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Question for Casual EoD players.


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Does it feel to you like the whole expansion is a shift to force their whole playerbase into the strike/raid scene? Or is it just the one event aimed at the tryhards, with a lot of badly designed elements (rng, casual features locked behind it, way too long, etc).

I'm trying to decide if I'll buy the expansion.

If it's just the one event then I don't mind, I imagine with enough time to learn and a few adjustments it could just become a triple trouble type event, but if the whole expac, feels like a general shift to increase difficulty and force people to do strikes, I'll skip this expansion, read about the story on the wiki, and wait and see if future content continues the trend.

I'm worried because it seems like a lot of achievements and collections are also gated behind very difficult events and even strikes... I don't know if most events or story instances are the same as well.

This game has been so enjoyable, beautiful open world and map designs with amazing exploration, very interesting and fun mechanics, and a world story and characters that keep me invested! I really hope it's not the case but if Arenanet wants to get rid of "filthy casuals" who use gw2 as a fun relaxing time instead of a second job, well.. I guess I'll have to get a clue and prepare to move on. But I'm posting this because I hope other casuals will prove my fears wrong.

------

Edit: Thank you so much to everyone that shared their experiences so far! From what I gather, they really want to get the community to try strikes, and it can get a bit unnecesarily forceful, but there's still plenty to enjoy for a more casual player.

I'm feeling way better about getting the expansion, but I'll wait a bit more to see how Arenanet continues to respond. 

(Not that I'd want challenging content removed from the game, just... make casual expansion features require casual methods of acquisition, and give hardcore players their own prestigious rewards, and better places where they can actually organize with like-minded people. I hope Arenanet realizes that it's best to respect both groups and create content for each, instead of trying to force both to merge, frustrating everyone in the process.)

Thank you for the depth, kindness and respect in your replies, it really gave me a lot of insight! I really appreciate it!

Edited by SaltyTidalwave.5876
Edit to update after receiving many kind replies!
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Story instances are still soloable, as per usual. Spoiler alert for the last mission:

Spoiler

You pretty much all but become a god; it's very difficult to die on the last mission.

All the metas except the big final one are relatively straightforward. The first three strikes are pretty straightforward, too, even for solid casuals, and I haven't been forced to do them, outside of the pretty routine "Oh, I want this shiny thing." Shoot, doing the story gives you what the gist of the first three strikes are.

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As a casual, in the terms of  liking ease.

It really does feel like they're trying to push more of players into doing strikes and playing *better*. There are good teaching of mechanics in this expac tho.

The meta events are harder than most meta events in the game. Especially Echovald and Dragons End. And this last one fails even in good organised groups.

In saying that. The story is alot of fun and I really enjoyed it. and still soloable, they have an easy mode for the big bosses. The maps aren't hard to map.

Unfortunately the story progression masteries have no optional achieves. If you want that mastery point, you need to complete all the achieves in an act. (I despise this).

Earning HPs are easier in this expac than HoT or Pof, and supposedly gen 3 ledgie weapons are the cheapest you can get.

Earning MPs appears to be very easy.

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Gotta add that the majority of people posting on the forum lately are people who aren't happy with the expansion, so getting an opinion from here is going to be hella biased and lopsided. Are there genuine criticisms here? Yes. Are some people just...toxic, and it just happens to be concentrated here and in the subreddit? Yes.

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I take it the 'one event' you'll alluding to is the Dragon's End meta event? If so then no that's not the whole expansion and not representative of what's in the rest of it, it's just the bit people on the forum currently want to talk about most.

The story and the events on other maps, even the majority of events on the Dragon's End map are the same sort of thing you see in the rest of the game. The whole story can be done solo and while there is an optional achievement for playing through the meta event before doing the last story step you get credit for it even if the event fails.

As far as I can tell strikes are entirely optional (and there are no raids). Some of the strike bosses are the same as story bosses, but the story version is the same as other story bosses. I think the idea is that it will make strikes seem less intimidating to try because you'll know some of the fight mechanics in advance, but that doesn't mean you have to do them if you don't want to.

I'm not sure yet whether any of the collections and things require strikes (I've heard the turtle mount does) but I can tell you there's a lot to do outside of that. If you haven't had a problem with PoF then I think you'll be fine with EoD too.

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Just keep in mind that the people enjoying and playing the game aren't the ones posting a lot on the forums. So there's a ton of positive stuff that just doesn't go here.
 

Personally, I'm loving this xpac. Yes, there's some issues with the last meta event, but besides that it's the most beautiful and mechanically interesting one we had so far.

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I'll just say if you're unsure, give it some time before buying EoD. Changes are still coming in that may warp how EoD plays.



There's a really easy way to show Anet which content you like and dislike.

They look at stats and implement changes + form new content depending on those stats.

So if you don't like certain content, the best way to confer that to Anet is to not play that content. The stats will do the rest if the majority of players agree. So if you feel Anet is pushing you away, i'd just suggest to follow that feeling and act on it.

It worked during the push for raids and similiar content. It will work the same way again, once completion- and playrates get reviewed over time.

Edited by Raknar.4735
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Of course there is a push towards Strikes/Raid content, it's easier to make something like that and throw it behind a door rather than expansions, it's the direction they have always tried and failed to push causal players for past few years now.
"Drizzelwood" just WvW against AI,
Dragon Response Missions, mini strike/raid .
I mean from a content creation point I get it, it's easier it make an unconnected map throw in some stupidly hard event and bosses with thick break bars that basically require everyone to EMP then say building a whole new expansion and crafting a new story,
as a causal player it make me angry because it's so blatant and they lock what I paid for behind content I don't do.
That being said I love this game and as to the expansion, loved the story absolutely despise DE and all the invisible walls in Echovald. What is the point of having a flying mount that can climb that high just to have some Dev chuckle at me saying, "Oh you thought you were going to get to the story entrance by climbing that when we put 80 Brotherhood over here for you to run though? HA HA HA Nope." 

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Being able to get Astralaria and almost all mounts after returning to the game from Vanilla time, I will say no.

 

I did not feel EoD was any harder than what I had to do to get the above.

 

I chilled out, played the content for pleasure (it's great), completed the maps. Finally learned some profitable recipes and understood better how the class system works and how to make good builds.

 

By the time I decided to go to the meta event, people already knew how to beat it, videos where out and we had competent commanders running a squad.

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26 minutes ago, QueenKeriti.5176 said:

Story instances are still soloable, as per usual. Spoiler alert for the last mission:

  Reveal hidden contents

You pretty much all but become a god; it's very difficult to die on the last mission.

All the metas except the big final one are relatively straightforward. The first three strikes are pretty straightforward, too, even for solid casuals, and I haven't been forced to do them, outside of the pretty routine "Oh, I want this shiny thing." Shoot, doing the story gives you what the gist of the first three strikes are.

 

9 minutes ago, QueenKeriti.5176 said:

Gotta add that the majority of people posting on the forum lately are people who aren't happy with the expansion, so getting an opinion from here is going to be hella biased and lopsided. Are there genuine criticisms here? Yes. Are some people just...toxic, and it just happens to be concentrated here and in the subreddit? Yes.

Thank you for your reply!
I think it's a good idea to make strike missions from story instances, if people enjoy them I think it really makes the idea of trying them not so scary, and of course locking some special achievements and prestige items behind strikes is to be expected, I'm just hoping they don't become the new norm, I tried some IBS strikes and really didn't like the format, I'll still keep an open mind if I get the expansion.
Giving people tools and options to jump into different types of content and difficulty is incredible! Expecting the whole playerbase to make the shift... well... 
I am being careful with basing my whole opinion on a few comments, I've heard both good and bad so far, and the biggest negative I've heard are only about the one event and mount being locked behind it. If that's all I have to "worry" about, then it's really not a problem.
Again thank you for taking time to reply to me!

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There's a weird dichotomy in EoD. Parts of it are player friendly so you have story missions that teach mechanics and let you take a power boost if you want to zip through it (it will disqualify you from achievements that run, though), nearly all hero points are commune, there's better audio cues for letting you know what's going on and what to do, and you can buy items from heart vendors without having to do the heart first. Just some good ol' quality of life improvements people have been asking for for years.

But then there are the strikes and metas. The metas are interesting but they all have split mechanics similar to Triple Trouble where, if one split fails, the whole meta fails and there needs to be organization and communication to do them. They also suffer from having too much going on during the fight. The strikes are interesting but some of them feel like HP sponges where the fight is being dragged out specifically so that there's more of a chance that a player will mess up and the boss can one-shot them.

It's both better than PoF but worse at the same time.

I'm guessing the one event you mention is DE, which is... polarizing, to say the least. It's definitely the most extreme example of forcing players into groups for hard content but the idea behind it (that casual players just need a chance to do hard content and they'll like it and hardcore players will be happy to have casuals forced on them) weaves itself throughout the metas to one degree or another.

There's also heavy RNG aspects in the game which you may or may not like, depending on how you feel about RNG in general.

If you're fine waiting, it wouldn't hurt to wait until the next patch in a couple weeks at least, just to get an idea of what Anet wants to do because they've dug in about how DE is how they want it and nerfed one of the new elite specs egregiously. But they also added points of interest to the new hub because people were missing locations.

The best way I can sum it up is that it feels like there's an internal struggle on with who the game should cater to—casuals or hardcore players—and we don't know which side has the most sway yet.

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49 minutes ago, SaltyTidalwave.5876 said:

Does it feel to you like the whole expansion is a shift to force their whole playerbase into the strike/raid scene?

They're trying to get more people into Strikes because strikes are supposed to be their solution to the problem of Raids.

But the biggest problem of Raids is that they're these bespoke maps and storylines that like 2-5% of the player base will ever see at all. So Strikes are a way to create that same "endgame instance" content but at much lower development cost because they can reuse more story / open-world elements.

So, do the EoD devs really really want you to try Strikes? Probably. Are they trying to make you do all strikes all day every day? Enh, I don't think so.

 

Some of the best stuff in the expansion is open-world stuff. Fishing and skiffs (which mainly exist to support fishing) are both aimed more at collector/explorer type open-world players. The Dragon's End meta (that lots of people are complaining about right now, because of how it's tuned) is an attempt to make an engaging boss battle for people who like stuff like the Frost Citadel map. A lot of the new maps only really come alive when you start doing the side-story quest extras from your achievements (Echovald in particular has a ton of "scavenger hunt" type stuff).

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28 minutes ago, Taygus.4571 said:

As a casual, in the terms of  liking ease.

It really does feel like they're trying to push more of players into doing strikes and playing *better*. There are good teaching of mechanics in this expac tho.

The meta events are harder than most meta events in the game. Especially Echovald and Dragons End. And this last one fails even in good organised groups.

In saying that. The story is alot of fun and I really enjoyed it. and still soloable, they have an easy mode for the big bosses. The maps aren't hard to map.

Unfortunately the story progression masteries have no optional achieves. If you want that mastery point, you need to complete all the achieves in an act. (I despise this).

Earning HPs are easier in this expac than HoT or Pof, and supposedly gen 3 ledgie weapons are the cheapest you can get.

Earning MPs appears to be very easy.

Thank you!! This is giving me a few things to keep in mind but it's overall pretty encouraging!

That aspect of wanting players to get "better" has me a bit worried. On one hand, yes I'd like to get better at understanding general mechanics of the game! And from what I've heard.. they are doing a good job at introducing these naturally and little by little. On the other hand I worry they'll soon expect the average player to get t4 fractal builds, memorize rotations, get food and upkeep a ton of boons for a party. As someone who plays in small chunks of time and likes to jump into different characters, it would be overwhelming, hard to build that muscle memory, and discouraging to be forced to just play the one class.

I'm happy to hear about the story still being very fun and soloable, and the maps being good. 
About the "Story progression masteries", do you mean stuff like in Heart of Thorns where you can't continue the story until you've reached a certain tier of a mastery? or like "War Eternal Mastery" that gives you a skin reward after completing? (Or maybe something completely different I'm not getting...?)
Over all this makes me cautiously optimistic, thank you so much for indulging my question!

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39 minutes ago, Danikat.8537 said:

I take it the 'one event' you'll alluding to is the Dragon's End meta event? If so then no that's not the whole expansion and not representative of what's in the rest of it, it's just the bit people on the forum currently want to talk about most.

The story and the events on other maps, even the majority of events on the Dragon's End map are the same sort of thing you see in the rest of the game. The whole story can be done solo and while there is an optional achievement for playing through the meta event before doing the last story step you get credit for it even if the event fails.

As far as I can tell strikes are entirely optional (and there are no raids). Some of the strike bosses are the same as story bosses, but the story version is the same as other story bosses. I think the idea is that it will make strikes seem less intimidating to try because you'll know some of the fight mechanics in advance, but that doesn't mean you have to do them if you don't want to.

I'm not sure yet whether any of the collections and things require strikes (I've heard the turtle mount does) but I can tell you there's a lot to do outside of that. If you haven't had a problem with PoF then I think you'll be fine with EoD too.

 

Yep! That is the one event I meant! It's really the only event I keep hearing about as well, but I also am trying to stay spoiler free so I wanted to ask a bit more directly about the whole expansion.

 

I'm glad as far as you've seen it appears they are completely optional. I agree it's a good idea to base the strikes on encounters from the story instances, I'd agree it would make them less intimidating for those that wish to do them.

 

Hopefully there's not a lot of collections and stuff behind strikes, besides fun challenging achievements and prestige items for the people that like the content. I'll keep an eye out for what other people say about this, but already I am feeling very optimistic and happy there's a lot more to do and I can still enjoy the story and open world.

 

Thank you so much!

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46 minutes ago, Xainou.1502 said:

Just keep in mind that the people enjoying and playing the game aren't the ones posting a lot on the forums. So there's a ton of positive stuff that just doesn't go here.
 

Personally, I'm loving this xpac. Yes, there's some issues with the last meta event, but besides that it's the most beautiful and mechanically interesting one we had so far.


That is true, I came here after seeing a lot of comments on youtube videos, and honestly was feeling worried that the whole expansion would be a really big shift in difficulty, and example of things to come moving forward. But if it's just the one event, I'm feeling better.

 

Yeah the maps look beautiful and it seems like the story and mechanics are really good, I wouldn't want to miss out!

But I'd also feel like an absolute moron buying an expansion that's subtly trying to tell me where the door is, y'know.

 

Thank you so much!

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There's a ton to enjoy without worrying too much about hardcore content or having to learn raid rotations! I honestly think a lot of players are looking at the tougher strikes or the DE meta and thinking they need to be confident there in order to enjoy EoD. In reality, you could spend a weekend learning how your class works and how to deal with common issues (i.e. learning CC skills, condi cleanse, etc) and be set to have a great time with the content.

 

When HoT and PoF came out, there was similar concerns about difficulty level improving, with many saying that Anet was forcing them to play in parties instead of alone. But you rarely see complaints about difficulty anymore, because the only real issue is that it was new content and it takes time to learn new things.

 

Imo, there's just a lot of folks looking at a few key instances of difficult content and saying that Anet is trying to force the playerbase into becoming Hardcore Elite Pro Gamers. But really, there's so much you can enjoy, and the skill cap for EoD is incredibly achieveable just by learning how the game works and bring a class (and skills) that fit the situation.

 

And as a last note, I personally think it makes a lot of sense for them to add more difficult content as the years go by. Everyone deserves new things to enjoy, from the casual folks to the more experienced. And imo, EoD does a really nice job of encompassing both.

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45 minutes ago, Raknar.4735 said:

I'll just say if you're unsure, give it some time before buying EoD. Changes are still coming in that may warp how EoD plays.



There's a really easy way to show Anet which content you like and dislike.

They look at stats and implement changes + form new content depending on those stats.

So if you don't like certain content, the best way to confer that to Anet is to not play that content. The stats will do the rest if the majority of players agree. So if you feel Anet is pushing you away, i'd just suggest to follow that feeling and act on it.

It worked during the push for raids and similiar content. It will work the same way again, once completion- and playrates get reviewed over time.

 

Thank you!

You're absolutely right, and I'm definitely going to wait and see.

But also since the general mood of casuals seems to be a bit pessimistic, I really wanted to get a better idea about whether this is only directed at the mount and the one event, or if it's about the whole expansion.

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Waiting and seeing is a great idea, honestly. Especially with how much better Anet is getting at reading and responding to player complaints. It feels more and more like they're actually paying attention and trying to resolve issues, so even if they're not fully on track yet, they're improving! Even a few more weeks will give you a better idea of where things are heading and how folks feel about EoD.

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1 hour ago, SaltyTidalwave.5876 said:

Does it feel to you like the whole expansion is a shift to force their whole playerbase into the strike/raid scene? Or is it just the one event aimed at the tryhards, with a lot of badly designed elements (rng, casual features locked behind it, way too long, etc)...

I'm casual, not in the sense of how much I play the game but because I am an old, slow player with very real physical limitations that keep me from "gitting gud". As a  casual player, I very much share your concerns about where Anet seems to be going right now. They really do seem to be pushing a "git gud" theme. Now that does not mean the whole expansion is that way. The story is very forgiving and I was able to solo all of it. On the other hand, the "git gud" push is not just about one meta either.

Anet started pushing strike missions with the IBS Saga. This expansion was the first time though that they locked something behind a strike mission that most players wanted. They also locked something similar behind a raid level of difficulty meta in an open world map. What really concerns me is that even after all the uproar here on the forum, the most Anet has done with the DE meta is tinker with the mechanics, making minor adjustments here and there, as though they still want to keep it as hard as they can get away with. Even more concerning, I have yet to hear anyone from Anet say, "No, we are not pushing 'git gud' on all our players. We very much want to keep our casual players and will continue creating content for them." Supposedly they are monitoring this forum and are paying attention to player feedback. To date though, I haven't seen or heard anything from Anet that addresses the concerns of those of us who don't want to play a "git gud or git gone" game.

Personally, I don't know if you should buy the expansion or not. The maps are beautiful. The story and many of the map events are doable by casuals. I love my new mechanist. It's great fun to play. Heck, some of my guildies and I went fishing together last night and that great fun too. On the other hand, this expansion exacerbated a toxic divide in this community and it may be showing us something about Anet's direction for the future that I do not like at all.

PS 1 - Oh, let me add something I've said repeatedly on this forum before. I'm not at all opposed to hard content in GW2 as long as it's optional, like raids, high level fractals, and structured pvp. I only have a problem with hard content if someone is trying to push me into it. The game needs both the hardcore players and the casual ones to keep it strong and thriving for all of us. In my book, the ideal situation would be for Anet to make a variety of game modes available so players can choose the level of difficulty they like. Open world maps have been a game mode for casuals. I hope that is not going to change.

PS 2 - I've been part of the arguments about all this since EoD dropped. At this point, I'm not going to argue about it here and won't be responding to folks who try to start an argument with me in this thread. The op asked an honest question and I did my best to give an honest answer and I'm going to leave it at that.

 

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1 hour ago, Sardeth Wynn.9548 said:

Of course there is a push towards Strikes/Raid content, it's easier to make something like that and throw it behind a door rather than expansions, it's the direction they have always tried and failed to push causal players for past few years now.
"Drizzelwood" just WvW against AI,
Dragon Response Missions, mini strike/raid .
I mean from a content creation point I get it, it's easier it make an unconnected map throw in some stupidly hard event and bosses with thick break bars that basically require everyone to EMP then say building a whole new expansion and crafting a new story,
as a causal player it make me angry because it's so blatant and they lock what I paid for behind content I don't do.
That being said I love this game and as to the expansion, loved the story absolutely despise DE and all the invisible walls in Echovald. What is the point of having a flying mount that can climb that high just to have some Dev chuckle at me saying, "Oh you thought you were going to get to the story entrance by climbing that when we put 80 Brotherhood over here for you to run though? HA HA HA Nope." 

Yeah this is what has me worried and needing to ask questions and maybe speak out, it makes sense and it is the cost effective solution to try and shrink the diversity of players, since making content for all the different groups of players has proven to be very difficult for them.

 

But hopefully they'll understand that trying to "convert" their casual players into hardcore endgame fans is just not going to work.  

 

I'm curious, do you see a lot more things being hidden behind Strike/Raid content in EoD? This is what I'm wary about the most. If the masteries, story and maps in general are fun, I will get my money's worth, but if wanting to dive into achievements and collections means you HAVE to do the hardcore content... that would be really disappointing.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts!

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It really is comfortable to casual players, and I am one. Some of the events don't scale well yet when a lot of people try them, and that causes folk to think they're hard to do. Then you get one that DOESN'T have too many people doing it, and it's not bad at all. So, yes, I'd recommend it.

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14 minutes ago, SaltyTidalwave.5876 said:

Yeah this is what has me worried and needing to ask questions and maybe speak out, it makes sense and it is the cost effective solution to try and shrink the diversity of players, since making content for all the different groups of players has proven to be very difficult for them.

 

But hopefully they'll understand that trying to "convert" their casual players into hardcore endgame fans is just not going to work.  

 

I'm curious, do you see a lot more things being hidden behind Strike/Raid content in EoD? This is what I'm wary about the most. If the masteries, story and maps in general are fun, I will get my money's worth, but if wanting to dive into achievements and collections means you HAVE to do the hardcore content... that would be really disappointing.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts!

There are definitely achievements and such that require doing the higher tier content. Examples include needing to do a strike for the turtle collection and the final steps of an achievement I'm working on requiring a completed DE meta instance. There's not a ton, but they're there. So if you're a completionist, or just really enjoy getting into all the content, there will be some roadblocks there. I'd actually love to see these roadblocks removed, bc while I personally love the content, I know many don't.

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1 hour ago, angrax.1372 said:

Being able to get Astralaria and almost all mounts after returning to the game from Vanilla time, I will say no.

 

I did not feel EoD was any harder than what I had to do to get the above.

 

I chilled out, played the content for pleasure (it's great), completed the maps. Finally learned some profitable recipes and understood better how the class system works and how to make good builds.

 

By the time I decided to go to the meta event, people already knew how to beat it, videos where out and we had competent commanders running a squad.

 

Thank you! Thad doesn't sound bad, better understanding the mechanics of the game, or having a better idea of how to make a nice build sounds good.

 

As long as it's not too restrictive like "You must know one or several classes inside and out, learn how to create the most efficient builds. And to advance you MUST group up and are expected to learn complicated rotations in order to pull your weight" Something like that would be stressful and not my personal idea of fun. It's good that content is in the game of course! But as long as it's completely optional then I'm very happy.

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1 hour ago, Zephire.8049 said:

There's a weird dichotomy in EoD. Parts of it are player friendly so you have story missions that teach mechanics and let you take a power boost if you want to zip through it (it will disqualify you from achievements that run, though), nearly all hero points are commune, there's better audio cues for letting you know what's going on and what to do, and you can buy items from heart vendors without having to do the heart first. Just some good ol' quality of life improvements people have been asking for for years.

But then there are the strikes and metas. The metas are interesting but they all have split mechanics similar to Triple Trouble where, if one split fails, the whole meta fails and there needs to be organization and communication to do them. They also suffer from having too much going on during the fight. The strikes are interesting but some of them feel like HP sponges where the fight is being dragged out specifically so that there's more of a chance that a player will mess up and the boss can one-shot them.

It's both better than PoF but worse at the same time.

I'm guessing the one event you mention is DE, which is... polarizing, to say the least. It's definitely the most extreme example of forcing players into groups for hard content but the idea behind it (that casual players just need a chance to do hard content and they'll like it and hardcore players will be happy to have casuals forced on them) weaves itself throughout the metas to one degree or another.

There's also heavy RNG aspects in the game which you may or may not like, depending on how you feel about RNG in general.

If you're fine waiting, it wouldn't hurt to wait until the next patch in a couple weeks at least, just to get an idea of what Anet wants to do because they've dug in about how DE is how they want it and nerfed one of the new elite specs egregiously. But they also added points of interest to the new hub because people were missing locations.

The best way I can sum it up is that it feels like there's an internal struggle on with who the game should cater to—casuals or hardcore players—and we don't know which side has the most sway yet.

 

This was very comprehensive!

A lot of what you mention sounds really good and makes me optimistic.

 

If the metas are like current Heart of Thorns I'm ok, I won't be doing them over and over but it's something fun to dive into once in a while. A bit wary about it having too much going on, hope it's not too confusing.

 

I didn't know there were more RNG aspects in the expansion besides the DE fight. But since that and length of the meta are the most common issues between both casuals and hardcore players... hopefully it will be addressed or it's impact reduced.

 

I hope Anet stops trying to push these two groups of players together and expect it to work. It's good that there's complexity and difficulty just... hopefully Anet learns it should be an option and not a requirement.

 

I agree with you, I'll definitely wait and see if there's any changes and adjustments, and thankfully I'll wait with a more positive attitude as well, thank you so much!

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I wouldn’t say the whole expansion is shifted to force the players into strikes, but there is definitely more stuff tied to strikes than prestige items and achievements.

The turtle requires one strike, reported to be the easiest. In order to get the best upgrades for your jade bot, you need account bound items that come from doing strikes. The fact that they are gating these kinds of things behind strikes for the first time makes it clear that they are interested in nudging casuals into strike missions.

Overall, general open world content doesn’t feel harder to me. Ambient mobs go down as fast as PoF mobs. But it is my impression playing so far that there are more group oriented events in general, not just the metas. I have had several encounters with easy events that chain into events with significant difficulty spikes later in the chain.

Having said all that, there’s a lot of very enjoyable content for casual, average players. There’s a ton of ArenaNet’s usual wonderful nooks and crannies for world explorers to discover and some beautiful environments. There’s some interesting and memorable story bits, though it does feel like they ran out of time and rushed some conclusions after doing a good job setting up the story.

If you don’t care for strikes but are okay with just ignoring the turtle and jade bot upgrades, you’d be fine.

If you’re the kind of person that doesn’t mind “just getting through it” the number of times you need to in order to unlock things, there are reportedly still plenty of groups made up of other players doing that, or even groups ready to carry you through.
 

If you really don’t want to do strikes, and not having the turtle and bot upgrades is going to chafe, best to wait a bit and see how things settle.

Edited by Gibson.4036
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