An open and Honest View of the game and the community(may contain spoilers)

[ROMANG.1903]

That comment may fall unnoticed, lost in the middle of a topic that won't last forever. But I think that perhaps it might be a good initiative that, when a member of Arenanet reads a post that consists in an idea or a suggestion from a player, an icon or something would appear somewhere to show people that the thing went into Arenanet's ears.

Not a developped answer, not even a "The devs liked your idea". I feel that just "Your idea has been read by someone in the dev team" might ease the feeling of non-communication that the community might have. I often find myself wondering if ANet even read the suggestion I spent 30 minutes to developp, and knowing that they did might just make me feel a lot better, even if my idea is to be discarded anyway. At least I'd know they noticed it, and from there I can trust them to do the right thing for the game.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

Might be okay, except the forum software probably doesn't offer such a feature, and the posters who don't get a 'gold star' will either be up-in-arms about the Devs ignoring them.
Since there would be no feedback from the Devs, one could just pretend every suggestion has the 'gold star'. It amounts to the same thing without the negatives.

[Jski.6180]

@"Inculpatus cedo.9234" said:Might be okay, except the forum software probably doesn't offer such a feature, and the posters who don't get a 'gold star' will either be up-in-arms about the Devs ignoring them.

Since there would be no feedback from the Devs, one could just pretend every suggestion has the 'gold star'. It amounts to the same thing without the negatives.

I cant talk about other poster but i am "up in arms" due to the lack of any meaningful communication to each class ele mostly for me 13 pages of a hard talk to devs with nothing back saying a lot about how much they are willing to changes there views base off of ppl post. So sure they maybe reading but it feels like they have there own views on balancing and will go forward even if there is massive backlash from the players. From ele point of view it has been mostly nerfs with any good reason or talk to the ele player base. Truth be told i have gotten tried of talking arone a class with out naming it for fear of moving post / threads that is another massive problem going on with communication and it feels just wrong.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

Well, there you go. Unsatisfied, with or without a 'star'. Even though the posts are read, some players will still be concerned unless the Devs develop the game to their ideas of what's best.As stated before, no matter what the Devs do (or don't do), some will be unhappy.

[Math.5123]

@Gaile Gray.6029 said:

@Jski.6180 said:

There is a lack of real comment for the dev. them self who made each chose

they need to come out and say why they did the chose they made and the chose they did not make.

<--emphasis added.

This comment, quite honestly, took my breath away. Do you truly believe that developers should justify each decision? Should explain in detail why they did [one thing] and why they did not do [potentially countless alternatives]? Do you feel it would be productive to spend the many, many hours that would be required to discuss each of the changes they made? I am leery of such a process, especially when I know decisions are made based on dev observations, instincts, statistical analysis, extensive development and gaming experience, and an

consistent, overall view of the game

. (Keep in mind that few of us players truly view the game as a whole. As the OP said, we frequently want buffs for us, and nerfs for others.)

I believe that engaging with our players is good, and valuable, and highly desirable. I love it when we can post information about skill changes, as in the 12/11 update notes -- that's a great thing. I am delighted when a dev can get into a discussion on the forums, but I also know that devs read the forums more often than they post, and they keep up on player thoughts on a daily basis. But they need to develop, improve, hone, and expand the game, and I believe they post when they are able. But in the end, I believe they should spend the majority of their time and focus

making the game

and not

talking about making the game.

To do otherwise -- to get involved in the constant back-and-forth of explanation, question, justification, and counter-demand that the comment above appears to demand -- seems destined to lead to a complete lack of forward progress.

Not necessarily discuss every change in detail, but sharing their overall vision about certain changes. (See latest patch and traits not being able to crit as an example). Sharing these stats with the community may not be a bad thing, at least in the competitive gamemodes.

Say having the devs share their vision for the upcoming 6 months with each class. That shouldn't be too much to ask, should it?It's not that I don't respect ArenaNet as a whole, but the complete and utter lack of following up on promises is what gets me. It's been three years since the promise of all gen 2 legendary weapons, it's been close to two years since swiss style ATs began being worked on. (Something that arguably should be in on release.)The complete and utter trainwreck that has been balance in PvP during the release of PoF takes waaayyy to long to see any changes. We just want to know why this is. Is it a shortage of staff, lack of dedication? Without knowing where the issues lie, we can't help.

[Sigmoid.7082]

@"AngelLovesFredrik.6741" said:Not necessarily discuss every change in detail, but sharing their overall vision about certain changes. (See latest patch and traits not being able to crit as an example). Sharing these stats with the community may not be a bad thing, at least in the competitive gamemodes.

They gave a reason as to why the example you cited was changed. Does this not count?

In addition to crowd-control trait reworks, this update also addresses traits that deal instant damage and how they affect the game. The large majority of these traits have had their base damage increased while removing their ability to critically hit in order to improve pacing and reduce time-to-kill in competitive game modes.

Each class often has a blerb to give some insight as to why they are making changes to the class.

Say having the devs share their vision for the upcoming 6 months with each class. That shouldn't be too much to ask, should it?It's not that I don't respect ArenaNet as a whole, but the complete and utter lack of following up on promises is what gets me.

I kept these two parts of your post together for the reason what the community thinks is a promise and what I'd an actual promise are two VERY different things. Anet could give a summary of what they would like to do with the longest and largest disclaimer that it is subject to change based on x,y,z and when it does change its " you promised to do this and you haven't. Liers. Someone should lose their job for this blah blah blah". Community wise we're incredibly unforgiving when it comes to changes of plans for whatever reason or delays due to reasons/unforseen circumstances.

We tend to over simplify the problem and cone up with over simplified solutions or solutions that are just plain unrealistic.

Are Anet perfect in what they do? No. But neither sometimes is the attitude and expectations of the community.

[messiah.1908]

@Gaile Gray.6029 said:

@Jski.6180 said:

There is a lack of real comment for the dev. them self who made each chose

they need to come out and say why they did the chose they made and the chose they did not make.

<--emphasis added.

i am kinda disagree some observations.the game is here only because players play it. thus it is very important to enhance the partnership with your players. a way to enhance it is via communication.for me to hear the dev. opinions on why and how they going to change the game is interesting. it doesnt mean they have to justify their decision rather to share them.i would love to see they look at number of alternatives. i dont think it should take many many many hours to post it or pop up in twich and do a 10 min conversion.

This comment, quite honestly, took my breath away. Do you truly believe that developers should justify each decision? Should explain in detail why they did [one thing] and why they did not do [potentially countless alternatives]? Do you feel it would be productive to spend the many, many hours that would be required to discuss each of the changes they made? I am leery of such a process, especially when I know decisions are made based on dev observations, instincts, statistical analysis, extensive development and gaming experience, and an consistent, overall view of the game. (Keep in mind that few of us players truly view the game as a whole. As the OP said, we frequently want buffs for us, and nerfs for others.)

i think you are wrong. they should talk about it and share. its seems there is an assumption which if the dev share their thoughts the community might disagree which results in postponing the changes in the game and hours of explanations to do.

I believe that engaging with our players is good, and valuable, and highly desirable.it is not good, it is a must.

lets sum it up. a king without a kingdom is nothing. so share your thoughts more often, explain them so we might know better your way of thinkingthe more we know about the dev the more we could see eye to eye and understand even if disagree arises. the more you share the community can share more

[Opopanax.1803]

I am pretty happy with the work the balance team is doing. Not perfect, and I've been caught off guard on some of my builds, but I love how much effort is going towards making old skills relevant and more competitive, as well as making certain classes more competitive.

It probably hurts if you are a mesmer, but it will be worth it foe the health of the game long term.

[blackheartgary.8605]

@sigur.9453 said:

@sorudo.9054 said:

@sigur.9453 said:

@sorudo.9054 said:

@"mauried.5608" said:Why do people play games they DONT like ?

the question is more, why is the game changed so that it isn't fun anymore?they add allot of stuff but in the end it still feels empty, before they catered to hardcore players and looked more at making the world exiting i had allot of fun.believe me, i love to play this game more often but when they make the boring stuff important and abandon fun things you can't really blame the players anymore.

OH yeah, so much content for hardcore players. They should definitely make more for the casual playerbase. Too much fokus on raids, fraktals, wvw and pvp. - nobody

thanks for calling casuals nobodies....

Ugh, no. Casuals won't say that. At least noone in their right mind. 90% of this game caters to the casual audience if not more. But feel free to prove me wrong.

The thing is, 99% of the community knew that Guild Wars 2 was a fantastic game for the casual player. It Is kind of in the business model (kind of). As for Casuals being "nobodies".... I appreciate the opinions of yours and everyone's in this thread, however, I am asking nicely to kindly refrain from making any remark that might be construed as "seperatist" or "elitist". we are all on a level playing field, regardless of how much we play this game or how much time we put into this game. I would like to think that after 6 years of the game's existence, those entering the game for the first time and those that have been around since launch both entered the game for the same reason and are still playing for the same reason: It's a damn good game to play.

[sigur.9453]

@blackheartgary.8605 said:

@sigur.9453 said:

@sorudo.9054 said:

@sigur.9453 said:

@sorudo.9054 said:

@"mauried.5608" said:Why do people play games they DONT like ?

the question is more, why is the game changed so that it isn't fun anymore?they add allot of stuff but in the end it still feels empty, before they catered to hardcore players and looked more at making the world exiting i had allot of fun.believe me, i love to play this game more often but when they make the boring stuff important and abandon fun things you can't really blame the players anymore.

OH yeah, so much content for hardcore players. They should definitely make more for the casual playerbase. Too much fokus on raids, fraktals, wvw and pvp. - nobody

thanks for calling casuals nobodies....

Ugh, no. Casuals won't say that. At least noone in their right mind. 90% of this game caters to the casual audience if not more. But feel free to prove me wrong.

The thing is, 99% of the community knew that Guild Wars 2 was a fantastic game for the casual player. It Is kind of in the business model (kind of). As for Casuals being "nobodies".... I appreciate the opinions of yours and everyone's in this thread, however, I am asking nicely to kindly refrain from making any remark that might be construed as "seperatist" or "elitist". we are all on a level playing field, regardless of how much we play this game or how much time we put into this game. I would like to think that after 6 years of the game's existence, those entering the game for the first time and those that have been around since launch both entered the game for the same reason and are still playing for the same reason: It's a kitten good game to play.

Read again, I have never said that casuals are nobodies. Edit: It is still a good casual game. It surely isn't for a more hardcore audience. Sadly.

[DeceiverX.8361]

@"Zelanard.5806" said:

While I agree with you, that it's complete idiocy to have the devs justify everything they do and throw their time away on things that aren't worth their while. It can get really dull to try to engage on the forums with suggestions and thoughts, meant for the developers inspiration, it can even get to the point of being discouraging, because we don't get a notice of any sort, of whether our voices are heard, until something happens in the game.A simple notice, a red dot lighting up on a post when a dev Read's it, or something akin to that, would be plenty to satisfy peoples wish to be heard. Direct engagement isn't needed as bad as a visualization of "A dev read this message".

Reworking gear, get expensive. It cost's a lot of gold and time and that is multiplied by the amount of characters you're playing. I am not saying this is THE solution. But there's a need for a solution that wont force you to justify your modifications to the game, while at the same time respecting the time and effort we're throwing into it, in accordance with your own policy.

EDIT: GOOOOSH I've wanted to say that for too long :lol:

This just creates a scenario where when people's suggestions - often ones which have little to no merit or truth behind them - get ignored, they'll just get upset and flame ANet for ignoring their ideas.

I'm guilty of being upset with ANet when I know they've seen my ideas. Especially when what they implement is blatantly a bad idea and is explicitly something in the same breath I warned shouldn't be done for the exact consequences which subsequently exist in-game as predicted. And I know I'm guilty of it it, because having this phenomenon occur is frustrating.

There are a lot of people on these boards with horrible ideas. There are a lot of people on these boards with a very narrow understanding of the game, or totally disregard all ways of playing the game/formats except one, who often make suggestions or provide feedback which are very poor ideas for everyone else. And there are a lot of people who are biased and do not care about the integrity of the general gameplay experience at all. None of these are mutually exclusive.

This is why having the reasoning to the release of things is so important - it creates an understanding of intent and verifies whether or not the decisions made were the right or wrong ones. Developers are going to be flamed regardless of the decisions they make, and it comes with the job - anyone in a creative industry exposes themselves to a pretty substantial amount of backlash and criticism; there were people who moaned and whined about ghost thief being nerfed. What matters is being objective and listening to the right people and ignoring those who are simply wrong. There's no reason to add systems which will just cause more people to be upset when their suggestion is deliberately ignored because it's stupid or their feedback lacks good reasoning, or is simply just based on pretense.

[Mikali.9651]

Read again, I have never said that casuals are nobodies. Edit: It is still a good casual game. It surely isn't for a more hardcore audience. Sadly.

yeah, I don't get it where they are getting from that you said casuals are nobodies, I read their responses and all I see is people trying hard to be offended and looking for fights.

[Dante.1763]

@"Mikali.9651" said:

Read again, I have never said that casuals are nobodies. Edit: It is still a good casual game. It surely isn't for a more hardcore audience. Sadly.

yeah, I don't get it where they are getting from that you said casuals are nobodies, I read their responses and all I see is people trying hard to be offended and looking for fights.

Its all in the wording of how things are written. I got called out for it once myself due to how i wrote a response and i *am a "casual" (meaning i dont play very long). And another reason is that there is no set definition of the term casual, almost every community uses it in different ways, some people use it to refer to people who dont play very long, some to those who dont care to learn, some to be rude to people, and theres been no definitive version decided upon by the GW2 community, every person who posts has their own definition.

[VAHNeunzehnsechundsiebzig.]

@Opopanax.1803 said:I am pretty happy with the work the balance team is doing. Not perfect, and I've been caught off guard on some of my builds, but I love how much effort is going towards making old skills relevant and more competitive, as well as making certain classes more competitive.

It probably hurts if you are a mesmer, but it will be worth it foe the health of the game long term.

which classes would that be? Mirage? Deadeye? Soulbeast? those, who are already op more op? Because that has been the balancing since PoF.

[Opopanax.1803]

@"VAHNeunzehnsechundsiebzig.3618" said:

@Opopanax.1803 said:I am pretty happy with the work the balance team is doing. Not perfect, and I've been caught off guard on some of my builds, but I love how much effort is going towards making old skills relevant and more competitive, as well as making certain classes more competitive.

It probably hurts if you are a mesmer, but it will be worth it foe the health of the game long term.

which classes would that be? Mirage? Deadeye? Soulbeast? those, who are already op more op? Because that has been the balancing since PoF.

They can't fix everything in one patch. If you look at the last couple of patches, they have done a nice job spreading out changes. I do not think they are done by any stretch.

[gateless gate.8406]

I'm disappointed to read what Gaile stated in this thread because, to me, it indicates a loss or a forgetting of the "fan perspective."

Anyone who's been a serious fan of a game knows the feeling of wanting insights from the dev team. Patch notes that read, "Skill X nerfed by 50%" are frustrating and generate doubt regarding the development team; patch notes that read "Skill X nerfed by 50% because... [insert sentence/paragraph with insights from the devs]" assuage speculation and doubt regarding the development team. It is so much healthier for the game and for the community/discussion surrounding the game to hear how the developers are thinking. And as players, we love it.

Gaile's reaction makes me concerned, because it seems to lack the above-mentioned instinct that all serious fans (of this game, or any other) are so deeply familiar with, because we have felt it many times.

[schloumou.3982]

@Eddy Law.2874 said:Devs know this, and they are interested in hearing some insight from frustrated players. But not to the level of importance as angry and frustrated players would like to believe.

I was around here for a long time and i have made different experiences. People at Anet have a history of confusing critics with negativity in a similar manner as OP. There were tons of posts with valid points and in depth statements of why people quit or take breaks and all got deleted. I made one of those because I played this game for allmost 10k hours, had a great time (which i stressed out) and somehow though I owed an explanation. It lasted like 10 minutes and I got a temporary forum ban.