Old player thinking about returning: Did game became less grindy towards stuff?

[Beast Sos.1457]

1 minute ago, Voltron.1043 said:

Again - you don't have to grind for relic in FF XIV for new gear score, pretty much nobody does that for that. The difference between gear you can get from other stuff is like 5 points (615 vs 610 for example, which still gives you 610 overall iLvl). 99% of us in FF XIV do relics they like just for skins. They pretty much offer no power increase for noone apart from pharsers.

But I am not here to explain FF XIV :D.

So how fast you can get Legendary weapon now if you put your mind to it?

To get a full BiS in FF14 does take a few weeks though no? From what I remember at least, I didn't grind the full set just a couple piece then quit. 

 

For a new player, you can easily farm 20g a hour and up to 50g a hour for the best gold farms. So it all depends on how much time you spend and what content youre doing. You can finish it in 2 weeks or 2 months. It all depends. 

[Sobx.1758]

10 minutes ago, Voltron.1043 said:

Again - you don't have to grind for relic in FF XIV for new gear score, pretty much nobody does that for that. The difference between gear you can get from other stuff is like 5 points (615 vs 610 for example, which still gives you 610 overall iLvl). 99% of us in FF XIV do relics they like just for skins. They pretty much offer no power increase for noone apart from pharsers.

Again, FF wiki disagrees with what you're saying here: https://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Relic_Weapons

"Relic weapons from past expansions are not intended for combat use, but for cosmetic and collection purposes. Better weapons for the same player level include those that drop from raids and those that can be bought with Poetics".

 

So I'll stick with that information 😅

10 minutes ago, Voltron.1043 said:

So how fast you can get Legendary weapon now if you put your mind to it?

Doubt anyone can really tell you, it depends what you have, what you still need and how much/where/how you play. All you can do is go on one of the gw2 pages (like gw2 wiki or gw2efficiency), check the recipes for what's needed, compare with what you have and check how to get what you're missing.

Edited September 7, 2022 by Sobx.1758

[Voltron.1043]

2 minutes ago, Sobx.1758 said:

Again, FF wiki disagrees with what you're saying here: https://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Relic_Weapons

"Relic weapons from past expansions are not intended for combat use, but for cosmetic and collection purposes. Better weapons for the same player level include those that drop from raids and those that can be bought with https://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/mediawiki/images/thumb/9/92/Allagan_Tomestone_of_Poetics.png/20px-Allagan_Tomestone_of_Poetics.png Poetics".

 

So I'll stick with that information 😅

Doubt anyone can really tell you, it depends what you have, what you still need and how much/where/how you play. All you can do is go on one of the gw2 pages (like gw2 wiki or gw2efficiency), check the recipes for what's needed, compare with what you have and check how to get what you're missing.

Dude, you try to tell me how game I play for last couple of years is played when it's obvious you don't play it. Going by your logic I should answer my own thread question here since I don't play GW2 but I can tell you how it's played....

Seriously....

Edited September 7, 2022 by Voltron.1043

[Freya.9075]

1 minute ago, Voltron.1043 said:

Since I was considering playing Necro I really like Zhaitan skins.

Then you will need aurene's legendary first. They cost from 2700 to around 2900 on tp. A bit less if you order them. And then do the zhaitan collection which took me a week i think. The variants are not so expensive but since you need Aurene legendary to open the possibility to make Zhaitan it does get a bit more expencive. 

If you want to craft Aurene weapon it'll cost you around 1400 gold. Assuming you will go for reaper and greatsword. So you can save some gold doing that. Wiki can help you find the cost of the weapon you want to create. And it'll take a while to gather the materials for them

[Sobx.1758]

7 minutes ago, Voltron.1043 said:

Dude, you try to tell me how game I play for last couple of years is played when it's obvious you don't play it. Going by your logic I should answer my own thread question here since I don't play GW2 but I can tell you how it's played....

Seriously....

Ok, so the FF wiki is wrong then?

(and it seems that's what you're already trying to do in this thread, since I'm explaining to you how significantly different that gear is in gw2 vs ff14 and you're just repeating "but I'm just interested in the skins" -ok, I get it, but your "interest in just the skins" doesn't change the fact about how different these gear tiers are in these two games, which is what you should understand to put time and gold value on those accordingly)

 

Anyways, in the same post I've tried explaining to you why nobody will truly be reasonably able to tell you how long it will take you. It will differ between the players by a lot, depending on multiple elements. The best move is to check what you need, what you have and how you can get the missing elements. Then make your own estimate.

Edited September 7, 2022 by Sobx.1758

[Gibson.4036]

24 minutes ago, Voltron.1043 said:

Thanks for insight. How hard is to get gold now when you reach max level? I remember in COF it was like 6-9g per hour back in my days.

I'm probably not the best to ask, since I don't really intentionally farm gold, and I'm a fairly casual player.

I've seen 20g/hour quoted as a the return on doing the Drizzlewood Coast meta. While I've done it, I largely keep the mats for crafting, and the gold comes from selling the mats. It's my understanding there are higher g/hour avenues than DC.

With my 6-8 hours of play a week, though, I'm sitting around 1k gold. I recently completed Vision, which took a several gold bite out of that, and I was suprised that I was back up over 1k again really quickly. This is without seeking out gold at all. I do have my 9 characters geared to where I'm not actively trying to gear anyone up. After that, the gold accumulates quickly. I've also been doing a fair amount of PvP, which pays out a surprising amount of gold, not to mention a lot of exotics (useful for gearing alts) and even the occasional ascended.

22 minutes ago, Voltron.1043 said:

how much and how would I shorten it with gold or how much gold I would need for that?

You can get up to 5 A.S.S. per week for 5 different currencies. They're currently running about 6g on the TP, so 30g per week you want to shortcut.

For pure utility, getting legendary trinkets is the most useful first, because you can use them on every single character.

Armor is next, since you can use a set on every single character of a given armor class. It requires PvP, WvW, or Raids, though. And PvP armor does not have a unique look (I don't know about WvW). Raids provide the shiny armor.

Since any given weapon is only going to be used on specific builds for only some of your characters, they have the least impact from a utility standpoint.

19 minutes ago, Voltron.1043 said:

I think about Legendaries only as skins, I don't really care about them being BiS (FF XIV) or that you can modify them for different builds (GW2) as I usually stick with just one class/role as I don't like to level up multiple stuff. Lego weapons in GW2 I want for skins, skins is all I care in MMOs.

Lego armors also do have epic skins like weapons?

If you are just looking for great weapon skins, IMO some of the black lion weapon skins are superior to most legendary weapon designs. You can get a lot of these BL weapon skins on the TP for around 100g (some quite a bit less), a huge bargain compared to leggie weapons.

Edited September 7, 2022 by Gibson.4036

[Voltron.1043]

6 minutes ago, Beast Sos.1457 said:

To get a full BiS in FF14 does take a few weeks though no? From what I remember at least, I didn't grind the full set just a couple piece then quit. 

 

For a new player, you can easily farm 20g a hour and up to 50g a hour for the best gold farms. So it all depends on how much time you spend and what content youre doing. You can finish it in 2 weeks or 2 months. It all depends. 

yes, it does but again - it's not needed for anything. It's just another thing to do. And it only take few weeks becasue newest set can be aquired 1 piece/week or 2 piece/week but it only take like 2-3h in one day to get that piece. So newest BiS is time-gated but not "grind-dated" as it doesn't require grind at all. Simillar to what someone told me here about 20-25 weeks time-gate but obviously in FF XIV it's nowhere near that extreme.

But what I ask here is skins, not BiS as I don't care about BiS here or in FF XIV. Only about rarest/coolest skins in game for fashion.

[Voltron.1043]

4 minutes ago, Gibson.4036 said:

You can get up to 5 A.S.S. per week for 5 different currencies. They're currently running about 6g on the TP, so 30g per week you want to shortcut.

So by how much does it shorten the time from 20-25 weeks with that?

[Beast Sos.1457]

1 minute ago, Voltron.1043 said:

yes, it does but again - it's not needed for anything. It's just another thing to do. And it only take few weeks becasue newest set can be aquired 1 piece/week or 2 piece/week but it only take like 2-3h in one day to get that piece. So newest BiS is time-gated but not "grind-dated" as it doesn't require grind at all. Simillar to what someone told me here about 20-25 weeks time-gate but obviously in FF XIV it's nowhere near that extreme.

But what I ask here is skins, not BiS as I don't care about BiS here or in FF XIV. Only about rarest/coolest skins in game for fashion.

If thats your concern then you shouldn't be too focused on legendary gear imo. There are so many awesome looking skins that are so much cheaper and just as cool. Especially when you're doing it for the fashion. A lot of armor skins will look better with weapons that aren't legendary. 

[Gibson.4036]

Legendary weapons, scroll down to bottom for gallery:

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Legendary_weapon

Black Lion weapon gallery:

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Black_Lion_weapon_set_gallery

For example, I think https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Lorekeeper_Staff_Skin is one of the sweetest weapons designs in the game, rivaling legendary designs. The previews on the page don't do the particle effects justice. You can get it for 72g, and as for exclusivity, I haven't seen anyone running around with it.

Edited September 7, 2022 by Gibson.4036

[Gibson.4036]

4 minutes ago, Voltron.1043 said:

So by how much does it shorten the time from 20-25 weeks with that?

600g, and you skip the entire timegate.

If you're going to pursue legendaries, gw2efficiency.com is super helpful. You can put your API key from your account in, an it will dynamically calculate how much it will cost you to make recipes counting what you already have in storage.

 

[patton the great.7126]

Gw2 is many things but I wouldn't classify it as overly grindy. Tbh I can't remember a time when it was ever that bad. You earn most of what you'll ever need just by playing what you enjoy. I mean leggy weapons and armor are total jokes if you think they require effort. The only thing grindy is if you want infusions. No real grind. Just have to show up.

[Einsof.1457]

??? I've never grinded for anything in this game. And Ive got almost 4000 hours clocked and a bunch of legendary stuff. 

[Danikat.8537]

If you fixate exclusively on collecting legendaries then you will find GW2 very grindy, especially if you want to get them as quickly as possible.

But they're by no means the only option for cool skins. Check out this for example: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Gallery_of_swords
That's all the sword skins currently available, only 6 of which are legendaries (3 actual and then the 3 additional skins for the Aurene one). You can click on each one to get info on how it's obtained and there's galleries for all the other weapons as well. Many can be bought with gold, others come from collections and other achievements or are earned by playing specific maps or areas of the game.

Armour is similar, there's 3 legendary sets (1 from raids, 1 from PvP and 1 from WvW), but dozens of others to find and collect in the game.

[Arianth Moonlight.6453]

nope, returned 5 months ago and still grinding my ascended gear =:/

and I dropped the idea of restoring my legendary almost immediately. That would take more than a year of pure grinding...

[captrowdy.9561]

Lol there called legandary for a reason. You can gear up rather quickly in this game and be set for everything. 

[Voltron.1043]

1 hour ago, captrowdy.9561 said:

Lol there called legandary for a reason. You can gear up rather quickly in this game and be set for everything. 

Gearing up is not my goal in MMOs. I play them for fashion. Gear as "stats" is not really big on my list.

[Voltron.1043]

1 hour ago, Arianth Moonlight.6453 said:

nope, returned 5 months ago and still grinding my ascended gear =:/

and I dropped the idea of restoring my legendary almost immediately. That would take more than a year of pure grinding...

Really? 5 months and you still didn't get ascended :(. Sorry to hear it man. That's really bad.

[Mell.4873]

I will take a stab at answering this since we have had a bit of mixed bag of responses.

If you played only end-game content exclusively vs lets say a year ago I would say things are better.
With the influx of new Legendary weapons which most of the components can be traded has lead to a gold mine of content that can net you 20+ gold per hour. 

The game has a lot of power creep at the moment so CM fractals/Strikes are much easier to do which results in upwards of 40+ gold per hour. If you want to Raid well that might be a dead end for gold per hour.

 

If you want to Farm EoD related content then look at this https://www.gw2bltc.com/en/item/96347-Chunk-of-Ancient-Ambergris. I don't think the price will drop anytime soon so this it a good source of income at the movement.

Edited September 8, 2022 by Mell.4873

[mythical.6315]

7 hours ago, Voltron.1043 said:

Brief story: me and my wife started to play this game on release with whole "horizontal progression" and "once you get best gear you never have to worry about getting better gear" stuff. Game was really fun until we got to "endgame" where everything was pretty much about farming CoF for gold as gold was needed for everything and getting "prestigue" skins like Legendary items were taking long weeks/months on top of having to farm gold to aquire mats/precursors (also it was time where people who uses exploit on release stacked a lot of precursors and forever destroyed market back then). It was like second job. By the time we both got preqursors we were bored to death thinking that every cool skin requires grind like that. Then Fractals came it with "have X gear or kick" and since we were few weeks behind we couldnt progress at all. So since we decided game doesn't respect our time - we dropped it and never came back. 90% of our day time was spend trying to progress the grind towards anything in this game if we wanted to get something cool. It wasn't what we thought GW2 will be.

Now we settled for playing FF XIV in last 2 years where there is pretty much no grind, stuff is easy to aquire and even hardest grind (relic weapons or Eureka armor) don't take more than week or 2-3 weeks while still doing all the stuff game has to offer and nothing is time-gated or you can easy gets tons of end-game cosmetic stuff in no time. Since we are now both adults with job and family - we like that it respects our time. Plus you can have all jobs on one character so no need to get new gear/new chars for anything. Not to mention story is great but that's irrelevant for this post.

So it's been very long time since that in GW2 and I wanted to ask if this game is still grindy as it was back then and requires long weeks to even get one "endgame" cosmetic item and if farming for gold is still a thing you spend a lot of time doing instead of enjoying a game. I know there has been a lot of changes in dev team so I am just looking for honest opinions as money is not an issue to even buy all expansions, but we want a game to respects our time and don't expect us to play it like second job to get anything cool in this game as we love fashion in MMOs.  It's our passion in FFXIV to make new fashion sets etc. and get prettiest glams (cosmetics) for characters.

To comapre I needed 10 relics weapons (Legendary equivalent in GW2) for some fashions in FFXIV I have and it took me about a month and half to get all of them.

I am just honestly stating here my expectations so thank you for your honest opinions.

The grind in the game has been steadily increasing with the largest leap during IBS/LS5. The direction continued on with EoD. 

[Voltron.1043]

16 minutes ago, mythical.6315 said:

The grind in the game has been steadily increasing with the largest leap during IBS/LS5. The direction continued on with EoD. 

 

Shame. Thanks for your honesty though.

[Garrison Storm.3046]

The additions over the past ten years have been incredible; just working your way through all of that new content should be enjoyable and provide you with many new objectives, beyond working towards Legendary items. 

But to answer your question, my take is that while it will still take awhile to accumulate 1k gold, the difference between now and a decade ago, is that there are now different approaches that you can rotate to mitigate that 'grind' (and as others have mentioned, even with a rotation, 20g+/hr is pretty attainable for several activities).  So you rotate amongst the more profitable activities, and at that point it's not really a grind anymore, is it?  At that point, you're playing the game...

I would say that if you're resuming from that long ago, there are many QoL game-additions (mounts, gliding, etc) introduced that will require a degree of time investment to attain, which will then make the game and the activities that follow even more enjoyable.... so to get you back up to endgame content will be a time investment on its own, but thoroughly enjoyable, imho.

Continuing with just the core game and without investing any of the expansions... Not sure there... You will definitely lose many of those rotational options, so it might continue to feel grindy from that perspective.   
 

As you presumably enjoyed your first experience of GW2 up to a certain point, I would say that the various additions introduced through the expansions will help to invigorate your experience as you work to update your endgame status and objectives... That aspect should be fun for you, at which point you can decide which of the many profitable aspects should be your focus if accumulation of gold and those skins is still your priority.

 

Best of luck and if you decide to continue... welcome back!

[Danikat.8537]

9 hours ago, Voltron.1043 said:

Gearing up is not my goal in MMOs. I play them for fashion. Gear as "stats" is not really big on my list.

In that case you definitely don't need to worry about legendaries. Have a look through the galleries on the Wiki or the wardrobe in-game (which has the added advantage that you can see the skins on your character and how they'll look when you mix and match) to find things you like. Or just play, make sure you check out the vendors for the various different currencies and see what you can find and collect.

[mercury ranique.2170]

the amount of stuff needed to obtain a legendary weapon has not decreased. There have been more effecient farms added to the game, that helps minimise time, but it still takes a good amount of time.

However, I disagree that GW2 endgame ever resolved around getting prestige skins. The game has a high sandbox character to it and this has only increased. You can do whatever you want. If you want to get the prestige skins go get them. Just keep in mind they come with a grind and that is the price you have to pay. if you do not like it, do not get it. There is so much more to do. Specially when you have been gone since the time CoF farm was the best way to get gold, the amount of content added  for max level is huge

[reddie.5861]

lets be honest, even if u find legendary grindy. what u want to do in this game when let say it all is handed to you?
if there wasnt a time wall from stopping me id make ton of legendaries. this game isnt grindy at all. like i said if they would make it less grindy then i dont see no reason for any PvE player to stay. hitting the same kitten over and over again with the same pattern hows that fun? 😉