New Players taken aback by what they call "one-shotters"

[Gibson.4036]

What if they just did a pass at how scaling works? Some sort of blanket damage reduction tied to character level.

You don’t really need raptor dismount or big hit skills to kill things too fast. I was partied with someone leveling a new toon last night, and whole groups of mobs in Gendarran Fields were going down fast only using vapor blade or lightning whip.

[Zok.4956]

9 hours ago, Katiekaboom.1980 said:

I know I heard a LOT of complaints of so many shooting a target and killing it before the new player could get any hits in. Mounts racing around and killing everything before the new player can even figure out where to go and what the objective is.

This is not a new issue. This is one of the rare occasions in the game where players are not happy to see other players and where "kill stealing" is real.

It was already an issue before the first expansion existed. Characters and gear levels are downscaled in low-level / starter areas but because they have all skills and trinkets unlocked (and are buffed and more experienced in the game) they are a lot stronger than low-level characters from new accounts.

With the power-creep from new Elites, stat-combos and mounts it became worse. And then Anet increased the problem with giving veteran players  also the grindy "Character Adventure Guide" and some of the Decade achievements with the result that level-80 players rush through low-level/starter areas as fast as possible.

 

9 hours ago, Scalacious.4139 said:

Maybe the starter zones should have the option to play in an instance with only charakters that are below level 30 or something.

That's not a good or sufficient solution.

I wanted to see if the steam version was different and created a new steam-gw2-account and went to Queensdale. Leveling was very fast, I was level 20 before the map was completed with doing only a few events and with the free test raptor even with level 15-20 I was able with the tail-spin dismount-pull-attack of the raptor to pull and kill groups of mobs in Queensdale a lot faster than lower-level players without mounts could tag them

I think this is one of those rare situations where mounts (that you don't have permanently as a F2P player) could be seen as P2W in a way and I think damage and skills of higher level characters and mounts should be reduced dramatically in starter (and low-level) zones.

 

Edited August 24, 2022 by Zok.4956

[Hesione.9412]

My solution: remove everyone's elite skill, as well as the current downgrading of health etc to fit the lower level.

[YourOnlyOne.4937]

Create an option to enter an exclusive L01-L09 instance. This is probably the quickest to implement since instances are part of the game already, probably just add some new filters (they already have a population filter).

L10 onward it is fair play.

In any case, the issue will more likely lessen in the coming weeks. The problem right now is they introduced new achievements which require a lot of existing characters to revisit the starting zones. IIRC, some of those achievements are per-character.

[SnackParty.3178]

I decided to start a lowbie warrior and limit mount use. I'll occasionally cheat and guide myself throughout the map on skyscale, but tuck it away when new players near by.

[Vayne.8563]

13 hours ago, Ronin.4501 said:

I hate to disappoint you, but this has been occurring since the game was new. I remember arriving in Cursed Shore for the first time (which would have been in 2012) and seeing dozens upon dozens of players farming the camp events; if you weren't running a class with a lot of high-damage AOE attacks you simply weren't going to credit for killing a single NPC. And it carried on that way for months on end. Sadly a lot of players only care about getting THEIR loot bags.

Personally I made certain to enter the starter zones yesterday after the new achievements had come out but before the Steam release, but I can only affect how I play.  Fortunately these new achievements only require 10 events to be completed, so this will likely die down by the end of this weekend.

I suspect Anet planned it this way on purpose in the hopes that the new Steam arrivals would see these areas as being very populated (and thus giving the impression that game is heavily populated) and instead it backfired and resulted in this instead.

You're thinking of the ember farm. That was horrible. Dragonhunters with traps would take everything down so fast, no one could get a hit in. I don't remember that fondly.

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

I have this radical idea to fix it: Downscaling that actually works and doesn't leave max-level, fully-geared players still 10x as powerful as someone who just started the game.

 

What a groundbreaking concept!

Edited August 25, 2022 by Mariyuuna.6508

[Labjax.2465]

What this whole steam thing has been showing me is that this community has a lot more problems than it would like to think it does, for one thing. And for another, anet tends to take a "hands off" approach when it comes to drawing lines that nurture a better community, and has basically been coasting on some game mechanics that some of its designers (prob not still with the company) made 10 years ago to encourage teamwork.

It's a pattern I see repeat with more than one "live service" game, where some of the best work is in the initial creation of the game and then those people move on or are fired, and a lot of what comes after doesn't really understand what made the best stuff work, they just have their own ideas and want to put them in a game. Sometimes this results in cool stuff still, don't get me wrong, but it also means stuff like, say... wanting people to be happy to run into another player in the open world, can get left at the wayside.

[Ashantara.8731]

21 hours ago, Katiekaboom.1980 said:

Please be aware of how new players coming into the game for the first time are experiencing their first time experience. I know I heard a LOT of complaints of so many shooting a target and killing it before the new player could get any hits in.

This isn't a problem that concern only new players/low level characters, though they are - naturally - the ones hit hardest by this.

Doing some of the new achievements on my Dragonhunter showed, once again, how crazy overpowered Power Rifle Mechanists are. They would pew-pew-kill enemies before I could place my Symbol of Resolution or execute my Whirling Wrath attack, hell, often even before I could simply swing my sword and strike the target.

And seeing tons of those Mech players in the starter zones on Steam release day gave me a stomach ache, because I felt bad for any newbies who couldn't get a single kill in.

Mechanist needs to be nerfed, badly.
 

Edited August 25, 2022 by Ashantara.8731

[Katiekaboom.1980]

14 hours ago, Zok.4956 said:

I think this is one of those rare situations where mounts (that you don't have permanently as a F2P player) could be seen as P2W in a way and I think damage and skills of higher level characters and mounts should be reduced dramatically in starter (and low-level) zones.

VERY well said (your whole post) and right to the point of the issue. I hope someone from Anet is reading this thread so that they better understand things from a new player perspective but also ideas. Thank you.

[Katiekaboom.1980]

10 hours ago, YourOnlyOne.4937 said:

In any case, the issue will more likely lessen in the coming weeks. The problem right now is they introduced new achievements which require a lot of existing characters to revisit the starting zones. IIRC, some of those achievements are per-character.

Ya that is it in a nutshell! Sure Anet might have wanted to starter zones to look especially active but this just went wrong.

[Katiekaboom.1980]

2 hours ago, Ashantara.8731 said:

This isn't a problem that concern only new players/low level characters, though they are - naturally - the ones hit hardest by this.

Doing some of the new achievements on my Dragonhunter showed, once again, how crazy overpowered Power Rifle Mechanists are. They would pew-pew-kill enemies before I could place my Symbol of Resolution or execute my Whirling Wrath attack, hell, often even before I could simply swing my sword and strike the target.

And seeing tons of those Mech players in the starter zones on Steam release day gave me a stomach ache, because I felt bad for any newbies who couldn't get a single kill in.

Thank you for that input. This is very important as it shows that it is not "just new players complaining" but a real problem! Thank you!

[Gibson.4036]

4 hours ago, Labjax.2465 said:

What this whole steam thing has been showing me is that this community has a lot more problems than it would like to think it does, for one thing. And for another, anet tends to take a "hands off" approach when it comes to drawing lines that nurture a better community, and has basically been coasting on some game mechanics that some of its designers (prob not still with the company) made 10 years ago to encourage teamwork.

It's a pattern I see repeat with more than one "live service" game, where some of the best work is in the initial creation of the game and then those people move on or are fired, and a lot of what comes after doesn't really understand what made the best stuff work, they just have their own ideas and want to put them in a game. Sometimes this results in cool stuff still, don't get me wrong, but it also means stuff like, say... wanting people to be happy to run into another player in the open world, can get left at the wayside.

Recent GW2 definitely can have that quality of the kid of a famous author going on to write sequels and prequels of their parent’s work.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

On 8/24/2022 at 6:38 AM, Katiekaboom.1980 said:

Please be aware of how new players coming into the game for the first time are experiencing their first time experience. I know I heard a LOT of complaints of so many shooting a target and killing it before the new player could get any hits in. Mounts racing around and killing everything before the new player can even figure out where to go and what the objective is. They don't start out with a lot of armour or all their weapon skills but just skill 1 and are confused and blindsided by all the shininess of new players who wanted to welcome them to the game.

I felt it was important to make this aware as it has been a long time since most of us were new players. I myself, having had played since 2012, made a new account back when free accounts first came out to get a feel for what their experience was so that I could better relate to them to help them more adequately but that is just me. I am disabled and have the time to help but all the years of experience, especially in PvE. But was not prepared for the repercussions of the new "Character Adventure Guide" achievements and long time players trying to get into all the events to get theirs while at the same time new players were trying to for the first time. This should have been foreseen and I thought that the "Character Adventure Guide"  was only going to be for new accounts. I personally feel it still should have been because this is what happens when it is not.

I found this review on Steam VERY telling of one player's first hand new experience Tuesday August 23rd 2022:

I felt bad for them but 100% know what they are talking about. I had heard a lot of similar comments in game and frustration and rage quitting .. which is not what we would expect with GW2 especially in PvE in s starter zone.

Let's try to be more considerate and helpful in the starter areas and try to remember what it was like to be new to a game that is unlike most others.

Thank you.

I call BS entirely. I started a new character yesterday just for kicks and giggles. Warrior of course. I was one shotting everything. On a fresh character. No high level shenanigan's, no bosting, just using fresh gear and lvl up rewards weapons.

The Steamers have no excuses, as they too should be one shotting things on their fresh characters. 

[PinkTacoLover.7603]

like in wvw when you wait near the camp so more ppl can kill the npcs then someone jump in the middle kill them all in 3 sec and leave

[Biermeister.4678]

The one's giving grief on the starter maps are the same ones that run around giving grief on other modes of the game. What would be nice if the Elite traits were disabled on any map below level 30 

[Shuzuru.3651]

4 hours ago, Biermeister.4678 said:

The one's giving grief on the starter maps are the same ones that run around giving grief on other modes of the game. What would be nice if the Elite traits were disabled on any map below level 30 

Well, those players are either auto attacking or using the 2 of their weapons, you will have the exact same result even with trait desactivated... 

[stormemperor.3745]

Thats what happens when you lock decade armor skins behind early game achievements.

It was a big move from Anet to kill every hope of newcomers. Pummelling steam players right when they begin the game.

 

Was it so hard to make the achievements completed for old players? Probably

 

Also Staff necro hits like truck in low level zones. 1200 range 5 target 300 radius, 3 skills. cds are so low you can tag kill before people even see it.

 

YOU WILL NEVER SEE IT COMING

[DarcShriek.5829]

As a veteran player, I've noticed this has greatly increased in frequency the last few days.  It's horrible.  There are a number of players that feel they have to do the entire event all by themselves to the detriment of the other players trying to participate in the event.  It's worse than when champ trains roamed the starter areas.

Edited August 26, 2022 by DarcShriek.5829

[Urud.4925]

As other people said, this problem was already present before, it's not because of the new achievements. I always avoid to play in the daily map for example, it's simply frustrating to compete with a horde of players on their mount, just to be able to tag a couple of mobs.

Two days ago there were players camped at the spawning point in Queensdale, waiting in circle for new players, on their shiny mounts, with tags up, even on the roof of the buildings. This is ridiculous. I said to a colleague of mine to wait a couple of weeks before trying GW2, or to create a non-human character if he really wants to try the game this week-end.

 

Being present in chat is one thing, and it's helpful for new players to have someone answering their questions (although even here, there is often a "race" among "teachers", and people end up for providing superfluous and confusing comments, just for the sake to add something). Stalking new players like a shadow, 1-shotting everything on sight, it's not help. When you start a new game, you want to try to understand how the game works, read the tooltips on your skill bar, trying your skills, weapons, and you don't care the slightest about other players' skins. You don't even know where they come from. The game is easy enough that you don't need any help, except for champion bandits.

 

The good thing is that I saw 20-30 players behaving this way, few people compared to the player base. Still, 1 lv80 is enough to ruin the experience of a new player. If you think to be skilled, go showing off your prowess to people of your level, seriously. Bragging with kids is just sad.

[Barabbas.8715]

It's a combination of narcissism and entitlement. These are the types of people who got told they were "special" by their parents when they were kids but didn't understand what that really meant, lol.

[Ronin.4501]

On 8/25/2022 at 12:50 AM, Vayne.8563 said:

You're thinking of the ember farm. That was horrible. Dragonhunters with traps would take everything down so fast, no one could get a hit in. I don't remember that fondly.

Actually I was referring to the event chain that took place at Penitent Waypoint, Shelter's Gate Waypoint, and Jofast's Waypoint in Cursed Shore. As I said in my post, this was back in 2012, and Dragonhunters didn't exist until 2015. It was primarily rangers and necros who took all the kills with their ranged AOEs, as they would kill all the npcs before they even reached the melee class players.

[Ronin.4501]

On 8/25/2022 at 10:57 AM, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

I call BS entirely. I started a new character yesterday just for kicks and giggles. Warrior of course. I was one shotting everything. On a fresh character. No high level shenanigan's, no bosting, just using fresh gear and lvl up rewards weapons.

The Steamers have no excuses, as they too should be one shotting things on their fresh characters. 

But also remember that you have the benefit of knowing what your class/weapon skills/traits/stats do at this point, even if you just rolled a new character. Someone who literally just started the game and has only a few hours of total play time won't have the benefit of that knowledge which will naturally lead to a far less optimal combat experience initially.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

16 minutes ago, Ronin.4501 said:

But also remember that you have the benefit of knowing what your class/weapon skills/traits/stats do at this point, even if you just rolled a new character. Someone who literally just started the game and has only a few hours of total play time won't have the benefit of that knowledge which will naturally lead to a far less optimal combat experience initially.

I'll give you partial credit for this answer, but I really was just using the starting gear along with a hammer from one of the lvl up rewards and every attack one shot anything so... 

[DarcShriek.5829]

Yes, this problem has always existed, but not to this degree.  It's way more than normal.