First the read was interesting, but after taking each point and thinking about each i don't think they are that good.
 
I think a lot of people will do the same mistake when playing some rpg game with fps combat in a sword and magic setting. Those games aren't like fps with gun, they are not like rpg with tab targeting but a mix of those. GW2 try to resolve some of the issues this mix have. So many of the negative points from the writer are positive to me. Like the visual cues and the visual UI, the tight coded control, for me those are very good aspects because they seam to resolve the problem other similar games had. The trinity, once more i think so many people mix up dealing damage, taking damage and healing damage with the trinity, sure you will always have something about damage, i mean its the all point, it doesn't mean its about a trinity. All combat in every games are about damage stuff, yet only some mmo game have trinity designs, you just can't put them in the same bag because they all have to work around damage for god sake.
 
The only thing i might agree are the elite skills but honestly it can be nice if its well done, seam risky thought, the choices , yes i think it lack some choices tbh but its not a rp game, its more a pvp game to me at least, so its understandable you have less choice because you don't need to balance all this. In a rp game you don't give a fuck about balance so you can give a lot of choices.

Originally posted by Wizardry

Originally posted by DiSpLiFF

point #6 is the biggest deal breaker for me on this game, but I guess they could technically change it later. Good to see an article about GW2 that brings concerns that i'm sure some well read people have. 

If anyone seriously is paying attention to the way this game is made,it is not a surprise to the WHY only one pvp mode.

A-Net is able to escape sub fees by cutting lots of corners and delivering less content.Then they sell you xpacs to bring the game up to par for content.Even then some things are left out entirely saving them LOTS of money.It is ALWAYS the same ,you get what you pay for.There is a reason that saying has been around for so long and used so often,i didn't just make it up.

However to be fair to A-Net lets see the finished product.Their game is already imo no better than a 7/10 ,it might remain there on release but if i see even more omissions in the game ,it will drop off in ratings.No mounts,no guild halls,1 pvp mode and several other ommssions is not so good a start for GW2.

One of the things i will be looking for is buildings and do they have insides,if not then VERY lazy,cheap game design.I know this was one of their cost saving ideas in GW1,so i get that gut feeling they will continue the trend.It is important to note becuase it is a huge factor in game immersion.

How the Event actually plays out is another factor we need to see.Example that infamous video the BOSS never moves,he goes through his scripted sequence then drops down.He is of no threat to the city at all,he is actually just like an instance boss.They spawn helpers sometimes but the main boss never moves. boss1 boss2 infamous boss

IMO it's not much of a boss fight if he is stationary.

 

While you raise a fair point about the bosses being stationary, I find it really hard to give credit to anything you say regarding your opinion about Guild Wars 2 pre-release when you haven't done any legitement amount of research on it yourself, it seems.

We already know there's interiors for buildings; there's tons of them in videos from the starting areas to the capital cities dating back to 2010. 

We already know that Guild Hall, along with in-depth player housing customization, will be going into the game as a free update some time after release. The reasons it won't make it into the game on release is because they didn't think it was a super-urgent feature and they wanted to do a good job on them. I'm having trouble hunting down the link but I'll edit this when I find it.

Mounts were intentionally excluded from the game on release, not because the developers were "VERY lazy" or because it's a "cost saving idea". Mounts have the potential to break Arena Net's intentions for the game, such as world scale. It's entirely reasonable to delay something like that until they can figure out a cool and fun way to integrate mounts into the game since they're not a necessity anyway. However, there are still mount-esque parts of the game, namely I suspect there might be a mini-game or personal story portion of the game that uses these. The usability of "mounts" like this would be akin to the Siege Devourer from Guild Wars 1.

Constructive criticism of the game is acceptable, but blind skepticism is not- especially considering the design process for the game is based heavily on iteration.

Edit: Guild Halls

Originally posted by Loke666

Originally posted by Unlight

There are negative things about GW2 that are actually known, but this writer fails to mention any of them.

Well, he did mention that you can't choose your skills for your weapon, and that is my top complain (At least let me pick 5 out of 10 or so for each weapon).

But I think he is kinda right in several cases. The game needs some polish up on a few things still. Attributes aren't really optimal, I have a feeling they will be revamped either before launch or in the first year. There probably will need to be some ways to see if certain spells like wall of flames are friendly or not. Removing the energy cost of skills might have created some issues.

There is small stuff like that, I am sure they will get fixed eventually thoughburt you can't expect a MMO launching with this much innovation without some smaller stuff that will be fixed eventually.

I can't think of a MMO that havn't changed any mechanics during it's time and there are always bound to be stuff that needs some polishing.

The important thing is if the game is fun enough so it is worth playing anyways while they fix it up and I think it is.

Arena Net recognizes this and has said that the entire point for traits were to fundamentally change the way skills interacted. It would add an entire level of complexity to the game that would restore the theorycrafting and player choice. It's easy to be cynical about the design process, but I'm  curious what Arena Net can do with it.

Originally posted by jondifool

Originally posted by xKingdomx

Flaw No.1

You misspelt 'article' :P

 

In reply to the article itself...

(........wall of text)

#1 Skill Design

I think there are like 100? skill design that players know about, I don't think that is even remotely enough to make a decision. But saying there are two damage skill overlaps the combat relying on efficiency than timing is contradictoy ot your previous argumnts. Timing is required in targetting and aiming of attacks, you can't be efficient if you are just spamming everywhere.

You are contradicting yourself in this point.

  

Many words doesn't make it a well though argument. The propose flaws aren't even flaws in the first place, it is simply the author unwilling to accept the game design.

 not the same you ! Sorry about the flaws in my not-native english ! The article is as I a wrote not by me, and as such it doesn't really make sense to try to adress the author with a you here!

You obviously didn't read my second sentence, you quoted it as well! :D

So now have a read :P

Well no game is perfect but at least it's better than most competition out there ^^

Currently only 2 other games have gotten me as excited as gw2

ArcheAge and TSW, the former make me puzzle over "is making a game that do everything even possible", the later makes me more excited with every info released

Reading the article again, I really have A LOT of qualms with the part about Attributes... it makes very little sense. The problems he tries to highlight just don't ring a bell in my head.

A person who stacks toughness is very susceptible to someone who focuses on degen and less susceptible to someone who stacks pure power or crits. A person who stacks health is more susceptible to a person who bunches hard than a person who focuses on degen. And not only that, your build factors in to the equation as well. If you stack toughness and focus on a lot of regen to make up for your lack of health, you are covering a hole in your defences but when a necro comes along and turns your boons into negative effects, you're pretty much left in the gutter.

One thing about the Guild Wars franchise that has stayed the same is the fact that it is not rock paper scissors when it comes to roles, it's rock paper scissors when it comes to skills. You put up a degen, I use my cleanse, you put up a skill blocker to prevent me from using that skill. You raise me a knockback and I raise you aura of stability, hopefully you get what I mean now. It just seems the author of that article missed the point.

Awesome article, cant wait till neext week for the 10 awesomeness of GW2!!!!

Originally posted by Zeroxin

Originally posted by Wizardry

Originally posted by DiSpLiFF

point #6 is the biggest deal breaker for me on this game, but I guess they could technically change it later. Good to see an article about GW2 that brings concerns that i'm sure some well read people have. 

If anyone seriously is paying attention to the way this game is made,it is not a surprise to the WHY only one pvp mode.

A-Net is able to escape sub fees by cutting lots of corners and delivering less content.Then they sell you xpacs to bring the game up to par for content.Even then some things are left out entirely saving them LOTS of money.It is ALWAYS the same ,you get what you pay for.There is a reason that saying has been around for so long and used so often,i didn't just make it up.

However to be fair to A-Net lets see the finished product.Their game is already imo no better than a 7/10 ,it might remain there on release but if i see even more omissions in the game ,it will drop off in ratings.No mounts,no guild halls,1 pvp mode and several other ommssions is not so good a start for GW2.

One of the things i will be looking for is buildings and do they have insides,if not then VERY lazy,cheap game design.I know this was one of their cost saving ideas in GW1,so i get that gut feeling they will continue the trend.It is important to note becuase it is a huge factor in game immersion.

How the Event actually plays out is another factor we need to see.Example that infamous video the BOSS never moves,he goes through his scripted sequence then drops down.He is of no threat to the city at all,he is actually just like an instance boss.They spawn helpers sometimes but the main boss never moves. boss1 boss2 infamous boss

IMO it's not much of a boss fight if he is stationary.

 

Apparently there are more PvP modes coming, the Conquest map was just one of the ones that they were ready to show.

There are more PvP maps coming, not more PvP modes, at least not in the initial release of GW2.

Q: Have you considered introducing any other types of structured PvP than Conquest before release of the Guild Wars 2?

Eric: For the sake of this answer I am going to define “conquest” as a game type that utilizes control points to accrue score. Using this definition, then we are not considering adding any other game types before launch. We want each map we release to be completely unique. We feel that we can get a ton of variety out of our maps by changing the secondary objectives and mechanics. For example, we won’t be launching with another map with trebuchets and destroyable terrain; those things are reserved for the Battle of Kyhlo map. The other maps we are testing all have some very involved mechanics and unique playstyles in them and we wanted a core game mechanic that was easily learned by players and stayed consistent across the maps we release at launch. This will ultimately help players learn each map and the game since they don’t have to relearn an entirely new scoring mechanic for every map they play on.

Once the game matures a bit, it is likely that we’ll experiment with both new maps and some new game types if we find a demand for them from our players.

And:

Please note that the distinction between what is and isn't conquest is a pretty fine distinction to make especially since the secondary mechanics can really change how the map plays. Also, we spent a lot of time developing many different game types including capture the flag, attack/defend, regicide, and even a DOTA like version to name a few. I am certain Regina played in and saw some of those other gametypes.

It's my fault for not communicating to her that we had settled on capture points as our core PvP scoring mechanic. Hope that clears up any perceived contradiction.

Originally posted by Zeroxin

Reading the article again, I really have A LOT of qualms with the part about Attributes... it makes very little sense. The problems he tries to highlight just don't ring a bell in my head.

A person who stacks toughness is very susceptible to someone who focuses on degen and less susceptible to someone who stacks pure power or crits. A person who stacks health is more susceptible to a person who bunches hard than a person who focuses on degen. And not only that, your build factors in to the equation as well. If you stack toughness and focus on a lot of regen to make up for your lack of health, you are covering a hole in your defences but when a necro comes along and turns your boons into negative effects, you're pretty much left in the gutter.

One thing about the Guild Wars franchise that has stayed the same is the fact that it is not rock paper scissors when it comes to roles, it's rock paper scissors when it comes to skills. You put up a degen, I use my cleanse, you put up a skill blocker to prevent me from using that skill. You raise me a knockback and I raise you aura of stability, hopefully you get what I mean now. It just seems the author of that article missed the point.

I'd have to agree on this. Especially when the author starts talking about 'consolidating the holy trinity'. For someone who sounds like they understood GW1 fairly well, he doesn't seem to grasp how GW2 is working. Maybe he hasn't actually played it, not sure. However, while it's true that each class can fulfill multiple roles, it's also true that different builds do so in different ways, and they cancel each other out.

For example, a guardian may be a really good tank w/ boons & shields, but if a necro reverses all that, he's going to have problems. A necro may be a great soak tank, but if he gets knocked down a lot / spiked instead of overwhelmed w/ status effects, he will be just as dead.

The system may be completely remodelled, but the style of counter-based combat is still in full effect. This is exactly how they manage to do away with the trinity model, and someone who has thuroughly played the first game should be well aware of this.

#10 - He obviously didn't get how every profession is supposed to fill all roles.

#9 - Wow, it's GW2 and not GW1: Next Addon. Congrats!

#8 - They should turn the battle somehow. In GW1 they were either overpowered for months or years or completely useless.

#7 - He must be a smart kid. Not!

#6 - Go play GW1 gvg if you like it so much more. After all it's called GW2.

#5 - You'll get used to it and you can even remap your controls.

#4 - See #5.

#3 - In GW1 skill cues were added much later. On the other, probably they will be add later too.

#2 - Just watch the health bar then. It doesn't matter whether you deal a 100 dmg in gw1 or 10k in gw2. Both is a lot.

#1 - See GW1 for boring or bad skill design. As for the costs, yeah balance is a bitch.

Originally posted by IPolygon

#1 - See GW1 for boring or bad skill design. As for the costs, yeah balance is a bitch.

 

Theres no mana in GW2 anymore!

yay :P

Originally posted by xKingdomx

Flaw No.1

You misspelt 'article' :P

 

In reply to the article itself.

All the arguments in the article is subjective viewpoints, meaning it is simply a personal take on one mechanic, there isn't actually any flaws, but simply a player don't want to deal with certain aspect of the game.

#10 Profession overlap is something GW2 player loved about the game, the idea that everyone can do everything, but together to concentrate certain aspects, it simplifies the trinity concept. But in the article, you are simply using the exact same argument, but saying you don't like it.

#9 Saying it isn't Guild Wars is a fact, but that doesn't make it a flaw. The devs have specifically stated they don't want to just do a reharsh of Guild Wars, because those players can just play Guild Wars instead. GW2 is selling innovation, changing the paradiam of MMORPG. You don't like its selling point, that doesn't make it a flaw.

#8 Firstly, you are presuming all Elite Skills are damage or killing skills, it could just as easily be support or CC skill that doesn't do damage. Secondly, if you look at League of Legends, not all ultimate skills are one hit skills that you must run away or use your own to defend from, some of them are setup skills to make their character's combo faster and easier to execute. Lastly, you should attempt to dodge every single attack anyway, the argument saying I don't like elite skill because I have to run away from it is like saying I just want to play a game where I should just stand there and take everything like a boss.

#7 The idea of choice is complex.

For your first point about choice in story progression, that is actually the player's min-max attitude's fault. Forcing players to make a choice is to ask them to make a progression for their character, to define their character. Players who want to make every single choice shouldn't even play a RPG, simple as that.

Weapons, you can change where the skill is slotted, so research first. Also the skill can be altered using the traits system, combination of different weapons gives you different skill, sword and dagger is different to sword and mace.

Attribute, you are discussing this mechanic under the assumption of the normal trinity setup. You have mentioned the profession overlap, so all players have potential to do the different roles. So speccing into different attributes can just as viable as making it a certain build for each class.

And if you don't want choice in a game, don't play RPG. Its like saying I don't want oxygen in air, doesn't make sense.

#6 Conquest, every type of PvP involves elements of conquest, thats why you are playing against other players. If they put an arena like DOTA, is it not conquest? You have to destory opponent's towers, it isn't capturing flags, but it is still conquest. Conquest presents objective, which is essential in any kind of game.

#5 lol controls, this argument is almost turn into mush when you compare this to normal MMORPG controls, 1-0, shift 1-0, ctrl 1-0, hotkey qertfgzxcvb, with shift and ctrl combinations, how is it any less simple. You don't have to change weapons often, for the main hotkeys are your movements and 10 hotkeys keybind. The combat design is design to value timing and usage of skills, not how often you use them. Rotations isn't needed, so 10 keys is easy to use.

#4 Targetting, I see someone need to take out a fps and do some training. Players are so cartered to when palying games like WoW or Rift, that they simply think 95% of their attacks should land no matter what. Successful targetting differentiates skilfull from the unskillfull. But I doubt aiming computer AI will pose any kind of trouble to players.

#3 By Cues you mean numerous amount of interface addons that tells you down to the exact numbering of damage outputs and status effects. The combat was designed to be visceral, minimalist UI design was a way to engage the player to actuallly look at the screen for cues, if you are on fire, you are on fire, nothing can be more clear than that. Do you really need to know more than that? Do you really need to know how much exact health does the enemy have left? Just worry about killing the damn enemy.

#2 Combat is illegible

They have already stated visual effects will be colour coded, enemy visual effect like fire wall or traps will have a red hue while the friendly elements will have green (or was it blue?) hue

As for damage floaters, again, it is a player min max attitude that is the problem, I sometimes not even sure what people need damage floaters, you don't really read them much anyway. You just argue targetting is a problem, should you first worry about hitting the target before even worrying about how much damage you are doing?

Health, this is honestly a stupid argument, you can read how much health you have left? Just to put it this way, if its empty, or no red stuff in the orb, you will go into the injured state. Anyone who have even just watched a gameplay video will realise the orb's shape makes no impact on how the health is decreased, the health display is scaled to the height of the orb, not the area of the orb. The closing in of the top and bottom makes no impact to how much health is decreased. 10 damage lowers the height by 5mm, whether is is an orb or a prism.

#1 Skill Design

I think there are like 100? skill design that players know about, I don't think that is even remotely enough to make a decision. But saying there are two damage skill overlaps the combat relying on efficiency than timing is contradictoy ot your previous argumnts. Timing is required in targetting and aiming of attacks, you can't be efficient if you are just spamming everywhere.

You are contradicting yourself in this point.

 

 

Many words doesn't make it a well though argument. The propose flaws aren't even flaws in the first place, it is simply the author unwilling to accept the game design.

Read it all. Some interesting point of views from both the op and the reply to the op i here quote. Main issue here is trying to figure out of those 2 wall of text wich one worries me the most. Im hoping GW2 can be all about the best in GW1 and none of the bad.

The lore in GW1 is perfect, visuals are stuning for a game with that age and game engine, soundtrack is up the chart, combat mechanics and skill system is the best i ever saw. The world feels huge, with alot of classes to pick that we can actually feel that they belong to a certain area of the world. No grind, gear rush, time mutilating quests. Gear<->player skill balance  is the best i know. - im hoping to see at least these in GW2

PvE is hollow, suffering from 1-man-army sickness, PvP is missing depth, having no open world confrontation (limited by GW game design) or even no instanced end game utility, we are left to play some random PvP combats, that are funny yes, but they feel old. Character mobility is bad (they cant jump, swim, or sit in a chair, but the emotes are great :P). World aeas are instanced, but feels even worst when some areas seem to "lead" you across the map (i like to explore and feel that im actually doing what the word implies). Game economy is not bad but is missing alot of elements that can define a games economy: like an auction house, player professions and the ability for players to craft something out of those professions (its an old mmo thing but i feel it is important)....just as long players are allowed to actually craft something of useful ofc. - im hoping to see at least these fixed for GW2

As for the promises of the "new gen" tpe of mmorpg, we all know what ANet is promising, i will have to wait and see how that turns out to be, but i have good hopes that they can deliver.

This was an interesting read.  I kind of agree with some and disagree with others.  Breaking down the whole list is a little much, so I wanted to talk about one thing, which was #7, how skills are chosen.

In GW1, you have 8 skills from any of two professions (only one of which can be elite).  It's pretty much a balancing nightmare, as each expansion added two more professions and hundreds of new skills.  Another thing they found was that there were people who were just bad at making builds when they had all that freedom.

In GW2, you do have your first 5 skills locked into your weapon.  Not only does this make it easier to balance (also no dual classing), it also keeps people from totally gimping themselves.  It does mean your builds can't be as free, but I don't see it as a totally stripped down and simplified system.

Think about it in terms of choices you make in your build.  In GW1, you have 8 choices of skills.  In GW2, if you're picking 1h weapons (and not an elementalist or engineer), you have 9 choices.  You have Primary MH, Primary OH, Secondary MH, Secondary OH, Heal, 3 Utility, and Elite.  Even if you pick a 2H weapon, you still have 8 (or 7 if both are 2H).  You also can customize yourself with traits to modify these skills, something that didn't exist in GW1.

That's also just the choices you're making in the build, and in game you have at least 15 skills to use (up to at least 25 in some cases)

I think it's going to be a different system, but still a good one.

Bump before the other thread catches on.  This is where the discussion has been.

Originally posted by Eir_S

The guy obviously didn't want GW2, he wanted GW1 with better graphics.  I most certainly do not feel the same.  Can't please everybody.

Think of these as areas to be improved, rather than 'reasons I hate GW2', which seems to be what a bunch of people seem to be reading it as. This article is, largely, from a high end PvP perspective. And as far as PvP went, GW was fantastic. It isn't bad to want some of the things that made the old great in the new one.

Anyway, back to the artic(k)le at hand. How does wanting a clearer UI and better ques on effects make it want to be like GW? They could both use some improvement here. There also seems to be a lack of choice in attributes, they are problems instead. Attributes usually end up as problems, no matter what setting. GW had a chance to create some more interesting attributes and failed to create anything more compelling than the same stuff that has been seen for a long time.

he has most issues with skillusage, targetting etc..

does that mean he yust doesnt know how to play and tries to eat his mouse? :D

I'm sorry but no 3 and 2 are by far the most bullcrap things I find in PvP.

It shouldn't be 100% obvious what an opponent can do before you get into combat.  You should get some hints (hes in plate armour and wearing a big axe, hes probly a bit tanky and melee) but a quick glance should not tell you 100% of what they can do (like it is in WoW).

Silhouettes have been a bane for me in many games as I feel it destroys the game in an attempt to keep "recognisable" silhouettes (WoW is a good example, their armour got stupid very fast).

Originally posted by Fishbaitz

Originally posted by Eir_S

The guy obviously didn't want GW2, he wanted GW1 with better graphics.  I most certainly do not feel the same.  Can't please everybody.

Think of these as areas to be improved, rather than 'reasons I hate GW2', which seems to be what a bunch of people seem to be reading it as. This article is, largely, from a high end PvP perspective. And as far as PvP went, GW was fantastic. It isn't bad to want some of the things that made the old great in the new one.

Anyway, back to the artic(k)le at hand. How does wanting a clearer UI and better ques on effects make it want to be like GW? They could both use some improvement here. There also seems to be a lack of choice in attributes, they are problems instead. Attributes usually end up as problems, no matter what setting. GW had a chance to create some more interesting attributes and failed to create anything more compelling than the same stuff that has been seen for a long time.

The problem is that, GW2 UI is extremely clean already, compare to other MMO, there isn't a threatmeter or healbot or any of those chunky UI to speak of, since the combat is designed totally different.

And since you said you are talking from a high end PvP perspective, there is no need of the objective tracker and all that.

As for better visual ques for combat, you can see in the provided screenshot that area of effect are very clear, there are circles on the ground to display the area of effect, with particle effect to communicate the effect of the skill. The colour of the circles on the ground are indicating whether the effect is controlled by the enemy or friend (the blue and red circles)

And the funny part is that, I just took that screenshot off the first HD video I can find on youtube that display some kind of combat, it didn't even took more than 1 min to find a shot like that.

People have a problem with the article isn't because it is read as 'reasons to hate GW2' but because of how forceful was those reasons/flaws, when many of them are not actually flaws but what made the game so special to many players. Many of those flaws (like the targetting, or the UI, or the visual display of effects) have been argued to be the complete opposite instead, like I have in this post.

So I had posted before in this thread, but lol this guild is PVP guild and self proclaimed great one at that, but yet he has issues with controls? the easiest set of controls?

I think the brits are mad that the Koreans got the win on dev team where they just got slaughtered in pvp @ PAX

To be honest, this is the only list of concerns regarding Guild Wars 2 that has actually got a bit of sense hammered into it.

While I don't agree with many of his ideas, I can understand where he is coming from as I have also played GW1 for quite a while.