Read and take it as you will. Gating of content or not.

“_Players who wish to delve deep into the Fractals will find that Agony makes progress increasingly difficult, until they reach the point where some defense against this condition is a must. The only way to mitigate Agony damage is by building up resistance through Infusions, a new type of upgrade component that can be acquired in the Mystic Forge._”
For now, Infusions slots can only be found in gear of a new rarity type: Ascended."

judging them for deciding to give ppl what they want aint realy fair. its for the hardcore gear grinders who felt the cosmetic way was not enough.

People who really want this stuff will have something to work toward.

Originally posted by Shroom_Mage
"LFM FotM Infusion 76 or higher ONLY"

You can expect to see things like in Lion's Arch from now on. If any one piece of content gives superior rewards, however slightly better, it's the only content anyone will do, so yes, this will affect the entire playerbase. It is not "purely optional".

In other MMOs, I must farm Raid#1 to be eligible for Raid#2, based on gearscore requirement.

Here, can I farm FotM difficulty#1 to earn enough ascended gear/infusions to be eligible for difficulty#2? As I understand it whether we like it or not, upon completion of 3 nodes players will be ported out and the dungeon difficulty will increase.

Originally posted by Destructhor
I am all for gear progrreason(within reason) but putting blatant gear checks on content sorta fucks the core of the game and the "take anyone to a dungeon" mentality that this game was built on. Content should be harder without BiS gear not impossible...

That's exactly what it is, it's harder without Infused gear. Like many have said, it's similar to GW1 where you have to have made your gear Infused or else you have a big chance of getting one-shotted by Mursaat NPCs. I won't be suprised if these guys ARE Mursaat.

Iam guessing for many players haunted by tireles grindy mmos, it would raise  an eyebrow.

but iam hoping there is a twist to all this- like SM and Explr...Anet is good and making things BETTER!

Originally posted by coxyroxy

judging them for deciding to give ppl what they want aint realy fair. its for the hardcore gear grinders who felt the cosmetic way was not enough.

People who really want this stuff will have something to work toward.

The problem is that other play styles, especially casuals, get the shaft yet again, where hardcore content somehow gets the best rewards even in what was suppose to be strictly a casual oriented game.  They have espoused all along that no single play style would be rewarded above another.  Now they are making liars of themselves.

Originally posted by coxyroxy

judging them for deciding to give ppl what they want aint realy fair. its for the hardcore gear grinders who felt the cosmetic way was not enough.

People who really want this stuff will have something to work toward.

All along, I've been saying that they need more of an endgame, but that gear progression would be the worst possible way to go about it.  

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Originally posted by Vorthanion
what was suppose to be strictly a casual oriented game.

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Now, I really dont know the answer to this. Did they actually say that in those words, Or was it community stigma that reinforced that?

Originally posted by Nitth

 

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Originally posted by Vorthanion
what was suppose to be strictly a casual oriented game.

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Now, I really dont know the answer to this. Did they actually say that in those words, Or was it community stigma that reinforced that?

Exactly, they've stated multiple times that they want a variety of content to appeal to a variety of player types.

People sometimes seem to hear what they want to hear though, they never said it was 'strictly a casual oriented game', ever, that's just people projecting.

I would agree with the frustration over this if their intentions were to continually add gear grinds and this wasn't just a one time case of them buffing up what's widely agreed to be a fairly weak and unrewarding progression system. If the game had launched with an additional tier no one would be batting an eyelid, because the scaling is so soft it's a non issue anyway.

As it stands though, I'd like to say people raging over it will look back and feel silly, but the truth is they probably won't even remember it.

We'll see, my moneys on sensational over reaction though.

Originally posted by Kuppa

Originally posted by Nephaerius

This a pure money grab.  Keep players playing longer.  They make more gem purchases.  Add new armor and all those folks in exotics are going to buy Transmutation Stones when they get their new gear.  Also, power creep, it's bad mmmkay.  So yeah I love GW2, awesome game and all, but these specific changes are probably what are going to make me barely bother to play and run directly counter to much of what appealed to me about the game.

Btw official forum thread is like 5500 replies and over 50k views.  Also might be worth pointing out that all negative threads have been merged into one collossal thread while most if not all pro threads have been left entirely alone.  That's based on my observation there.  I'm certainly open to being wrong.

So you expect them to want to keep players not playing? should just stop adding content, cause "its a money grab"? Please explain what are you trying to say. Of course they want people to keep playing, EVERY GAME wants that.

They should want to keep players playing.  They should add content.  You don't hear me complaining about added dynamic events.  I'm complaining about added power creep that they promised not to have in their game.  Added content does not have to be through vertical progression and gear treadmills.  Horizontal progression is perfectly viable and other even better solutions have been suggested as well.  Arena Net literally stated they would not be creating a gear treadmill and they have gone against that design decision entirely.

Originally posted by daemon132
This is sort of like what you had to do during some of the guildwars prophecies campaign missions with the mursaats since if your armor wasnt infused it would be near instant death facing them due to there spectral agnoy attack, honestly i think this is a great idea.

Except that provided you no bonus outside of a PvE environment and no stat bonuses at all.

Just going to point out this contradiction:

Latest blog/update: “we’re not building a gear treadmill”

Previous blog/update: “The Future of Items Progression: This is just the beginning. In November, we’re only adding the first level of Infusions and Ascended Rings and Back slots, so that leaves us a lot of room to build upon these levels of Item progression in future content.”

???????????

Also, ANet is standing by the claim that this is "bridging the gap between Exotics and Legendaries."  In case you don't know this, Exotics and Legendaries have the exact same stats!  Ascended gear is factually better than both those tiers.  If ANet is telling the truth here then they would have to buff stats on Legendaries to keep up their "levels of item progression."  The alternative is that's just pure bs.  An intermediary step (Ascended) can't be statistically better than the final one (Legendary).  If they then do not buff Legendary stats everyone will rely solely on Ascended gear.

Just face it guys. 

The people that need a gear progression system in a mmo for it to be worth staying in heavily outweigh the people that dont want it.

Every day people leave GW2. this will keep people playing longer.

Originally posted by Z3R01

 

Just face it guys. 

The people that need a gear progression system in a mmo for it to be worth staying in heavily outweigh the people that dont want it.

Every day people leave GW2. this will keep people playing longer.

 

People played GW1 for 7+ years.  There was literally 0 item progression.  Everything was entirely cosmetic.  There are other, better, ways to keep people playing your game then introducing a treadmill. 

The other threads were locked, and this is related to the other discussion anyway. Please let me bring it over here.

Quote from evilastro:

Originally posted by KhinRunite

Originally posted by evilastro

Originally posted by KhinRunite
muffins you are being over dramatic about this. We don't have all the details yet. Adding item progression isn't breaking any of their promise as far as I can recall.

Well yeah it is.

Hmmm...I really don't recall them saying that this game will not have item progression. What they did say was this game will not have forced grinding. They also said they always listen to the fans.

This is just my recollection of things.

"Here's what we believe: If someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can't realistically acquire it, that rare item should be differentiated by its visual appearance and rarity alone, not by being more powerful than everything else in the game. Otherwise, your MMO becomes all about grinding to get the best gear. We don't make grindy games -- we leave the grind to other MMOs."
-Mike Obrien, President of Arenanet

Fun impacts loot collection. The rarest items in the game are not more powerful than other items, so you don’t need them to be the best. The rarest items have unique looks to help your character feel that sense of accomplishment, but it’s not required to play the game. We don’t need to make mandatory gear treadmills, we make all of it optional, so those who find it fun to chase this prestigious gear can do so, but those who don’t are just as powerful and get to have fun too.”
– Colin Johanson

It was quoted multiple times and also mentioned in the manifesto. I really have no idea how you missed it or if you are being deliberately coy.

They are backtracking on this design principle. There really is no other way to look at it. I personally dont think it is a horrible decision by them, as it adds something for long time PvE players to work for. But you cant pretend that it isnt the complete opposite design of what they promised in the manifesto.

Nothing in their quoted statements say that they won't be adding item classes. They were talking about Legendaries here being on par with whichever is the current top tier item (Exotic). They're also talking about optional gear treadmill. The only ways to prove they backtracked on this are:

1.) They announced somewhere that "Exotic" is the final tier item and they will not be adding more. I honestly am not aware of such statement.

2.) They announced that Ascended items can only be acquired through running FotM or dungeons. As far as I know the ring and cape can be obtained through Mystic Forge, but we don't know the ingredients yet. This won't matter however if Ascended will be just as strong as Exotics outside the FotM dungeon.

I'm not denying the possibily that ANet did change direction. They could have, because it's a result of listening to their fans. What I'm saying is right now, it's still early to point fingers and feel betrayed.

EDIT:

http://www.gamebreaker.tv/mmorpg/arenanet-responds-to-gear-grind-speculation/

Seems the two points were answered there.

Originally posted by Nephaerius

Just going to point out this contradiction:

Latest blog/update: “we’re not building a gear treadmill”

Previous blog/update: “The Future of Items Progression: This is just the beginning. In November, we’re only adding the first level of Infusions and Ascended Rings and Back slots, so that leaves us a lot of room to build upon these levels of Item progression in future content.”

???????????

Also, ANet is standing by the claim that this is "bridging the gap between Exotics and Legendaries."  In case you don't know this, Exotics and Legendaries have the exact same stats!  Ascended gear is factually better than both those tiers.  If ANet is telling the truth here then they would have to buff stats on Legendaries to keep up their "levels of item progression."  The alternative is that's just pure bs.  An intermediary step (Ascended) can't be statistically better than the final one (Legendary).  If they then do not buff Legendary stats everyone will rely solely on Ascended gear.

"You’ll also see more Legendary items in the future and an update to our existing Legendary weapons. Legendary items were always intended to be on par with other “best-in-slot” items. So fear not, all existing Legendary weapons, which are currently on par with Exotics, will be upgraded to be on par with Ascended weapons at the same time that we add Ascended weapons to the game. Thus Legendaries will remain “best-in-slot” items. All Legendary items going forward will be of Ascended power."

Direct quote from the blog post in the OP of this thread.  I really wish people would read through things before they start going off.

They have explicitly said that Legendaries are still going to be the best gear in the game.  Nothing they have done so far has gone against that.  The infusions are only for the specific dungeon, just like infusing armor in GW1 was only for specific enemies.

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Originally posted by Nephaerius

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Originally posted by Z3R01   Just face it guys.  The people that need a gear progression system in a mmo for it to be worth staying in heavily outweigh the people that dont want it. Every day people leave GW2. this will keep people playing longer.  

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People played GW1 for 7+ years.  There was literally 0 item progression.  Everything was entirely cosmetic.  There are other, better, ways to keep people playing your game then introducing a treadmill. 

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Did guild wars 1 say they wanted to "compete for wow profits"?

Originally posted by Nephaerius

Originally posted by Z3R01

 

Just face it guys. 

The people that need a gear progression system in a mmo for it to be worth staying in heavily outweigh the people that dont want it.

Every day people leave GW2. this will keep people playing longer.

 

People played GW1 for 7+ years.  There was literally 0 item progression.  Everything was entirely cosmetic.  There are other, better, ways to keep people playing your game then introducing a treadmill. 

Sorry but if that was a case ANet wouldn't do gW2. One of the reasons they started working on the 2nd game was that endless horizontal expansion of the game became stale for them.

Originally posted by QSatu

Originally posted by Nephaerius

Originally posted by Z3R01

 

Just face it guys. 

The people that need a gear progression system in a mmo for it to be worth staying in heavily outweigh the people that dont want it.

Every day people leave GW2. this will keep people playing longer.

 

People played GW1 for 7+ years.  There was literally 0 item progression.  Everything was entirely cosmetic.  There are other, better, ways to keep people playing your game then introducing a treadmill. 

Sorry but if that was a case ANet wouldn't do gW2. One of the reasons they started working on the 2nd game was that endless horizontal expansion of the game became stale for them.

What is the source of your info? did Anet ever came out and explictly stated that is the reason to start working on GW2?

In my opinion they started working on GW2 because GW was too instanced and wasn't allowing them the freedom they wanted in creating content. Anet wated to make a proper open world MMO. I doubt that horizontal progression becoming stale was the sole reason behind birth of idea that is GW2.

You guys need to stop making your own stories.