Back after 7 years. Are Elite Specs given to all people who SPVP? If not, the vision of this game is compromised/trashed.

[Ronald McDonald.8165]

I think you forget you had to buy the game

originally to play it. And plenty of core classes perform very well. Core necro, thief, ranger, guardian. 

[crewthief.8649]

7 hours ago, Banus.5086 said:

First off some of these players bought the game back in its day. I wouldn’t call them F2P. 
Second, I understand. No wonder the game power creeped to hell and back. 
 

They lost themselves, SPVP was all about equal grounds, they dumped that. That’s what happens when you chase the endless PVE money. They should have fortified the PVP balance and state and then go ahead with the carrot on a stick business.

Okay, so in order to even play the game “back in the day,” you had to purchase it. I don’t see any issue with Anet expecting you to purchase an expansion if you want to utilize expansion content. Now, upon purchasing the expansion, you have immediate access to those elite specs. No grind required.

[Shao.7236]

GW2 is B2P, calling it otherwise because it offers you the ability to play a good chunk of the game for free is ill minded.

 

I play F2P specs competitively, even if we'd talk about how S/D core Thief was meta at some point, you'd still have to argue that Anet is making Core specs weak on purpose in a pay to win format which is false.

Edited May 15, 2021 by Shao.7236

[Kickpuncher.8109]

No you need to pay for e-specs. 

 

Yes pvp is hot trash, but instead of "flavor of the month" it is "flavor of the 2 years" because these devs move at the speed of smell.

 

 

I'm sure you'll get a whiff of my aerosolized rose before the devs patch the game for a decent change.

 

 

See you in year maybe.

[The Fear.3865]

If you want to play the expansion content, you need to pay for it ofc... This has nothing to deal with any vision of equalty or accessibility. 

 

That is the same on GW, if you want to use factions or nightfall skills in pvp, you need to buy the expansions lol. What's wrong ? 

[saerni.2584]

Multiple professions have viable builds for Core in sPvP. To an extent, the original elite specializations were upgrades and not side-grades. However, the trend in balance was to try and reduce that and make the specializations real trade offs and not merely Core+. For example, Mirage loses a dodge. Daredevil loses range on its steal ability. 
 

Sometimes a new elite specialization will be better. That's not unfair. It would be unfair if, in a shifting meta, new content could never perform well enough to win. You can't simply say "for this profession the elite specs are always better" (and I'm not sure if that is clearly the case anyway) and have that be proof that the game is unfair.
 

This also isn't pay-to-win. Pay to win is where the players who spend the most in micro transactions have a material advantage over players who spend less, or no money at all. What you have here is merely a buy to play model where updates to the game (which sustain the continued support of the game) cost money and players pay to access the newer content through purchasing expansions. 

I also take exception to a person who hasn't played for 7 years complaining that pvp isn't 100% fair to players who haven't paid anything for the game since buying the original game (or now are free to play players). That depends on whether the person plays a profession that has a Core build viable for the type of sPvP they are playing. Unranked? Stronghold? Ranked? Automated tournaments? WvW? Of course they may be at a disadvantage if they can't select from the full range of options available to synergize with their team. But that is a "may" and not a "will." Many elite specs are bad choices compared to core. You can't assume. 
 

Lastly, welcome back to the game. It's a big shift from 7 years ago and there's a lot of PvE content you've missed. There's a few new pvp maps and automated tournaments to try. It's a lot, so have fun figuring it out and experiencing it for the first time.