten you and your KP otherwise)? Too bad - you still aren't eligible to run with pugs, as most of them put out an asinine LI/KP requirement, and those that don't are few and far between. Keep grinding training runs, which can take up to 3 hours. Because, well, people are new there, there's nothing to demand from them.

And then there is a fact that nothing you've learned on VG is of any use on ANY other raid boss. Not within W1, not anywhere else. Each and every raid boss is a unique puzzle, that has almost literally nothing like it in the whole game, and the only way to learn it is to wipe with other noobs like yourself on it. Which is fine to some degree, but.

But then there are bosses like Dhuum. Or, gods save me, Qadim. It's borderline impossible to learn Dhuum or Qadim in training groups. Because the initial bunch of mechanics is so punishing that training run (assuming it even gets to the boss) barely makes it to second phase. I've attempted 6 training runs on Dhuum with different people, each took hours. Only ONCE I've made it to the soul split mechanic (that naturally wiped us, and that was it). The only reason I've ever cleared Dhuum is because I've begged my way into one of those 50KP groups, under promise and pressure of not kittening up. Now I have whooping 6 Dhuum KP out of 50 needed to run it. Nice. I won't even dare to attempt this kitten for Qadim, because, unlike Dhuum, that boss is actually hard, and I do need practice on just his combat mechanics. Which, in the course of 4 training runs so far, I got precisely 0 of. Because everybody instantly wipes on the second phase - forget the second miniboss. Your personal performance stops mattering quickly - other people can and will wipe you regardless of how well you kite or do the lamp. Again, this is fine, training and all. But how the kitten am I supposed to learn?

On a totally unrelated note - notice how Qadim LFGs, in contrast to everything else, have incredibly low KP requirements, like 10 or so? Could it be that nobody actually plays that kittening fight?

All of this combines into a wonderful cocktail of stress, need to organize and schedule myself around a videogame, and the fact that I spend more time looking at LFG or waiting for squad reshuffles than playing the actual raids and "gittin gud" at them. Those that I did "git gud" at I still can't run (unless I fake my KP of course), because you need 50Kp to DPS Xera for some godforsaken reason. And 250 LI for Gorseval. I can't join statics, because, again, KPs.

The only reasonable way to breach raids is to have 5-6 friends willing to suffer through that together with you. Personally, I can't even synch my work/off times with my friends to run dungeons, forget raids. Otherwise you'll need to put so much effort and time into just getting in the encounter, without clearing it, that it's not worth bothering. I did bother, and after going through all this, I'll just get my 300LI for legs, probably buy my Qadim run from raid sellers, and never touch raids again. Because kitten this.

How can you feel qadim is harder then dhuum?

Dhuum is aprox bettwen 30-150kp

And I guess this is Na since people ask for way more then 10 for qadim on Eu.

Edited December 5, 2021 by Linken.6345

[Obtena.7952]

 

2 hours ago, Wintermute.5408 said:

Here's a question though. What skill do you need to do raids, and how do you get it?

I've been maining necro for 6-7 years now, I don't remember. I'm by no means pro or a theorycrafter or anything, but I know the class and my possibilities on it. My DPS numbers aren't top-notch, but within accepted raid bracket. I stay alive well enough.

I've dutifully grinded my way through fractal tiers before even thinking of raids, all the way from T1 to T4, without skipping. Naturally, I've learned the mechanics presented there. I also gathered my ascended setups for pretty much everything PVE necro can do, and the only thing I lack at the moment are stat infusions. It's a work in progress though.

Does all of this  this help me, in any way, to get into raids? No, it doesn't. While fractals teach some basic stuff like "stand in greens" and "dodge kitten", absolutely by no means they prepare you for mechanics of - let's take something easy - Vale Guardian. And VG actually puts in an effort to introduce you to the fight - something almost no other boss does. The only way to learn and "git gud" at VG is to do VG. Several times, most definitely with wipes.

What, now you learned VG well enough, and got several kills of it (over the course of several weeks of course, because kitten you and your KP otherwise)? Too bad - you still aren't eligible to run with pugs, as most of them put out an asinine LI/KP requirement, and those that don't are few and far between. Keep grinding training runs, which can take up to 3 hours. Because, well, people are new there, there's nothing to demand from them.

And then there is a fact that nothing you've learned on VG is of any use on ANY other raid boss. Not within W1, not anywhere else. Each and every raid boss is a unique puzzle, that has almost literally nothing like it in the whole game, and the only way to learn it is to wipe with other noobs like yourself on it. Which is fine to some degree, but.

But then there are bosses like Dhuum. Or, gods save me, Qadim. It's borderline impossible to learn Dhuum or Qadim in training groups. Because the initial bunch of mechanics is so punishing that training run (assuming it even gets to the boss) barely makes it to second phase. I've attempted 6 training runs on Dhuum with different people, each took hours. Only ONCE I've made it to the soul split mechanic (that naturally wiped us, and that was it). The only reason I've ever cleared Dhuum is because I've begged my way into one of those 50KP groups, under promise and pressure of not kittening up. Now I have whooping 6 Dhuum KP out of 50 needed to run it. Nice. I won't even dare to attempt this kitten for Qadim, because, unlike Dhuum, that boss is actually hard, and I do need practice on just his combat mechanics. Which, in the course of 4 training runs so far, I got precisely 0 of. Because everybody instantly wipes on the second phase - forget the second miniboss. Your personal performance stops mattering quickly - other people can and will wipe you regardless of how well you kite or do the lamp. Again, this is fine, training and all. But how the kitten am I supposed to learn?

On a totally unrelated note - notice how Qadim LFGs, in contrast to everything else, have incredibly low KP requirements, like 10 or so? Could it be that nobody actually plays that kittening fight?

All of this combines into a wonderful cocktail of stress, need to organize and schedule myself around a videogame, and the fact that I spend more time looking at LFG or waiting for squad reshuffles than playing the actual raids and "gittin gud" at them. Those that I did "git gud" at I still can't run (unless I fake my KP of course), because you need 50Kp to DPS Xera for some godforsaken reason. And 250 LI for Gorseval. I can't join statics, because, again, KPs.

The only reasonable way to breach raids is to have 5-6 friends willing to suffer through that together with you. Personally, I can't even synch my work/off times with my friends to run dungeons, forget raids. Otherwise you'll need to put so much effort and time into just getting in the encounter, without clearing it, that it's not worth bothering. I did bother, and after going through all this, I'll just get my 300LI for legs, probably buy my Qadim run from raid sellers, and never touch raids again. Because kitten this.

A great post ... touches on almost every reason raids are so inaccessible to many people. 

Edited December 5, 2021 by Obtena.7952

[Krzysztof.5973]

 

4 hours ago, Wintermute.5408 said:

Does all of this  this help me, in any way, to get into raids? No, it doesn't

Yes, It does. No need for self-pity. Ascended gear helps you. Polishing your dps rotation helps you perform across all the game modes. In fractals you mostly learn about positioning and staying stacked for boon distribution, which you also use in raids - maybe even more so there. The more you play your class, the better you know the rotation, the less you tunnel-vision when you encounter new mechanics in raids or fractals. 

4 hours ago, Wintermute.5408 said:

The only way to learn and "git gud" at VG is to do VG. Several times, most definitely with wipes.

It's the case for every piece of content in this game. 

4 hours ago, Wintermute.5408 said:

(over the course of several weeks of course, because kitten you and your KP otherwise)? Too bad - you still aren't eligible to run with pugs, as most of them put out an asinine LI/KP requirement,

Do you think everyone had it easy when learning raids? Here is 9/10 LFG at any time of the day ready just for you to join with no requirements. Of course everyone knows the counter perfectly so you can do as many mistakes as you wish ☺️
Small kp increments DO matter. For single bosses people do ask for smaller amount of kp for that specific boss or endboss 

4 hours ago, Wintermute.5408 said:

Keep grinding training runs, which can take up to 3 hours. Because, well, people are new there, there's nothing to demand from them.

Training with pugs is possibly the worst approach you can take. Every single training you have entirely different squad of people with entirely different skill set. Raids were not meant for LFG and pugs. 

4 hours ago, Wintermute.5408 said:

And then there is a fact that nothing you've learned on VG is of any use on ANY other raid boss. Not within W1, not anywhere else.

No? Besides general boss encounter awareness we have the blues. Almost exact same blues are on cairn in wing 4. You also learn that getting into green aoes is something you want to do. 

4 hours ago, Wintermute.5408 said:

Each and every raid boss is a unique puzzle, that has almost literally nothing like it in the whole game,

Which is the best thing about raids. I would pay a lot to forget raids so I can re-learn them again. Learning with your squad new mechanics and fresh bosses is an amazing experience. 

4 hours ago, Wintermute.5408 said:

But how the kitten am I supposed to learn?

Again, with the same team, not different bunch of strangers every single time. 

4 hours ago, Wintermute.5408 said:

The only reasonable way to breach raids is to have 5-6 friends willing to suffer through that together with you.

Suffer? You learn the boss together, you "git gud" together. You make it sounds like you would hate helping them to learn the raid boss. 

4 hours ago, Wintermute.5408 said:

Personally, I can't even synch my work/off times with my friends to run dungeons, forget raids.

This is probably the only barrier I can see there is in getting into raids. For some It's just impossible to have a set schedule that allows them to raid interrupted for couple of hours. Not the KPs, not the raid sellers, arc dps or whatever silly idea some people come up with.

And what do you expect from "raiders"? People who put hundreds or sometimes thousands of hours into raids to "suffer" every single encounter with people who have close to none successful kills under their belt in the name of what? There is plenty of low-kp squads out there. If not, be the change you want to see in the world - make one. And yet again, learning new bosses from scratch with pugs will mostly likely result in horrible experience, find a guild, training discord yadayada, I'm sure you're tired of hearing this. 

Edited December 5, 2021 by Krzysztof.5973

[Xanadrine.4352]

4 hours ago, Wintermute.5408 said:

Here's a question though. What skill do you need to do raids, and how do you get it?

I've been maining necro for 6-7 years now, I don't remember. I'm by no means pro or a theorycrafter or anything, but I know the class and my possibilities on it. My DPS numbers aren't top-notch, but within accepted raid bracket. I stay alive well enough.

I've dutifully grinded my way through fractal tiers before even thinking of raids, all the way from T1 to T4, without skipping. Naturally, I've learned the mechanics presented there. I also gathered my ascended setups for pretty much everything PVE necro can do, and the only thing I lack at the moment are stat infusions. It's a work in progress though.

Does all of this  this help me, in any way, to get into raids? No, it doesn't. While fractals teach some basic stuff like "stand in greens" and "dodge kitten", absolutely by no means they prepare you for mechanics of - let's take something easy - Vale Guardian. And VG actually puts in an effort to introduce you to the fight - something almost no other boss does. The only way to learn and "git gud" at VG is to do VG. Several times, most definitely with wipes.

What, now you learned VG well enough, and got several kills of it (over the course of several weeks of course, because kitten you and your KP otherwise)? Too bad - you still aren't eligible to run with pugs, as most of them put out an asinine LI/KP requirement, and those that don't are few and far between. Keep grinding training runs, which can take up to 3 hours. Because, well, people are new there, there's nothing to demand from them.

And then there is a fact that nothing you've learned on VG is of any use on ANY other raid boss. Not within W1, not anywhere else. Each and every raid boss is a unique puzzle, that has almost literally nothing like it in the whole game, and the only way to learn it is to wipe with other noobs like yourself on it. Which is fine to some degree, but.

But then there are bosses like Dhuum. Or, gods save me, Qadim. It's borderline impossible to learn Dhuum or Qadim in training groups. Because the initial bunch of mechanics is so punishing that training run (assuming it even gets to the boss) barely makes it to second phase. I've attempted 6 training runs on Dhuum with different people, each took hours. Only ONCE I've made it to the soul split mechanic (that naturally wiped us, and that was it). The only reason I've ever cleared Dhuum is because I've begged my way into one of those 50KP groups, under promise and pressure of not kittening up. Now I have whooping 6 Dhuum KP out of 50 needed to run it. Nice. I won't even dare to attempt this kitten for Qadim, because, unlike Dhuum, that boss is actually hard, and I do need practice on just his combat mechanics. Which, in the course of 4 training runs so far, I got precisely 0 of. Because everybody instantly wipes on the second phase - forget the second miniboss. Your personal performance stops mattering quickly - other people can and will wipe you regardless of how well you kite or do the lamp. Again, this is fine, training and all. But how the kitten am I supposed to learn?

On a totally unrelated note - notice how Qadim LFGs, in contrast to everything else, have incredibly low KP requirements, like 10 or so? Could it be that nobody actually plays that kittening fight?

All of this combines into a wonderful cocktail of stress, need to organize and schedule myself around a videogame, and the fact that I spend more time looking at LFG or waiting for squad reshuffles than playing the actual raids and "gittin gud" at them. Those that I did "git gud" at I still can't run (unless I fake my KP of course), because you need 50Kp to DPS Xera for some godforsaken reason. And 250 LI for Gorseval. I can't join statics, because, again, KPs.

The only reasonable way to breach raids is to have 5-6 friends willing to suffer through that together with you. Personally, I can't even synch my work/off times with my friends to run dungeons, forget raids. Otherwise you'll need to put so much effort and time into just getting in the encounter, without clearing it, that it's not worth bothering. I did bother, and after going through all this, I'll just get my 300LI for legs, probably buy my Qadim run from raid sellers, and never touch raids again. Because kitten this.

I get what you are saying, but here is the thing. No one and i mean no one just starts gw2 and gets into raids without practice and experience. It has to come from somewhere, I dont apply to groups I have never even attempted the boss they are doing. That would be insanity on my part, I started out with the easiest bosses to get in the door. It takes time to learn and advance, and most people just want to jump into experienced groups and hope for the best . It took me months of doing the easy wings before I even attempted to learn anything harder. And yes there are training groups that will train take you to Twins Dhuum Adina SH Xera I have not seen a Qadim one but thats to be expected, it is a final boss. There is a very good and patient raid instructor that does these harder bosses a couple times a week. He fills up fast because this is the best training you can get outside of a static. I have run with him a few times for bosses we are going to be on or have never done personally.

 

The thing is raids are top tier content, you have to put in effort to do them. You have to learn what abilities you need to bring what your role will be, learn the fight mechanics. Yes it requires more than just spamming a world boss , and its more indepth than most fractals my exception being SQP on CM and a few others. But honestly raiding is the most fun I have in GW2 with the people I raid with. Raiding is a major part of playable content for me, so I do it as much as I want, I dont always get into pugs, and I have been kicked from pugs too. But that dont stop me, I work at getting better and learning where I screwed up on a fight. I hit the practice golem and turn up the intensity .  TDLR: raid trainers exist and they do the harder bosses, you can get in them and learn, everyone starts at the bottom and works their way up, you can always start your own group its really not that bad.

 

Oh another thing, for the longest time cairn was my nemesis, one of the easier bosses that he is lol. I could not get the boss down for maybe a month. I missed most greens, got knocked the hell back got agony got hit with the sword. I figured that was the end of my envoy journey right there. But I got it after that it was all cake. SH is another boss I have a serious issue with, mainly because my pc is getting old and I need a new video card but I can not see the walls so boom I get smacked everytime.  So thats another thing, your graphics need to be dif in raiding than in open world, anet saw fit to make mechanics act like characters so if you turn down stuff in open world because of the 40+ boss zergs then you will not see jack in raids.

Edited December 5, 2021 by Zuldari.3940

[Obtena.7952]

This is the thing. No one debates that players shouldn't have to put effort into raiding as top tier content. I have no doubt there is a portion of players that don't raid who would be more than capable of being successful and productive raiders. Their contribution could have impacted the raid community in a positive way ... except for the barriers that prevent them for participating, even if you are going to argue those barriers are just perceived. 

So the question isn't primarily about difficulty or effort. It's about incentive and participation in that raid content. Throughout these discussions, we have all unfairly put all players into two buckets: casuals and hardcore ... but that's not really an accurate view. There are way more buckets. Anet's challenge should be ensure that they implement content so they can reduces the number of buckets that players fit in so the content can be managed and sustained. Raids didn't do that. Hopefully Strikes do. 

 

Edited December 6, 2021 by Obtena.7952

[Minos.5168]

The issue with raids is simple math:

It took the raid team 1.5 years after the launch of HoT to release the first 4 raids.

Assuming a team of 5 devs finished a raid roughly every 6 months... That's probably at least $268,000 per raid (per salary estimates on Glassdoor, which likely exclude the cost of benefits like PTO and healthcare)

Metrics probably didn't show raids contributing substantially to player retention, compared to open world content.

I believe the solution is simply to focus on making great instanced open world content (like Marionette, Battle for Lion's Arch, and Dragonstorm), but then to also add leaderboards and such for private squads.

Edited December 6, 2021 by Minos.5168

[LegendsOfTheWist.7591]

I think the main problem facing raids in GW2 is that there's very little incentive for experienced players to overlap with inexperienced, learning or players running progression raids.  People stick to their statics and cliques to a fault.  EU definitely has a way better pugging culture than NA, but both have an epidemic of raid-sellers.  It's not a good look.   It took me 40m the other day for someone to whisper me to tell me to check out XYZ guilds or discords (I was curious) so I logged in on an alt with an old 80 character and hit up the NA LFG.

I'm not optimistic that Strike Missions will remedy this overlap.  It's easy to teach players that listen, read, write and communicate mechanics.  It's not easy to teach players content when you want to "fix" their builds and the way that they play the game because it implies what they're doing is incorrect, broken and wrong.   Most players will react defensively or with hostility, and even if they change their builds, they won't put the time into learning how to practice and play them correctly, at which point the only thing you've done is antagonized them.

The challenge is in creating a scenario where having inexperienced players are as equally as valuable as experienced players.  I think the main way to do that is to make some Strikes less about DPS and more about mechanics.  Ultimately, the burden would be on ArenaNet to maintain the fun-factor while preserving simultaneous opportunity for mechanics and DPS; making each portion (5) players on DPS , (5) players on mechanics - feel valued, appreciated, respected -- that they have a valuable job to do that has a meaningful impact on the fight; and more importantly, that job has to be fun for them.

Think about it like the Ring Around the Rosie element of the Dragon's Stand lane finale where the zerg (inexperienced players) are running around killing preservers and you have more experienced players killing the Mordrem Commanders.  There's something for everyone of all experience levels to do.   If ArenaNet wants to make raids as something that people see as accessible then they need to use raids as an experience that brings players of different skill levels together instead of dividing and turning Strikes or Raids into an exclusive experience.

... and yes, I have raid/fractal experience; 1250 LI ~ 3x Armor Sets, LNHB, DWD, FG, Eternal, DD/SS, VitV, CoZ etc. 

Edited December 6, 2021 by LunarRXA.5062

[Cyninja.2954]

1 hour ago, LunarRXA.5062 said:

I think the main problem facing raids in GW2 is that there's very little incentive for experienced players to overlap with inexperienced, learning or players running progression raids.  People stick to their statics and cliques to a fault.  EU definitely has a way better pugging culture than NA, but both have an epidemic of raid-sellers.  It's not a good look.   It took me 40m the other day for someone to whisper me to tell me to check out XYZ guilds or discords (I was curious) so I logged in on an alt with an old 80 character and hit up the NA LFG.

Good points. Long gone are the times when NA players came to the forums, 4 years ago, laughing at EU for using KP and LI to sort and organize via the LFG. As player counts dwindled, the more organized approach allowed more players to stick with the content that much longer while the other part of the player base evaporated.

 

The majority of remaining players joined guilds, statics and/or discords to organize while the influx of new blood, both to the game in general and raids in particular, dried out.

Just goes to show how important it is to give players better in game organizational methods if instanced group content is supposed to work.

Quote

I'm not optimistic that Strike Missions will remedy this overlap.  It's easy to teach players that listen, read, write and communicate mechanics.  It's not easy to teach players content when you want to "fix" their builds and the way that they play the game because it implies what they're doing is incorrect, broken and wrong.   Most players will react defensively or with hostility, and even if they change their builds, they won't put the time into learning how to practice and play them correctly, at which point the only thing you've done is antagonized them.

The only thing strike CMs are going to "fix" is the resource allocation. To be exact: there will be more shared resources between challenging content and open world or easy instanced content.

 

If strike CMs are raid level difficult or above, the same issues players struggling with raids today will remain. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink. Players who refuse to meaningfully contribute to a group or squad will be left behind.

Quote

The challenge is in creating a scenario where having inexperienced players are as equally as valuable as experienced players.  I think the main way to do that is to make some Strikes less about DPS and more about mechanics.  Ultimately, the burden would be on ArenaNet to maintain the fun-factor while preserving simultaneous opportunity for mechanics and DPS; making each portion (5) players on DPS , (5) players on mechanics - feel valued, appreciated, respected -- that they have a valuable job to do that has a meaningful impact on the fight. 

Some of the most mechanic heavy encounters are the least played or completed in a PUG setting. The reason is simple: the easiest role is to dps without having to know any mechanics. It can even be practice on the golem. Once you introduce mechanics into fights you are introducing another element which players need to learn/provide. On top of which, experienced players will be eventually able to do the mechanic AND provide better dps than inexperienced players.

 

The only way to make inexperienced players just as valuable or desired is what current strikes did: make the bosses so easy that past 5 players it makes no difference in what you bring along and as such can just fill up the group/squad.

Quote

Think about it like the Ring Around the Rosie element of the Dragon's Stand lane finale where the zerg (inexperienced players) are running around killing preservers and you have more experienced players killing the Mordrem Commanders.  There's something for everyone of all experience levels to do.   If ArenaNet wants to make raids as something that people see as accessible then they need to use raids as an experience that brings players of different skill levels together instead of dividing and turning Strikes or Raids into an exclusive experience.

... and yes, I have raid/fractal experience; 1250 LI ~ 3x Armor Sets, LNHB, DWD, FG, Eternal, DD/SS, VitV, CoZ etc. 

 

The 1 flaw here is: Dragon Stand is balanced around 10 people: 5 outside, 5 inside (champ is scaled to 5, can be soloed if need be). The reason this works is because you can pile on as many inexperienced players as you want outside (because there is no scaling worth mentioning). Do that on the champ middle and you get a fiesta. Also let's not exaggerate, running in a circle, which some still fail, is NOT a mechanic.

 

Instanced content is limited to 10 players. Your suggestions thus boils down to what I said earlier: make bosses so easy that a small core group can just bring along a few more players.

Edited December 6, 2021 by Cyninja.2954

[Astralporing.1957]

4 hours ago, LunarRXA.5062 said:

I think the main problem facing raids in GW2 is that there's very little incentive for experienced players to overlap with inexperienced, learning or players running progression raids.

That is generally always the case, and not something easy to avoid. No matter who you are, grouping withe xperienced players will always make it easier for you. In order to counter that, you'd need to create incentives that would be good enough to balance the risk of failing (and would not be easily gamable).

And that's where the real issue comes - the carrot has to balance the stick, but in GW2 the stick is just way too big. In short, the disparity between experienced and more casual players is just way to massive - and you can't reduce it to reasonable levels without nerfing content difficulty into the ground. Or, without massive changes to core game mechanics, but that approach is not likely to happen.

There's simply no way to make incentives big enough to overcome that gap.

[GRRRR.3521]

If Anet wants to try this "hard group content" thing again there need to be ingame tools to measure qualification like in any other game with thriving raids. They dropped raids on an unsuspecting populace without any of the required framework. But the problem isnt even if theyre willing to do that and conflict with their casual design philosophy.

Most other games have gear inspect and dps meters but im not even sure that would be adequate for GW2 since its so heavily skill based. How do you express that in standardized values.

Thats toxic and excludes people? Raids already got so toxic theyre dead now. People got already excluded based on diffuse perception of whats a good build or unreliable player-concocted measurements. Watch any streamer long enough and youll see 500+ KP/LI groups where half of em dont know mechanics. People lie about anything to get into groups. Remember that meme with the guy giving build advice or whatever and when inspected with an illegal gear checker had absolute clown shoe equipment? Wowie so much better than a reliable, standardized ingame method which would hurt my fee-fees.

For starters introduce difficulty settings. Provide a clear progression path from open world flower picking to hardcore content. Yes thats hand-holdy but if you want hard content played by more than 5 people you gotta train your general player base towards that. Or just dont do hard content.

[Obtena.7952]

5 hours ago, GRRRR.3521 said:

If Anet wants to try this "hard group content" thing again there need to be ingame tools to measure qualification like in any other game with thriving raids. They dropped raids on an unsuspecting populace without any of the required framework. But the problem isnt even if theyre willing to do that and conflict with their casual design philosophy.

Most other games have gear inspect and dps meters but im not even sure that would be adequate for GW2 since its so heavily skill based. How do you express that in standardized values.

Thats toxic and excludes people? Raids already got so toxic theyre dead now. People got already excluded based on diffuse perception of whats a good build or unreliable player-concocted measurements. Watch any streamer long enough and youll see 500+ KP/LI groups where half of em dont know mechanics. People lie about anything to get into groups. Remember that meme with the guy giving build advice or whatever and when inspected with an illegal gear checker had absolute clown shoe equipment? Wowie so much better than a reliable, standardized ingame method which would hurt my fee-fees.

For starters introduce difficulty settings. Provide a clear progression path from open world flower picking to hardcore content. Yes thats hand-holdy but if you want hard content played by more than 5 people you gotta train your general player base towards that. Or just dont do hard content.

Easier said than done. How does the game objectively measure a player for 'suitability' for a certain level of difficulty?

[Tails.9372]

2 hours ago, Obtena.7952 said:

How does the game objectively measure a player for 'suitability' for a certain level of difficulty?

By adding instanced single player content with various difficulty levels.

Edited December 8, 2021 by Tails.9372

[Obtena.7952]

13 minutes ago, Tails.9372 said:

By adding instanced single player content with various difficulty levels.

So just thinking about what you are suggesting here. Anet introduces an assessment system, based on INDIVIDUAL capability for group content. You don't see the problem there? I can see LOTS of problems with that. Primarily, GW2 allows gear to make up for a lack of skill to a certain extent ... and I can assure you that a player 'upscaled' by the individual assessment system is not the player a choosy team wants. The bottomline is that an individual assessment system does not translate to a player being capable in group content.

Really, it's an academic discussion anyways because a system like that is no more effective than what we have now. 

Edited December 8, 2021 by Obtena.7952

[Tails.9372]

5 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

So just thinking about what you are suggesting here. Anet introduces a gating system, based on INDIVIDUAL capability for group content. You don't see the problem there?

That by itself is not a gating system, all it would do is to give players a way to prove that they could handle the level of difficulty in question and understood the related mechanics.

The actual "gating" would still be done by the playerbase but that happens regardless.

[Obtena.7952]

2 minutes ago, Tails.9372 said:

That by itself is not a gating system, all it would do is to give players a way to prove that they could handle the level of difficulty in question and understood the related mechanics.

The actual "gating" would still be done by the playerbase but that happens regardless.

Sounds like how we are getting strikes. Different tier levels, etc ... players judge other players for teaming how they like. 

Edited December 8, 2021 by Obtena.7952

[Astralporing.1957]

11 hours ago, Tails.9372 said:

That by itself is not a gating system, all it would do is to give players a way to prove that they could handle the level of difficulty in question and understood the related mechanics.

The only thing that can truly prove that is observing said person on specific boss. Preferably over many, many attempts, because what counts is not really the ability to do something - it's the steadiness/dependability while doing it. I hope i don't have to explain how that is not exactly a good option for PUg environment, right?

In reality, individual raid mechanics are not that hard. Nor is doing "enough" levels of dps, tbh (although it does require a certain way of thinking/playing most players simply do not have). What makes it difficult is having 10 players trying to do that all at once, when often even a single mistake of one of them can cascade into a wipe for the whole group.

There's no way individual "combat assesment" can ever check that. And if you look at it, i don't believe there's even a single game of the market that has been able to introduce such a system. And i am definitely sure, that it's true when applied to all the major MMORPGs on the market.

 

11 hours ago, Tails.9372 said:

The actual "gating" would still be done by the playerbase but that happens regardless.

Then nothing would change anyway.

[Minos.5168]

On 12/8/2021 at 6:37 AM, GRRRR.3521 said:

If Anet wants to try this "hard group content" thing again there need to be ingame tools to measure qualification like in any other game with thriving raids. They dropped raids on an unsuspecting populace without any of the required framework. But the problem isnt even if theyre willing to do that and conflict with their casual design philosophy.

The lack of gear inspect, etc. is irrelevant. (even with WoW you have to use an add-on to get a DPS monitor)

The key issue is that NCSoft is a publicly traded company whose primary obligation is returning profit to shareholders. If a game mode can't produce metrics showing that its meaningfully contributing to profit, then it's hard to justify allocating resources (i.e. development time) to it.

Put plainly: If raids only attract a small fraction of the GW2 player-base, there's no justification to continue development.

With End of Dragons, ArenaNet has smartly decided to consolidate some of the development effort by linking challenge-mode strikes with story bosses. That way, they can say "this development effort was for the story content which almost all players completed."

Edited December 10, 2021 by Minos.5168

[Tails.9372]

On 12/9/2021 at 8:36 AM, Astralporing.1957 said:

In reality, individual raid mechanics are not that hard.

 That depends on the person, the devs. intended it to be hard "for the average player" and for most of them it is. Ofc. there are also those who think everything is far too easy and GW2 doesn't have any "hard" content at all.

On 12/9/2021 at 8:36 AM, Astralporing.1957 said:

There's no way individual "combat assesment" can ever check that. And if you look at it, i don't believe there's even a single game of the market that has been able to introduce such a system. And i am definitely sure, that it's true when applied to all the major MMORPGs on the market.

Except there are, the japanese version of PSO2 requires specific single player titles for their expert matchmaking. Maplestory 2 has a solo dungeon and several boss fights (including a boss rush) with related leaderboards for weekly and overal clear times.

On 12/9/2021 at 8:36 AM, Astralporing.1957 said:

Then nothing would change anyway.

Ofc. it would, many raid groups just want people that both know the mechanics and are able to do them. For those a title for clearing solo content that incorporates all the important stuff would be sufficient. This would also eliminate the "how are we supposed to know the mechanics to if no group wants to take us" complaint.

The only group of people for which such titles would be insufficient are those that ask for >1000 KP because what they really want are seasoned veterans to make the run as smooth as possible.

But the question was about "suitability for the content" so all you doing with your objection here is trying to move the goalpost.

Edited December 12, 2021 by Tails.9372

[AliamRationem.5172]

23 hours ago, Minos.5168 said:

The lack of gear inspect, etc. is irrelevant. (even with WoW you have to use an add-on to get a DPS monitor)

The key issue is that NCSoft is a publicly traded company whose primary obligation is returning profit to shareholders. If a game mode can't produce metrics showing that its meaningfully contributing to profit, then it's hard to justify allocating resources (i.e. development time) to it.

Put plainly: If raids only attract a small fraction of the GW2 player-base, there's no justification to continue development.

With End of Dragons, ArenaNet has smartly decided to consolidate some of the development effort by linking challenge-mode strikes with story bosses. That way, they can say "this development effort was for the story content which almost all players completed."

That's one way of looking at it and it's certainly a factor, but it ignores the fact that very few players play only one game mode.  For instance, fractals and strikes are content I enjoy sometimes but have never been a focus for me.  Maybe that doesn't hit the right value metric, but from my perspective the game would be diminished by focusing all resources on the content I play the most because it's not the only content I enjoy.