The reason i'm writing this, is because i need an outlet on the things that annoy or even depress me about the end game or some of the mechanics of guild wars 2 and i would like to hear some opinions.

I have a level 80 mesmer, finished the story and play with 5 of my closest friends in a guild. I have explored the world (100%) and i am now looking for stuff to do, but i just can't find the motivation to start up the game and play. And here are some reasons why:

(note: i'm german, english is not my native language and my english can be a little bit rough at times, so please excuse typos etc)

1. There is no "end game", not now. I've read the post that one of the guild wars 2 devs posted about their end game and it really sounds great on paper but i have seen it all by now and i don't want to do most of the stuff again. fighting dragons? yeah, the encounters are cool, but the rewards are basically a joke, which has to do with the incredible poor designed item system for PVE (more to that later). dungeons? sure, but they often don't work properly. We've had problems for the last three nights in a row with events in dungeons that prohibited us from playing any further. When the dungeons (or the joining as a group to a dungeon) work, the rewards for the ok designed encounters are still poor and not a reason to come back, which again, is a problem of the item system. Why should i complete the ashford dungeon over and over again, to get the ascalonian tears, if i can craft exactly the same items in 2 minutes time? there's no unique loot for the dungeons (except 1 or 2 of the later ones, that drop more exotic stuff). And yeah, we did ashford yesterday again, two of the three ways and guess what: both of the final enemies where the same. same model, same position in the dungeon. they changed one skill on the enemy and that was that. that's not really unique design that's ensuring replayability, right?

2. PVP as an end game option? Here in germany, it's most of the time unplayable. I have a 16 mbit connection and it lags all the time, for everyone involved. You can't finish one sPVP game without having the game freeze on you for 2 seconds. And if you're doing pvp, there's no real reward either. They had a great idea when they seperated the PVP from the PVE, which makes for more balanced games and a more levelled playing field, but why did they do it only for sPVP? why do they allow your weapons and equip in WvWvW? My friend, who's playing a LVL 80 thief, can 3-hit guys in WvW, because of the Equip he farmed in PvE. When you're not level 80 yet and you still have your blue items, you're gonna have a really bad time in WvWvW. Especially when one of the servers you're matched against has an active PVP guild with great equip, there's no chance you that you will have any fun on your home world or the center map. If the matched servers are ok, then WvWvW is really kind of cool and makes a lot of fun. Especially the siege weapons and getting some friends together, capturing castles and supply camps. But if you want to do sPVP, you can't play with your friends so easily. (you can't play wvwvwvw easily either, because of the totally random waiting times, that can take between 10 minutes and 2 hours). Why did they do this shitty server browser thing? This is not a FPS. Let me join sPVP with the group i'm currently in! It's nice that they can join my match, but what good it is that they're not on my team?!

3. Items. Ugh. So, one of my BIGGEST complains about GW2 is the item system that's in place. First of all: man, there are like 5 models for every type of armor. I've seen 5 leather head designs for thieves and engis so far and my character looks totally the same SINCE LEVEL 50! The coloring option is great and it gives you a neat system to style your character ..but i don't care if my armor is in a different color when the armor looks just bad. I have a human, female mesmer and i have to look totally sexy, i get that... but i don't really want to look like a character from some medieval anime who's basically naked. give me something to work for. i want to look as bad-ass as my sword does.

Then there's the stats system, which could not have been designed lazier. Ok, not really "lazy", but it is in total contradiction to everything playing a MMORPG stands for: Building a character after your likes that gets more powerful and more badass to look at. As i said: i'm level 80 and i don't know where to go from here. I'm maxed out. how? I was standing in lions arch for a couple of hours, maxed tailoring to 400 and build me the exotic armor "of the beserker". Now, the thing is: there's no armor that's better then that and EVERYONE can learn those recipes. The ascalonian tears i talked about earlier? They are - and every dungeon has this kind of thing - a currency to buy armor in lions arch. Like, a reward for doing good in those dungeons. But why should i do the dungeons, if the armor that i can buy is ugly and has the same or worse stats then the armor i can craft? i have not seen a single piece of armor that is not better then ones i have.

And there's a fatique to that. The items you'll find always have the same stats, they always have the same names because of that. "oh, another axe of the beserker of the shaman". Beserker means: Crit Damage, Power and Precision and there's no change to that. Sure, there are other "Stats", like Eagle, explorer and so on, but the game is so narrowed in its item design, that you will not find a single weapon or piece of armor that is unique. Remember that cool axe from WoW, where every 4th hit, there would be a chain-lightning and it had like 300 agility on it, and you hit super fast with it? (i made this item up to make my point) There are no items like that in guild wars. There's even a DMG cap to the items! I have the best Broadsword you can get (again, crafted by a friend). Sure i could get a legendary weapon, but do you know what? they're not really better. My broadsword has a max dmg cap of 1100. you know what the legendary item (that will take you WEEKS to farm) will get you? 1117. yup. 7 dmg more. That's fucking imba.

And man, the items that drop in PVE, PVP or the dungeons are so f'in boring. If it's not exotic, i will not use it. period. I've even made a thing, where i do one of the following things, without hesitation: blue -> reclaim, green -> vendor, yellow -> reclaim (for ectoplasma). If it's not exotic, it's not useful. period. I'm drawing comparisons with WoW here, because i played it for 9 months in 2005 and remember some things quite well: some of those weapons in WoW had a story to them. Man, when you've seen someone with the new sword from naxrammas, with its unique model, its crazy glow and those awesome stats you just wanted to have it! and i did get it and was so f'in happy about it. There's no point for me to do the dungeons in GW2, because they don't reward like other games do. Once i've done them all, i'm done with them.

Then there's also the point that you can buy diamonds (? i don't know what they're called in the english version) with real world money. and you then can exchange those diamonds for in-game gold. It's nice idea on paper: prohibiting the gold farming market by introducing your own service for gold buying. but this comes to another point, that's kinda stange: you can buy a perfect exotic equip in one hour, with not more then 10-20 euros. and when you've done that, you're done with your characters equip. and that's the shittiest thing that there is in a MMORPG.

4. Crafting - more like how fast can you get to 400? Being a cook in GW2 is awesome. Really. It was SO much fun to discover all the recipes and stuff, to get the food i needed and then to stock them in my bank so i have it on my hands when i need them. But it's imbalanced as hell. You know, they said that a level roughly takes a player 1 1/2 to get, even in the late game (60+). But it just can't be, that i can get 6-7 levels in 20 minutes of crafting in lions arch. how's that? as the recipes get more high level, you will get more xp for them. makes sense. but at one point, you will get double the xp from crafting a piece of pizza then you will get from killing a champion in the orr areas. that's just batshit crazy.

And i'm missing unique recipes. There are no recipes that drop randomly, that you can use to sell your service to other players. if another player has maxed taylor and bought all the recipes (which you'll have to do), he can do the same stuff as you. There should be value in crafting something unique or in some of the recipes but there's not. I know that there are recipes that you can find through the mystic forge, but they will only get you those really "great" legendary items that are,, unless you're completely insane, a total waste of time and in game money.

phew. i'm getting long here. still with me? Just one more point, even if i can name some more.

4. Events and Quests - Grind. Grind. Grind. GRIND. When you first read about the event and quest system for Guild Wars 2 you were thinking: "Oh shit! This is the game changer right here!".. and yes, it kinda is.. but it needs A LOT of work and way more dedication when it comes to the design of the actual events. It's so amazing that you can get anywhere on the map and there will be players, doing a quest or an event. you want to do the same thing and you don't even have to search groups or have to be worried that they're kill stealing all the time. Hell, they will even rez you without asking and they don't even know you! THAT IS INCREDIBLE. But the dynamic group stuff can be as cool as it is, when the quests or events you're doing are no fun at all. The thing is: there are 3 types of things you will always do, in any kind of quest: kill, gather, tidy. everytime. As a human, i started in an area with a lot of zentaurs. Want to know what my goal was, most of the time? Kill zentaurs and their housings. And it's grinding alright. You will kill, gather or tidy until the the bar is full, open your message, take the money and move on. When did you ever read a quest from one of the quest givers? And if you did, when was it something interesting? I was starting to get tired of quests when i wasn't even level 30. they're the same, ALL THE TIME. But phew, the orr areas don't have quests anymore. But man: events are not better. Defend this point, kill this big monster. that's mostly it. And skill challenges? How is it a challenge to "communicate with this thingy" to get a free skill point? It's like they ran out of ideas.

So. i'm stopping now. this took me 20 minutes or so. All in All i really hope that there will be some new end game content or some fixes coming regarding lags etc. I was a big fan of the first guild wars and was looking for something really unique here, but i am mostly diasappointed right now. Good thing there are no monthly costs to it. And note: i really had some fun playing the game.

to close things off: WATER COMBAT AND UNDERWATER EVENTS ARE THE WORST.

It sounds like you played this game like a power grind and burned yourself out.

i was just about to buy GW2 but this put me right off. cheer for the warning

If it's anything like Guild Wars 1, it'll get a lot better as they add stuff to it / fix things. One example is the Dervish class in GW1, several years after the class was introduced in Nightfall, ArenaNet went in, gutted the class, and re-built it to play better. They're pretty committed to making things work, although as it stands, the game is a little rough at the moment.

That's one nice thing about it not having a sub, you can go back any time you want to see if things have improved.

Sounds like an MMO. I played WoW for years. Thought about playing GW2 and backed out. After checking out what a friend of mine was doing in current WoW, I can't say the formula is all that appealing anymore.

I agree with TC. If you take away the lack of monthlee fees, I don't see what's the fuss with this game. I tried it for like, 20 hours, and now I never feel the urge to get back to it. Too many games at the moment anyways.

@jesterroyal said:

It sounds like you played this game like a power grind and burned yourself out.

the thing is: i didn't. i played with friends, 2-4 a hours a day at most. on the week-ends more, sure. but you're MOVING in GW2. leveling up and getting to new locations is going so fast. it's one of the first games where you level faster in the end game (60+) then you'll do in the first levels of your character.

@Silvergun said:

If it's anything like Guild Wars 1, it'll get a lot better as they add stuff to it / fix things. One example is the Dervish class in GW1, several years after the class was introduced in Nightfall, ArenaNet went in, gutted the class, and re-built it to play better. They're pretty committed to making things work, although as it stands, the game is a little rough at the moment.

That's one nice thing about it not having a sub, you can go back any time you want to see if things have improved.

it's more like guild wars 1 then you know. jeff said this is more like a MMORPG and that he doesn't want that, but you know what? it just like GW1 with bigger maps and every map is a city hub.

oh, yeah, i know that it is still early in the game and that they will fix stuff, but its been a month now and there a still some big, big problems that are really annoying to me and my friends. i have not complained in the first two weeks, i was in the WoW beta and knew what's going to happen, but after a month, these points ought to be named.

Do you smell that? That's the smell of not having to pay any subscriptions of any kind. Take a break, check back in whenever you want. Nothing's keeping you from resting when you're burnt out.

I played it like a powergrind, and now I'm done for a while. Not for good, but for a while. And for me, that's fine; I have Borderlands 2 and Torchlight 2 to play. That was the beauty of GW2 to me.. play until you're done, come back later to new content and fixes, no continual cost.

@Turambar said:

Do you smell that? That's the smell of not having to pay any subscriptions of any kind. Take a break, check back in whenever you want. Nothing's keeping you from resting when you're burnt out.

Yup my thoughts exactly.

@murisan said:

I played it like a powergrind, and now I'm done for a while. Not for good, but for a while. And for me, that's fine; I have Borderlands 2 and Torchlight 2 to play. That was the beauty of GW2 to me.. play until you're done, come back later to new content and fixes, no continual cost.

and yup! that is exactly my plan too. but i'm still disappointed. i haven't played a "real MMORPG" for 6-7 years now and i was ready this time to get hooked again. and now? i'm waiting for something cool to happen. there aren't even any side activities that i can do except for this strange barrel-football-game in hoelbrak, which sucks.

Yeah I think you powered your way through all the content. I think they paced it more for people who maybe will get about 8 hours a week. Don't expect them to have infinite content for people who can 100% games just after they barely come out. What I'm trying to say is that you just happened to be faster at finishing the game then what they developed for so there's nothing you can really do about it other than wait for new content. It's the same as if you beat Arkham City or Assassins Creed 2 or whatever. Now you just wait for the DLC.

Edit: The game is more similar to beating a single player game than a real MMORPG.

@mortal_sb said:

The reason i'm writing this, is because i need an outlet on the things that annoy or even depress me about the end game or some of the mechanics of guild wars 2 and i would like to hear some opinions.

I have a level 80 mesmer, finished the story and play with 5 of my closest friends in a guild. I have explored the world (100%) and i am now looking for stuff to do, but i just can't find the motivation to start up the game and play. And here are some reasons why:

(note: i'm german, english is not my native language and my english can be a little bit rough at times, so please excuse typos etc)

1. There is no "end game", not now. I've read the post that one of the guild wars 2 devs posted about their end game and it really sounds great on paper but i have seen it all by now and i don't want to do most of the stuff again. fighting dragons? yeah, the encounters are cool, but the rewards are basically a joke, which has to do with the incredible poor designed item system for PVE (more to that later). dungeons? sure, but they often don't work properly. We've had problems for the last three nights in a row with events in dungeons that prohibited us from playing any further. When the dungeons (or the joining as a group to a dungeon) work, the rewards for the ok designed encounters are still poor and not a reason to come back, which again, is a problem of the item system. Why should i complete the ashford dungeon over and over again, to get the ascalonian tears, if i can craft exactly the same items in 2 minutes time? there's no unique loot for the dungeons (except 1 or 2 of the later ones, that drop more exotic stuff). And yeah, we did ashford yesterday again, two of the three ways and guess what: both of the final enemies where the same. same model, same position in the dungeon. they changed one skill on the enemy and that was that. that's not really unique design that's ensuring replayability, right?

2. PVP as an end game option? Here in germany, it's most of the time unplayable. I have a 16 mbit connection and it lags all the time, for everyone involved. You can't finish one sPVP game without having the game freeze on you for 2 seconds. And if you're doing pvp, there's no real reward either. They had a great idea when they seperated the PVP from the PVE, which makes for more balanced games and a more levelled playing field, but why did they do it only for sPVP? why do they allow your weapons and equip in WvWvW? My friend, who's playing a LVL 80 thief, can 3-hit guys in WvW, because of the Equip he farmed in PvE. When you're not level 80 yet and you still have your blue items, you're gonna have a really bad time in WvWvW. Especially when one of the servers you're matched against has an active PVP guild with great equip, there's no chance you that you will have any fun on your home world or the center map. If the matched servers are ok, then WvWvW is really kind of cool and makes a lot of fun. Especially the siege weapons and getting some friends together, capturing castles and supply camps. But if you want to do sPVP, you can't play with your friends so easily. (you can't play wvwvwvw easily either, because of the totally random waiting times, that can take between 10 minutes and 2 hours). Why did they do this shitty server browser thing? This is not a FPS. Let me join sPVP with the group i'm currently in! It's nice that they can join my match, but what good it is that they're not on my team?!

3. Items. Ugh. So, one of my BIGGEST complains about GW2 is the item system that's in place. First of all: man, there are like 5 models for every type of armor. I've seen 5 leather head designs for thieves and engis so far and my character looks totally the same SINCE LEVEL 50! The coloring option is great and it gives you a neat system to style your character ..but i don't care if my armor is in a different color when the armor looks just bad. I have a human, female mesmer and i have to look totally sexy, i get that... but i don't really want to look like a character from some medieval anime who's basically naked. give me something to work for. i want to look as bad-ass as my sword does.

Then there's the stats system, which could not have been designed lazier. Ok, not really "lazy", but it is in total contradiction to everything playing a MMORPG stands for: Building a character after your likes that gets more powerful and more badass to look at. As i said: i'm level 80 and i don't know where to go from here. I'm maxed out. how? I was standing in lions arch for a couple of hours, maxed tailoring to 400 and build me the exotic armor "of the beserker". Now, the thing is: there's no armor that's better then that and EVERYONE can learn those recipes. The ascalonian tears i talked about earlier? They are - and every dungeon has this kind of thing - a currency to buy armor in lions arch. Like, a reward for doing good in those dungeons. But why should i do the dungeons, if the armor that i can buy is ugly and has the same or worse stats then the armor i can craft? i have not seen a single piece of armor that is not better then ones i have.

And there's a fatique to that. The items you'll find always have the same stats, they always have the same names because of that. "oh, another axe of the beserker of the shaman". Beserker means: Crit Damage, Power and Precision and there's no change to that. Sure, there are other "Stats", like Eagle, explorer and so on, but the game is so narrowed in its item design, that you will not find a single weapon or piece of armor that is unique. Remember that cool axe from WoW, where every 4th hit, there would be a chain-lightning and it had like 300 agility on it, and you hit super fast with it? (i made this item up to make my point) There are no items like that in guild wars. There's even a DMG cap to the items! I have the best Broadsword you can get (again, crafted by a friend). Sure i could get a legendary weapon, but do you know what? they're not really better. My broadsword has a max dmg cap of 1100. you know what the legendary item (that will take you WEEKS to farm) will get you? 1117. yup. 7 dmg more. That's fucking imba.

And man, the items that drop in PVE, PVP or the dungeons are so f'in boring. If it's not exotic, i will not use it. period. I've even made a thing, where i do one of the following things, without hesitation: blue -> reclaim, green -> vendor, yellow -> reclaim (for ectoplasma). If it's not exotic, it's not useful. period. I'm drawing comparisons with WoW here, because i played it for 9 months in 2005 and remember some things quite well: some of those weapons in WoW had a story to them. Man, when you've seen someone with the new sword from naxrammas, with its unique model, its crazy glow and those awesome stats you just wanted to have it! and i did get it and was so f'in happy about it. There's no point for me to do the dungeons in GW2, because they don't reward like other games do. Once i've done them all, i'm done with them.

Then there's also the point that you can buy diamonds (? i don't know what they're called in the english version) with real world money. and you then can exchange those diamonds for in-game gold. It's nice idea on paper: prohibiting the gold farming market by introducing your own service for gold buying. but this comes to another point, that's kinda stange: you can buy a perfect exotic equip in one hour, with not more then 10-20 euros. and when you've done that, you're done with your characters equip. and that's the shittiest thing that there is in a MMORPG.

4. Crafting - more like how fast can you get to 400? Being a cook in GW2 is awesome. Really. It was SO much fun to discover all the recipes and stuff, to get the food i needed and then to stock them in my bank so i have it on my hands when i need them. But it's imbalanced as hell. You know, they said that a level roughly takes a player 1 1/2 to get, even in the late game (60+). But it just can't be, that i can get 6-7 levels in 20 minutes of crafting in lions arch. how's that? as the recipes get more high level, you will get more xp for them. makes sense. but at one point, you will get double the xp from crafting a piece of pizza then you will get from killing a champion in the orr areas. that's just batshit crazy.

And i'm missing unique recipes. There are no recipes that drop randomly, that you can use to sell you service to other players. if another player has maxed taylor and bought all the recipes (which you'll have to do), he can do the same stuff as you. There should be value in crafting something unique or in some of the recipes but there's not. I know that there are recipes that you can find through the mystic forge, but they will only get you those really "great" legendary items that are,, unless you're completely insane, a total waste of time and in game money.

phew. i'm getting long here. still with me? Just one more point, even if i can name some more.

4. Events and Quests - Grind. Grind. Grind. GRIND. When you first read about the event and quest system for Guild Wars 2 you were thinking: "Oh shit! This is the game changer right here!".. and yes, it kinda is.. but it needs A LOT of work and way more dedication when it comes to the design of the actual events. It's so amazing that you can get anywhere on the map and there will be players, doing a quest or an event. you want to do the same thing and you don't even have to search groups or have to be worried that they're kill stealing all the time. Hell, they will even rez you without asking and they don't even know you! THAT IS INCREDIBLE. But the dynamic group stuff can be as cool as it is, when the quests or events you're doing are no fun at all. The thing is: there are 3 types of things you will always do, in any kind of quest: kill, gather, tidy. everytime. As a human, i started in an area with a lot of zentaurs. Want to know what my goal was, most of the time? Kill zentaurs and their housings. And it's grinding alright. You will kill, gather or tidy until the the bar is full, open your message, take the money and move on. When did you ever read a quest from one of the quest givers? And if you did, when was it something interesting? I was starting to get tired of quests when i wasn't even level 30. they're the same, ALL THE TIME. But phew, the orr areas don't have quests anymore. But man: events are not better. Defend this point, kill this big monster. that's mostly it. And skill challenges? How is it a challenge to "communicate with this thingy" to get a free skill point? It's like they ran out of ideas.

So. i'm stopping now. this took me 20 minutes or so. All in All i really hope that there will be some new end game content or some fixes coming regarding lags etc. I was a big fan of the first guild wars and was looking for something really unique here, but i am mostly diasappointed right now. Good thing there are no monthly costs to it. And note: i really had some fun playing the game.

to close things off: WATER COMBAT AND UNDERWATER EVENTS ARE THE WORST.

Wow thanks for sharing, man. It is this kind of information that is valuable, stuff you never seen in reviews.

No interest in trying another character, eh? I hear most of the classes are pretty fun

@Veektarius said:

No interest in trying another character, eh? I hear most of the classes are pretty fun

yes, i probably will do that. but i have explored the world 100%, that means i will see, no mather content, for the second time. i will do the same quests for the second time. they had this cool idea for this "achievement" type of thing with the world exploration stuff but it really was something that turned out to have negative impact on your gameplay experience. you don't really explore anymore, you just want to complete the map (collect all vistas, pois etc) because you will get a big chunk of items, xp and silver. every race has its own capital and starting area, but now i have seen it all because the game "pushed" me in some weird way. it's not like in wow, where i remember playing an undead rogue and the starting area was a completely different experience that the starting area of my gnome rogue. as an undead, i have not seen the gnome starting area in my leveling process. as a gnome, i haven't been in the undead starting area.. so this was new content as soon as i started a new character. and this will be different now for my second char here in gw2. maybe it will be a pvp only character. i'll have to look.

I was a huge fan of the first game, and I have to say that I'm a disappointed with GW 2. I'm stuck at work with IE 8, so I can only use the simple text editor (can't even do line breaks!), so I'll keep this short. The public tasks and events are neat, but it doesn't eliminate the grind. I've found myself too low-level for some tasks while I've already completed the lower level ones and am stuck with nothing to do but wait for events to start. Not the worst thing in the world, but it definitely kills the fun sometimes. What I find the most boring about GW 2 is the skills. They're just not as intricate as the first game. I find myself with 20 unspent skill points and can't find any interesting skills to invest in. I'm sure GW 2 would be a good MMO, but it's just not a good "Guild Wars" game because of that.

@mortal_sb:

You've likely played already more than 300 hours in less than a month, and it's okay for you to take a break. I'm about to maxime my pure DPS gear in awhile as well, and I've still 40% map completion to go, and a lot of dungeons to run, before I've seen it all. From the sound of it, I've also spent a lot more time in-game, and I've done way less. Maybe you're just being too efficient and mechanical about playing the game? Lost your sense for discovery and adventure? Discovery and adventure is what Guild Wars 2 does best. In fact better than any game I've played.

Personally, as long as I keep playing, I will be evolving my playstyle repertoire. So what if you've got an exotic Berserker-set? How about trying a condition build? A support build? A combo synergy build? GW2's stats system isn't lazy, it's extremely elegant and deep. You don't have to stick to the most obvious build. Read up on profession-specific forums, about what builds people are running with, depending on what they're doing - and try some out for yourself.

Once I've done my 100% map completion and geared my main character - guessing it'll be about mid-October by then - I'll be dialing down GW2, mostly playing sPvP and WvW with the various professions. Or who knows, maybe I'll do another full playthrough with another character. Either way, both sPvP and WvW can be played ad-infinitum - and since both are lacking a real barrier of entry other than player expertise, you can come back anytime to get your Guild Wars 2 on. Personally - I've enjoyed the fuck out of leveling my character and adventuring through the zones. I will do so again. If that is with an upcoming add-on and all-new content, or simply with another character, remains to be seen.

Except for impossible queues for WvW (being on the most populated German server, which is likely the most active server in the world), I've experienced none of the lag-issues you've experienced. Albeit I'm not only playing during peak hours, during which there's noticable lag due to heavy traffic, but far from what you're reporting.

@Bell_End said:

i was just about to buy GW2 but this put me right off. cheer for the warning

Wrong decision. You're missing out. Even if you'd develop the same opinions and complaints as the thread creator, you'd have enjoyed the ride through 100% map completion & all the dungeon runs & maximizing your character - in other words, you'd have had a blast until you'd have 'finished' the game. 300+ hours of great entertainment for the same price as some 5-hours FPS game or something. And who knows, you might actually dig its endgame - and play it for the sake of the game, as the design of the game intends, rather than just the hollow item-grind (which is there, but you'll only earn visual prestige rewards, not actual prestige stats) - then you'll get an infinite amount more value out of it. And the value proposition is already insanely good.

Oh - GW2 is in fact top of class for 'Adventure' games. If you only play the 'best' games, you need to give GW2 a shot. If you're the sort seeking adventure, canyoneering and mountain climbing and such, you absolutely must play Guild Wars 2.

I was super pumped for GW2 too but after hitting level 80 within the first week I got bored quickly. I'm kinda just waiting for friends to start hitting level 80 too so we can start doing things together but most of them seem to not be too into the game and only play when they have nothing else to play. If they don't hit the cap soon I might be done with GW2...for now.

You, I'm sure will also know all the major story beats but there's no reason you cant join the other 2 orders and experience some new racial storylines. But I say you should totally take a break. Im sitting at lvl 51 on my main an level 20ish on my alt and i played the hell out of FTL last night because, as i said in mumble, it sunk in and there's no reason I have to play guild wars. My money is spent and nothing will change that.

@mortal_sb: That was a very informative and well written post man. It's a shame most people here are just saying you "played the game wrong" and it's your fault but I share your experience and I didn't even get halfway to level 80. At level 27 I had traded another really decent player drops from an even boss and received a really good , at the time, greatsword that I'd be able to use at level 32. Ok no problem I grinded excitedly for 5 levels to get the sword and once I got to it there was this crazy waking up from the Matrix type feeling. I killed a few random mobs and realized well yup, this sword is doing a bit more damage, so what now? I tried a dungeon with friends and the party leader got frustrated and left an hour into it leaving us all with an hour of wasted time - not to mention the 20 minutes it took to gather a party in the first place. Not that the dungeon was especially fun in the first place, just a bunch of spongy mobs, clearing house room after room. WvWvW is awesome everyone says - but what you mention is correct and at mid 30's I was getting destroyed by other players. I felt no desire to play sPVP since it did not advance my levels. My armor looked still like beginner gear at level 35, and I kept waiting until I started looking as cool as the concept art I kept seeing from the very talented Daniel Dociu.

Overall similarly as you I had fun at the outset of my adventure, but the grind sets in quick. I feel as if most of the buzz words like the dynamic events and whatnot are better written than executed. There is nothing to me that makes the game stand high above others. You kill mobs and move on.

@Seppli said:

@Bell_End said:

i was just about to buy GW2 but this put me right off. cheer for the warning

Wrong decision. You're missing out. Even if you'd develop the same opinions and complaints as the thread creator, you'd have enjoyed the ride through 100% map completion & all the dungeon runs & maximizing your character - in other words, you'd have had a blast until you'd have 'finished' the game. 300+ hours of great entertainment for the same price as some 5-hours FPS game or something. And who knows, you might actually dig its endgame - and play it for the sake of the game, as the design of the game intends, rather than just the hollow item-grind (which is there, but you'll only earn visual prestige rewards, not actual prestige stats) - then you'll get an infinite amount more value out of it. And the value proposition is already insanely good.

i agree: don't be put off. it doesn't have monthly fees and you will get a couple of hundred of hours out of the game, while still having fun.

The thing that annoys me the most is what you mentioned about the crafting as the economy is totally messed up, it may be due to the fact I was a jeweller but everything I could make (such as upgraded version of gems) would sell on the Trading Post for less than the sum of its parts. I would hit times where I had gathered the materials to make an exotic necklace or ring that I could put on the Trading Post to provide others with gear options, but upon inspection noted that I would gain 50s-1g more if I just sold the materials that I would use to make it. You can probably put that down to the game being new and the economy being a bit off right now, but it still sucks.

My personal story (Thief) I also found painfully boring, to the point where at level 80 my class quests were still on level 50. I picked The Order of Whispers as they described themselves as the secret, sneaky faction, thought that would fit well with my thief-y ways, but every story mission and I mean EVERY story mission was just me killing a huge amount of mobs with a group of NPCs that stood there and did nothing, most of the time the mobs would forget that the NPCs were even there and just make a B-line straight for me. Three separate class quests of mine also had game breaking bugs that completely halted progress for many days at a time, which was incredibly disappointing.

As many have said as there is no subscription so I don't feel bummed out that I'm not playing it, I'll just wait until they add something in that I'm interested in checking out and jump straight back in. It's nice to know it's always there.

@mortal_sb said:

@jesterroyal said:

It sounds like you played this game like a power grind and burned yourself out.

the thing is: i didn't. i played with friends, 2-4 a hours a day at most. on the week-ends more, sure.

~3 hours a day and more on weekends is over 20 hours a week, which sounds like quite a bit. With how much Guild Wars 2 "values player's time," by eliminating a lot of grind, I was expecting to quickly reach a point where I felt done with the game. I agree that it sounds like you just reached that point a lot sooner than you might have been expecting.

@mortal_sb: What is the difference between cosmetic grind and traditional gear grind?

Neither one means anything. If anything, I'd be more motivated to grind for nice looking gear than improved stats that have no impact on the game.

You can't reasonably expect the PvE content in a game to last forever. Endgame content is just junk content. The real endgame in this game really is the PvP (mainly WvW as it uses your PvE character).

I do agree with a lot of your points though.

Mainly, I wish that WvW was also separated from PvE just like sPvP is as I don't play PvE (for much of the reasons you stated). Likewise, I find the quest system to be very grindy and repetitive (at least when compared to GW1).

You should definitely check sPvP out though. It's a lot of fun, and always feels fresh because you are playing against other human beings.

@UssjTrunks said:

You can't reasonably expect the PvE content in a game to last forever. Endgame content is just junk content. The real endgame in this game really is the PvP (mainly WvW as it uses your PvE character).

i played world of warcraft for 9 months with only one character, 7 months i was level 60 and i was playing daily, for a couple of hours. this was in 2005, so there was no addon out yet and there was still SO MUCH to do.

@UssjTrunks said:

You should definitely check sPvP out though. It's a lot of fun, and always feels fresh because you are playing against other human beings.

i wish i could play spvp more often, but as i stated: it's almost unplayable because it lags like hell. they apparently have routing problems with the biggest internet provider in germany, which sucks.

@mortal_sb said:

i want to look as bad-ass as my sword does.

If you are honestly going to say that armor doesn't look good in this game, then you aren't going for the end-game armor at all.

I literally feel the exact opposite about all of your complaints. This is an MMO, and a specific amount of grinding will exist within it. To complain about that is to generally complain about MMOs. Maybe MMOs aren't your thing anymore.

The underwater combat is excellent, especially when compared to literally ANY OTHER UNDERWATER SHIT EVER!

The items look awesome, and you WILL see a progression in your gear as you go along through the game. If you don't make that commitment, then you won't see the gear.

I'm sorry your connection sucks, but if you went into Guild Wars 2 thinking that PvP would just be a secondary thing, you came into Guild Wars misinformed. The first game was HEAVILY focused on PvP, and this game does exactly the same. They just actually offered up PvE capabilities for people. Also, top-tier PvP armor will annihilate someone in top-tier PvE armor. If it doesn't, then the player in PvP armor is bad.

This video is what i think this thread needs. It has a end game, its everything in the game. Unless you have 100% the map you have not been to end game or even came close to seeing everything there is in the game.

Nice message from the developers about "endgame" in GW2.

https://www.guildwars2.com/...

Also about future content updates which it looks like will be free.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Gui...

"We do appreciate that you’d like to buy lots of new content, but we’d prefer to give a lot of it to you for free, cause that’s what we think a responsible MMO company does! "

Anet won me over with that quote.

You know if you bought it digitally you can get a refund within 30 days after release or time of purchase depending on which was later....I did because i felt like it was a grind-fest....it could be because I'm a father now and don't have the time to put into leveling. I know GW2 doesn't have a subscription but its not wasted money that would had differed me its now a question of reward for time played...an could had played GW2 for 20 hours and may have gotten to level 30 or so...or I could play Darksiders for that same time..beaten it...got a great story from it...and moved on to another great experience. That's just me....I mean i quit wow for the same reason...but to each his own I know others have to time to invest but I rather spend more time with my beautiful children and wife.

Yeah I'm pretty much done with GW2 as ive 80ed a while ago, but not because its a bad game, because theres better stuff to spend my gaming time on. 

@Big_Mex said:

Nice message from the developers about "endgame" in GW2.

https://www.guildwars2.com/...

Also about future content updates which it looks like will be free.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Gui...

"We do appreciate that you’d like to buy lots of new content, but we’d prefer to give a lot of it to you for free, cause that’s what we think a responsible MMO company does! "

Anet won me over with that quote.

you haven't read my post, have you? i talked about both of these points and there are currently just not true. on paper yes, but not in game.

@mortal_sb: Ya I read your post. I mean if you play the hell out of any game you're going to get tired of it. I enjoy all sorts of games so this is nice to not have to worry about monthly payments, stop playing when I want and start up again whenever. Definitely feel as though I've gotten my moneys worth out of the game already. From what I've read about the future content being free to an extent is awesome. If the games not for you anymore then move onto something else.

Yea, same here, and I won't return.

I agree with every point you made.

@Big_Mex said:

@mortal_sb: Ya I read your post. I mean if you play the hell out of any game you're going to get tired of it. I enjoy all sorts of games so this is nice to not have to worry about monthly payments, stop playing when I want and start up again whenever. Definitely feel as though I've gotten my moneys worth out of the game already. From what I've read about the future content being free to an extent is awesome. If the games not for you anymore then move onto something else.

why is everybody saying that i've played the hell out of the game? i burned out, yeah, but that's because the game got so repetitive and non-essential at one point. i got my money worth too, and i'm glad about it, i just want to state my point on why i think that the buzz leading up to its launch and the raving reviews are kinda misleading when you get to endgame or play it a little bit more.

I was going to get a new PC around Christmas time, and thought about getting this game but decided against it. I think RPG quest design is right up there with Modern Military FPS. It's not that it can't be fun, but it's so overdone and almost exactly the same in every game. If a game doesn't have a cool story to back up its 'samey' rpg quests, then I'll probably get bored.

I may sound like an idiot in this thread - I really don't play MMO's, but I do keep track on them like I do almost all genres as I like learning what makes each one tick to then possibly use in other genres later if I do into videogame design - but I thought the point of Guild Wars 2 was that people would play what they wanted and stop, and come back whenever they wanted (as long as the service is still up) and continue without feeling bad about it at all due to it being an upfront-fee-only game and so players shouldn't feel bad if they stopped playing the game in the same way someone who only plays the single player of a non-MMO game shouldn't feel bad about stopping even though there is multiplayer to do - or vice versa.

So to me, it seems like the raving and the reviews were right since the endgame isn't as essential as it is in most MMOs; and so acting as if it was an Open world game with the endgame being optional extras to do for those that love to stay playing it seems like a good way of reviewing it.

@mortal_sb said:

@Big_Mex said:

@mortal_sb: Ya I read your post. I mean if you play the hell out of any game you're going to get tired of it. I enjoy all sorts of games so this is nice to not have to worry about monthly payments, stop playing when I want and start up again whenever. Definitely feel as though I've gotten my moneys worth out of the game already. From what I've read about the future content being free to an extent is awesome. If the games not for you anymore then move onto something else.

why is everybody saying that i've played the hell out of the game? i burned out, yeah, but that's because the game got so repetitive and non-essential at one point. i got my money worth too, and i'm glad about it, i just want to state my point on why i think that the buzz leading up to its launch and the raving reviews are kinda misleading when you get to endgame or play it a little bit more.

Well, you did play the hell out of the game, you say yourself you spend 2-4 hours each day and more on the weekend. Which is already a staggering amount of time to spend on a game. You also claim to have 100% the entire world which should take a ton of time. I am really interested in your time played, it must be at least 250hours or you were playing it at optimum efficiency which is also a surefire way to burn out on the game. I am not trying to downplay your criticism of the game as I am sure they are all totally valid, but I feel you are not playing the game the way it was designed. It just doesn't seem like a game with long lasting appeal for a powergamer like you. If you play this game a couple of hours a week the combat stays fresh, you see plenty of nuance in the quests and events and you don't exhaust the content until there is some new stuff out there.

@Bell_End said:

i was just about to buy GW2 but this put me right off. cheer for the warning

I'd say still grab it, just treat it like an RPG with a bunch of other players. Once you hit 80 and beat the final boss go play another game if you arent motivated. If they wanted to you play constantly they wouldn't make the final boss available at release : P

@Vexxan said:

I'm kinda just waiting for friends to start hitting level 80 too so we can start doing things together

Can I stab you? GO PLAY WITH THEM CAUSE YOU CAN DOWNGRADE TO THEIR LEVEL!!!!

I've been playing since day one and logged about 200 hours so far. Granted I'm not one of the insane people to level 80 in a week but thats cause my goal isn't what I'd do in a traditional MMO

-Dont need to max level ASAP cause theres no 80+ stuff, just explo runs and dynamic events.

-I've spent half my time in WwW to keep from getting burnt out on PvE.

-Spend more time exploring the zone then trying to find the fastest way to get to the next one! There are hidden dungeons, and the npc's do amazing/terribad things if you stop and see (all the haters heard the pirate sing Major-Generals Song?)

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

@mortal_sb

You have good points though I think just taking a break for a few weeks will solve a lot of them.

I truly feel bad for people who have lousy connections making SPvP not an option. Yes its all the same gear and you can farm better stuff but you can't do that in counter strike either! I really dont like the idea of getting a PvP combat game with the mentality of 'skill up and get levels then prestige levels' as the main focus.

The main focus should be to play the game and have fun.

Yes I completely agree that the lack of grouping up is a pain but it seems your best bet is for you and your friend(s) to join in a free tournament. Just queue up and when enough people are queued it starts and puts non-full teams together.

Oh and I am an 80 mesmer as well, granted a stick-dude I feel your pain at a lack of armor that appeals to our profession... I dont really want a ton of skulls on my threads. Luckily I've kept a few low level pieces and they've grown on me (no pun intended) but I see what you mean about everyone looking the same... that one dang pirate leather hat is everywhere!

I'd say put the game down and play borderlands or torchlight or one of the many other awesome games soon to come out and then check back. Maybe only play GW2 once a week?

@8bit_Archer said:

You know if you bought it digitally you can get a refund within 30 days after release or time of purchase depending on which was later....I did because i felt like it was a grind-fest....it could be because I'm a father now and don't have the time to put into leveling. I know GW2 doesn't have a subscription but its not wasted money that would had differed me its now a question of reward for time played...an could had played GW2 for 20 hours and may have gotten to level 30 or so...or I could play Darksiders for that same time..beaten it...got a great story from it...and moved on to another great experience. That's just me....I mean i quit wow for the same reason...but to each his own I know others have to time to invest but I rather spend more time with my beautiful children and wife.

I got a refund also. Took five days to garner an resposnse, but a full refund I received. Props to NCsoft for that.

My issue with the game was a technical one, though. I wanted to like it but the game ran like complete shit on my new setup.

Rather than addressing each of your points individually, I'll answer what seems to be the core issue you're having with understanding the game's design. The most significant endgame in Guild Wars 2 is based entirely around weapon and armor skins. You're not supposed to want that dungeon set because it has +20 to your Betterthanotherplayers stat, you're supposed to want it because it makes you look like a bat out of hell if the bat was also made of razor-sharp metal. That's why all of the visual variety is back-loaded into the game and why those transmutation stones are so neat. You can get max stats by doing practically whatever (as you discovered though Cooking), but you're going to have to buckle down for some serious shit if you want to look the part. It's not enough to entice everyone, but it's not supposed to be. If you enjoyed your 1-80 experience (and it sounds like you did), you're free to dismiss the endgame grind entirely and come back whenever you want to experience new or revamped content. Significantly, though, you won't be months of gear tread-milling behind every time you choose to do so.

Also, there is totally a weapon sigil that has a chance to strike everyone around you with lightning on a hit. Just thought I'd throw that out there because it's awesome.

@jesterroyal said:

It sounds like you played this game like a power grind and burned yourself out.

Yep yep

Have you considered crafting a Legendary? That'd be one hell of a long term goal, but then again, I don't have much time to play, so it might seem longer for me.

Never understood GW2 hype.. it always looked like a pretty standard MMO to me.

@Etnos: Try playing it, you might think otherwise.

@mortal_sb said:

to close things off: WATER COMBAT AND UNDERWATER EVENTS ARE THE WORST.

Could not agree with you more. I don't know why they tried to "fix" underwater combat. Just leave it out, there is no reason to do that. Underwater sucks, period. Getting attack from 360 degrees is never fun. Ever.

@jesterroyal said:

It sounds like you played this game like a power grind and burned yourself out.

This.

I only get to play about an hour of it a day and I'm loving the fact that I can play at my own pace without the spectre of impending subscription payments forcing me to dump my life into it.

I think Guild Wars 2 offers a different experience that no other game offers where there are definite weaknesses. For instance the improvements to player-to-player interaction like the auction house are stellar but immediately hampered by the lack of "look for..." tools. This game from top to bottom feels like "1 step forward, 1 step back".

It's a 60 dollar game. Since when is it only holding your attention for a MONTH an issue. It's not a subscription. This is similar to all the dumb stuff that happened with Diablo.

Anyway that little rant out of the way. Take a break, come back when you're ready. It's just burnout and not the fun kind with cars.