I want to emphasize that I'm not arguing against anybody's point, everything you guys said about the problems of raiding, I agree with.  I just feel the need to further clarify my perspective.  Also sorry for any grammatical errors z_z.

Yes it is a logical fallacy to assume that cutting resources to an "unpopular" form of content, and reinvesting it on more popular forms of content will equate to "less content".  The truth is though nobody is going to notice if GW2 launched with 20% more Dynamic Events, Dungeons, Crafting or other PvE content, they are only going to notice what's missing, and that's raiding.  It's also a logical fallacy to compare apples to oranges, but consumers do it all the time and will continue to do so, and make judgements based off that failed logic.  I don't know what the technical term for it, so feel fee to jump in, but the perceptive reality is that people are going to notice that GW2 has no raiding content, and are going feel the game has less content overall compared to other MMOs, and this perception, truth or not, will definitely hurt the game.

The disagreement about Raiding being the ultimate form of PvE.  I'm not trying to state my opinion of raiding, in fact I don't even really like raiding that much.  What I mean to say is that Raiding content multiples the good and the bad aspect of 5-man PvE content by a factor of X amount of players.  All the problems people have in raiding (gear heavy, class specifics, time/reward, social dynamics, etc) was already present in the 5-man content although probably not as noticeable.  For example if Raiding became all about gear, that's not raiding's fault but a design fault in game itself that was also present in PvE 5-mans.  GW2 should have resolved the gear and class issue, thereby raids shouldn't have that problem either in this game compared to other games.  If AreaNet can't incentive players to do harder level content after reaching a certain level of gear, then that's a whole another problematic issue entirely, and isn't going to be solved by discluding Raids content.

I also really want to drive home the importance of separating hardcore players from casuals via content difficulty.  Dynamic events is not a solution to raiding because endgame DE should be puggable, and Raids should not. 5-man endgame content should be difficult but not to the point where only raider types (5-10%) can complete it.  The less variety of content MMOs have, the harder devs have to make it, and the harder the content is, the less access to content casual players will have at endgame.  In this regard, having raids and Arena type content gives casual players indirectly MORE access to endgame content then without.

A player's desires are diverse, mixed, and varied.

Developers balance this out, by categorizing players into labels, such as; casual and hardcore, solo players and group players, achievers, explorers, pve players and pvp players, crafters, levelers, etc.

This balancing act isn't easy and decisions must be made for end-game content.  This is where developers fail or succeed, but only because players expect max-level content, since levels suggest the end of progression (this is why i believe leveling systems are archaic).  Personally, i don't like the word end-game either, because i think there should be content for all playstyles.

I've seen a lot of people ask "Where's the end game!" everywhere on the internet. It's called the game itself.

I searched around for stats on WoW. In Vanilla WoW, about 5% of the players raided. At it's height, it was close to 20%. Most recent estimates put it at 14%. In any event, it's a minority of the population. Broadening the field to include players of other MMOs, I think the numbers would still be fairly consistent across the genre, though some titles have more stress on end game raiding than others. So, I just don't think there will be a huge issue with people dismissing GW2 because there are no dungeons higher than 5-mans.

From my experience in Raiding guilds, I'd say maybe a third loved raiding and would do it even if there were plenty of other "end game" options. The rest didn't particularly like raids, but did it for a mix of reasons, like gear, achievments, the social aspect or just because there wasn't much else to do end game, other than grind battle grounds.

I'm generally all for games catering to as many playstyles as possible. A big selling point of GW2 is it's broad appeal and variety of things to do. However, I think it's the right call to stick with 5-man dungeons and reserve mass participation content to Dynamic Events and World vs. World vs. World PvP.

Probably the only people who will have a fit are the people who are huge advocates of Guild Raiding Point systems that create elite sub-groups with in guilds an give those players a huge advantage of getting gear over more casual raiders in the guild. There is just no point of something like that in GW2.

Pretty much everything you just said is why i am looking forward to GW2

Very well done mate, Very well done indeed.

But on the other hand you up'ed my Hype for GW2 even more! so now its even more straining waiting for release, Curse you =P  ^_^

There is a good interview on another site. Page three has a lot of info on their philosophy on end game:

http://www.tentonhammer.com/gw2/gamescom/2011/pvp-interview-with-eric-flannum

Basically, they don't want to "bait and switch" players by having them play one game to the level cap and then forcing them to do something different at end game. There will be end game content that appeals to all the playstyles supported by the game prior to cap: "dungeons, exploring the world, personal story, PvE, PvP, competitive PvP".

My end game WILL NOT be a gear grind, although I will enjoy the dungeon content. I could care less about traditional raiding. It will be spent in PvP!!!! :)

I didn't read the whole thread, but did anyone bother seperating the basic idea of raiding (large-group, highly organized, high-complexity encounters) from the travesty it has developed into (repetitive gear grind on a weekly basis, with a ridiculous competition for first-kills)?

The former is done with the large-scale DEs, and the latter thankfully avoided completely.

Originally posted by Naqaj

I didn't read the whole thread, but did anyone bother seperating the basic idea of raiding (large-group, highly organized, high-complexity encounters) from the travesty it has developed into (repetitive gear grind on a weekly basis, with a ridiculous competition for first-kills)?

The former is done with the large-scale DEs, and the latter thankfully avoided completely.

I lost all faith in that when I saw Paragon guys moaning left and right that PvE raiding could and should be considered an eSport

I couldn't take any of it seriously after reading Kungens blog about how they pulled an all-nighter to rush to level cap after LK release. They seem to think they deserve praise for that, but all I can really do is to pity them.

Originally posted by Fir3line

Originally posted by Naqaj

I didn't read the whole thread, but did anyone bother seperating the basic idea of raiding (large-group, highly organized, high-complexity encounters) from the travesty it has developed into (repetitive gear grind on a weekly basis, with a ridiculous competition for first-kills)?

The former is done with the large-scale DEs, and the latter thankfully avoided completely.

I lost all faith in that when I saw Paragon guys moaning left and right that PvE raiding could and should be considered an eSport

.... are they kidding? how could it ever be called an E-sport

@Naqaj

Dynamic events can't even possibly begin to be compared to dynamic events for one particularly important and non-trivial reason: They won't be organised. Even better than that, it'll be impossible to organise them, since you'll have people dropping in and out randomly and the max team size is five. So it'll be glorious chaos with a lot of people simply doing their best.

When I hear 'organised' I think of a raid leader reading from a script of scheduled mob actions.

Over to the left side. Everyone attack. Push buttons. Push buttons. Everyone over to the right side. Everyone attack. Push buttons. Push buttons. Tanks push your aggro buttons to take care of those mobs. Push buttons. Healers push buttons. Everyone move over to the left side again. Push buttons. Push buttons.

I view 'organisation' in relation to raids as a very bad thing. (Hopefully you understand and appreciate why dynamic events are different than raids due to this and why I'm happy about that.)

Originally posted by fiontar

There is a good interview on another site. Page three has a lot of info on their philosophy on end game:

http://www.tentonhammer.com/gw2/gamescom/2011/pvp-interview-with-eric-flannum

Basically, they don't want to "bait and switch" players by having them play one game to the level cap and then forcing them to do something different at end game. There will be end game content that appeals to all the playstyles supported by the game prior to cap: "dungeons, exploring the world, personal story, PvE, PvP, competitive PvP".

That's awesome. Thank you for sharing that. That's the best thing I could read, really, since a lot of traditional MMORPGs are responsible for those shenanigans and I can't really say I'm down with that. It's trading your life for number fetishism and I can't think that no one in their right mind would want that.

Yahtzee did a piece on Wrath of the Lich King a while back...

Why are you fighting? To get gear with better numbers. Why are you getting gear with better numbers? To take on the raid boss on a harder difficulty. Why are you taking on the raid boss again? To get better gear, duh. And why are you doing that? To take on the raid boss on a harder difficulty. To... ? Get gear with bigger numbers!

And that... I pity anyone who gets caught up in that. The thing is is that it's a trick, it's designed to obe psychologically addictive, so that people remain playing the game without any sense of closure, and the content is demanding and long, and takes a lot of setup, all designed to keep people playing a subscription. Hacking minds for money, that's what raiding is in my opinion. It's not a game, in particular, it's not fun, it's a bloody narcotic.

Since Guild Wars 2 doesn't have a subscription though... well, they don't need to pull those sorts of shenanigans, do they? And that makes me happy.

(Also, your post prior was beautiful, fiontar. You're certainly saying a lot of things I like and agree with. I'm just... tired of the whole raiding thing. Raiding is like subscriptions, it's a massive con and one that I sorely want people to start to see through.)

Originally posted by Dream_Chaser

Over to the left side. Everyone attack. Push buttons. Push buttons. Everyone over to the right side. Everyone attack. Push buttons. Push buttons. Tanks push your aggro buttons to take care of those mobs. Push buttons. Healers push buttons. Everyone move over to the left side again. Push buttons. Push buttons.

This kind of over-generalization isn't really helping the discussion. We will be doing a lot of pushing buttons in GW2 as well, you know? :P

Rest assured though that I very much do understand the nature of DEs, and am similarly excited about them as you. 

Organisation in raids is not a bad thing. What you describe is a problem with the design of a raid encounter, not a problem with being an organized group.

Organization in a DE could be as simple as going there with a group of 40 guildmates, and designating different teams to do different objectives of the DE. For example, in the Tequatl DE, you'd designate a group to operate the cannons and another to guard them, another to deal with the bone walls and the creepers, and yet another to defend the megalazer. 

Basically, the large scale DEs are content you can approach as a solo player, but you can also turn it into group content with as much organization as you like. 

The difference to raiding here being mostly that you don't have to repeat the same fight week after week after week to grind out upgrades. You can just do it for fun, and if it isn't fun anymore because you've done it too often, you simply do something else.

If you dont  want make raiding your main end game, it's better to leave it out completly. If you will not reward raiders with best gear or something unique not obtainable othewise they will complain how raiding is not worth. There is not problem with raiding itself but with community of raiders, they think they deserve better than non-raiders.

There is enough games with end game raiding content and in all of them non-raiders get shit compared to raiders, maybe its time for some AAA mmo game that dont cater to raiders.

The thing about gear grinds and vertical gear progression is that higher-end encounters aren't usually any harder, really, than the ones before them. They just use bigger numbers. Just look at WoW, all the fights have the same basic mechanics, maybe with a special gimmick for some of the more important bosses, but really, each new fight has bigger numbers than the last, and that's the increased challenge. But it isn't a new challenge. It's just bigger numbers, and then biggerer numbers after that, and then biggererer numbers after that.

With Guild Wars' mentality, in which there is a maximum level of gear at the level cap that is relatively easy to achieve, when you make harder bosses, they will actually be harder, because you won't be more powerful save in the skill you have gained playing earlier content.

Madness, right?

Originally posted by Dubhlaith

The thing about gear grinds and vertical gear progression is that higher-end encounters aren't usually any harder, really, than the ones before them. They just use bigger numbers. Just look at WoW, all the fights have the same basic mechanics, maybe with a special gimmick for some of the more important bosses, but really, each new fight has bigger numbers than the last, and that's the increased challenge. But it isn't a new challenge. It's just bigger numbers, and then biggerer numbers after that, and then biggererer numbers after that.

With Guild Wars' mentality, in which there is a maximum level of gear at the level cap that is relatively easy to achieve, when you make harder bosses, they will actually be harder, because you won't be more powerful save in the skill you have gained playing earlier content.

Madness, right?

Well, that "special gimmick" makes up 90% of a raidboss' mechanic nowadays. There are certainly bigger numbers in play somewhere, but ignoring the variety and complexity that Blizzard has introduced in their raid encounters is just silly. 

Originally posted by Malevil

If you dont  want make raiding your main end game, it's better to leave it out completly. If you will not reward raiders with best gear or something unique not obtainable othewise they will complain how raiding is not worth. There is not problem with raiding itself but with community of raiders, they think they deserve better than non-raiders.

There is enough games with end game raiding content and in all of them non-raiders get shit compared to raiders, maybe its time for some AAA mmo game that dont cater to raiders.

I agree 100%

There are quite enough mmos out there to cater to the gear grind raid preference. Not every game has to do the same thing.

in world of warcraft or other mmo u have alot of content (quest) from lvl 1 to 85 and then the real part of the game start there, farm ur gear into raid and dungeons,

The End Game for me in Guild wars 2 seem to start at lvl 1 and never end.

U start doing outside raid (Small event and big event) with people at anytime of the day everytime u get in and u can enjoy pvp right away,

well that was my opinion and my opinion only

End game is when i cancel my subscription, thats what end game means to me.  The positive thing about guild wars 2 is there is no subscription so i dont feel i have to play everyday to justify the fee i pay each month. The game for me starts at level 1, i enjoy that part the most, what i dont enjoy is doing the same damn dungeon over and over with a bunch of jerks to get some silly piece of armour