No, there's a plethora of raider orientated games, let gw2 be for the rest of us.
Now some people will make an argument that if you have raids, they might shift more boxes but.... 1 raiders are a very tiny % of mmo players 2 why would they raid in gw2 when they can raid in all these other games for "phatlewt" 3 which brings me to - raiding just isn't that much fun, its a second job (or job replacement), the fun for most of those that raid cones from the "phatlewt" at the end of it.
Anet has said that the story of the game will come out in Dungeons. Again, I hope they have a far more advanced version ofdungeons, but I"d like for them to stick with keeping the story stuff in one place.
Again, this is the diselusion we need to wipe ourselves from. Initially there were no "raids" only ways to bring more than one party into a dungeon.
This was so lower level parties could still do higher level stuff with mroe people. The raid content was what companies did to mutate this concept and make it about consistent gear grind.
Anet has hte potential to improve on the process. Multi-teared dungeons that revolve around 2 or 3 teams of dungioneers in communication would rock. Like story centric dynbamic content events.
Thats a great concept, Since Dungeons in GW2 already have 3 different explorable modes, why can't they just allow players to explore all three modes consecutively.
15 player raid, one dungeon, 3 passages, you decide how you want to split the groups. Since there is no healer, no tanks, if you have extremely skilled players that can tackle the bosses with just 3 players, you can have 6 , 6 and 3
Each requiring another to activate a switch that unlocks the final raid boss event, that requires all 15 to take down.
That would be one heck of a raid event.
Life is a Maze, so make sure you bring your GPS incase you get lost in it.
Your words are a fine example of why I don't want gear progression in my next MMO. I don't want to pay for a questionable pleasure of playing with people who think they are superior to the rest of humanity just because they regularly group up to beat scripted encounters in a video game.
Taken totally out of context. Of course you omitted the part of the post where I was defending raiding from being attacked by someone who was very opinionated and making statements about raiding that only focuessed on why peopel hate it, but not why people like it.
And we won't even get into the fact that elitism isn't a result of raiding. it's a personality problem. Those same elitists will be in GW2. What are you going to blme it on when you run into the same people who loard titles over you in GW2?
And even look at your description of raids. "Scripted encounters" Yes, they are, but negative spin much?
I think Banks had a great idea: end-game "raids" that are ramped-up open-world encounters. I would imagine ANET is already putting this in the game. The problem is that this kind of raid cannot satisfy anyone who wants there to be exclusive, superior content available only to a select few in the game. ANET's phiosophy is obviously about inclusivity, not exclusivity.
I would support PvE raids in the sense that they already exist as open-world, inclusive events, even if they were instanced like the WvWvW battleground is instanced. IOW, anyone can zone in and join the fight and be a part of the effort to take down a huge PvE boss, and get the same reward at the end.
I'm fine with doing content that takes time and effort just for cosmetic rewards. I'd prefer not to have traditional instance based raiding in GW2 though. Not because I hate raiding per se (although it's getting a bit old), but because I feel that there are plenty of MMOs that already focus on raiding and do a great job at that. Why reinvent the wheel when the developer resources that would go into raiding could be spend on other content that doesn't involve holding hands with 10-25 people for 2-3 hours?
I'm a big ol' fluffy carewolf. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
I, a self-admitted GW2 fanboy and proud of it, would say yes, with the following caveats...
Doesn't break balance, and doesn't cave in to demands for balance changes due to raid content.
Doesn't begin any type of progression treadmill.
Yeah... that's it basically. If a group of ten or so have content they can run that fits into and sticks with the design pholosophy of GW2 I have no issues with that at all. Right now there are five man raids, (known as explorer mode dungeons)... if it were possible for ANet to create for example a ten man instance that still can take the new active semi-chaotic combat into account and produce exciting gameplay, why not?
However, the combat system would make this a challenge, so it's a low priority, if one at all. Remember, there's no trinity, which has made larger raids easy to design.
i voted no, simply because i have raided just about all content in EQ2 and quite honestly im bored of, if i wanted end game raiding there are plenty of games out there both old and new that offer this type of game play.
i would much rather they put all the time and effort it would need to make end game raid zones into developing the dynamic events system even more, some of these look like they could be a type of raid anyway as they scale up with more people but anyone can join in which im all for, also would like them to add content that everyone can enjoy not just a limited few so apart from DE's more dungeons/instances.
For me personally cosmetic gear is much more important than stat gear. Why? Because stat gear you replace all the time and it's all +1, +1, +1.... Gear that makes you look badass = pure win.
But no, I don't want raiding in any form. Dungeons of 4-6 people is perfectly fine. Raids are sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
BORING!
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
Imagine a game with 100 6 man dungeons that were fully fleshed out with a few branches for added variety. Add a random dungeon finder and you got me hooked.
Given GW2 design, this might be a possibility down the road.
I, a self-admitted GW2 fanboy and proud of it, would say yes, with the following caveats...
Doesn't break balance, and doesn't cave in to demands for balance changes due to raid content.
Doesn't begin any type of progression treadmill.
Yeah... that's it basically. If a group of ten or so have content they can run that fits into and sticks with the design pholosophy of GW2 I have no issues with that at all. Right now there are five man raids, (known as explorer mode dungeons)... if it were possible for ANet to create for example a ten man instance that still can take the new active semi-chaotic combat into account and produce exciting gameplay, why not?
However, the combat system would make this a challenge, so it's a low priority, if one at all. Remember, there's no trinity, which has made larger raids easy to design.
That's just it though. We know very well from history that if you give the most vocal minority in the genre an inch, they will run with it for the next 100 miles. We see their influence in the genre not only in the games themselves, but also within the developer arena, with just about every major MMO offering Guild summits at some point, to discuss game direction. Who do you think comprises most of the guilds that participate? Raiding guilds of course. Do we ever see summits for soloers or small groupers or how about roleplayers and crafters? Despite the fact that we outnumber raiders easily 4 to 1, they get the most representation and concilliation from the developers in this genre.
Despite the fact that we outnumber raiders easily 4 to 1, they get the most representation and concilliation from the developers in this genre.
And that is exactly why I am glad that ArenaNet chose not to cater to to raider playerstyle. Raiders have enough MMOs that already give them what they want. It's time for non-raiders to get what we want.
Personally, I never understood the logic of catering to raiders. Creating content for the lowest percentage while alienating the highest doesn't make sense to me.
I for one would very welcome out-door raids (for anyone to join in) that does require a little bid more communication and that can be triggered in some way. Would be a great sunday evening activity and can maybe lead to some smaller guild alliances.
I for one would very welcome out-door raids (for anyone to join in) that does require a little bid more communication and that can be triggered in some way. Would be a great sunday evening activity and can maybe lead to some smaller guild alliances.
They're called Dynamic Events.
I wouldn't support raiding of any kind. They're are numerous MMO's out there catering to the raid crowd. I see no reason to include them in the one MMO that's trying to do things differently.
I for one would very welcome out-door raids (for anyone to join in) that does require a little bid more communication and that can be triggered in some way. Would be a great sunday evening activity and can maybe lead to some smaller guild alliances.
They're called Dynamic Events.
Nope, while there are most certainly huge boss (raid) events present. As far as i know they can not be triggered on purpose (as far as current information goes). So tackling an event like that can not be planned on a sunday evening
As far as i can see the more choice in a game the better, raids would add another choice for people. Having a few raids wouldnt stop development of other mechanics and would just be another activity in a game i hope will have much to do in. Why the hate for raids? i enjoy all aspects of a game, some dont and i can understand that but extra content is always good whether its for you or not is unimportant.
Raids in GW2, please no. I do not want to be forced to raid if I want a certain armor set. I don't dislike raiding itself, but I hate the organizing behind it. Getting a large group of people online at a specfic time every week always seemed more like a job than anything else.
GW2 to me is all about opening up game content for everyone. Raids are the opposite of that.
Just as guild wars 1 worked, would you support there being raids if it was purely cosmetic Edit: messed up the poll by Accidently clicking a button:/
the best thing about gw2 is its lack of emphasis on raiding. raiding is an old fashioned, restrictive and elitist pasttime that really needs to be ejected from mmos to bring some fun and positive socializing back into the whole idea of gaming.
i want to join up with a bunch of guys based solely on the fact that they're pretty cool, rather than that i need them to get me through a raid and while we're at it - how's your min-maxing skill? and oh, i can't let you into our raid. you haven't got that bracer you need to get from dungeon x. come back l8r, noooooooob.
If WoW proved anything during its lifetime it is that majority of the playerbase wants to 'raid'.
During Wrath, 50%+ of the playerbase went to a raid instance. That's a fact.
Content is there to be 'consumed' and if the playerbase gravitates one area of content, it is smart business to expand that area.
actually, wow proved that a lot of people wanted to join in and see the content, but that only a very small percentage were actually able to. raiders have often spread the belief it's because everyone else is a noob, but the reality is the way raids are set up promotes elitism and excludes many from taking part because there ends up being a catch-22 of gear, time, and "knowing the fight."
for me, gw2's strength will lie in the fact that its versions of "raids" are all outside and easily accessible by everyone. everyone can join in. everyone can see the big beastie. everyone can fight it and be useful. it won't matter if they don't have the "right" gear, the "right" cookie cutter spec, or "know" the fight by watching it a zillion times on youtube until they satisfy some elitist guild leader's napoleon complex.
the problem is, raiders have promoted the belief that a raid is difficult. it's no more difficult than any other dungeon. the boss still leaps about like an extra from mario bros. the only real difficulty is getting a group together which can function. that's the only challenge. gw2 hasn't made the fights easy. by all accounts they look difficult. but they have taken the "difficulty" of finding a group out of it. it's gotten rid of the whole clique nature of guilds on a server.
now everyone really CAN raid! together! we'll all be able to get the same gear and be cool together! and with the rewards scaling with our skill and input, we'll know we got there by the power of our skillz, too! yay! we're all awesome now.
If WoW proved anything during its lifetime it is that majority of the playerbase wants to 'raid'.
During Wrath, 50%+ of the playerbase went to a raid instance. That's a fact.
Content is there to be 'consumed' and if the playerbase gravitates one area of content, it is smart business to expand that area.
The sense of achievement is natural for any human being. In every RPG of any kind, getting a "better" item or a new skill is something everyone welcomes. To just stop it at max level will be... well just something new, which i wouldn't put my money on for being a big success. Not that many people are interested in cosmetic rewards exclusively. You have to make people "grind" for something, even if it is PvP stuff, skills, territories etc. Doing stuff in order to obtain some kind of benefits and improve your character stands at the base of the genre.
Those who think the community is gonna be awesome and everyone will group and just do instances and events for nothing to gain but cosmetic things are proven wrong by the industry now. In older games, people grouped to grind hard mobs because they had to do it in order to level up. They camped dragons for hours in EQ because they needed the kill for a quest. I loved that model, things were difficult to achieve, but there always was the carrot on the stick. As soon as that model "improved" and solo-oriented games came along, it is easy to see that people don't group except when forced to, or "bribed" to, by offering them rewards (better gear, easier XP gain, questline completion etc.) The natural tendency is to go solo, not group. I am amused by those who think that players would just roam around areas, looking for events, with zero rewards for them. I wish GW2 proves me wrong, really.
If WoW proved anything during its lifetime it is that majority of the playerbase wants to 'raid'.
During Wrath, 50%+ of the playerbase went to a raid instance. That's a fact.
Content is there to be 'consumed' and if the playerbase gravitates one area of content, it is smart business to expand that area.
Maybe because the content is there. And because of how they are rewarding the players.
If a game rewarded exploring or crafting or whatever most players(that enjoy and wants to play the game) would want to do it. Because they want the rewards. It depends on how the developers design the game and wants you to play.
Actually I am surprised only 50% of the players went to a raid considering WoW:s heavy focus on end game raids.
And among those 50% probably only a small minority are hard core progression raiders. Or people that think raiding is more interesting and important than anything. I would guess most of them are people that wants to sometimes raid but prefer other things most of the time. And wouldnt be very interested in raids if there was no rewards.
I think raids are a cheap way(for the company) to entertain people and give them something to do. Some other endgame activitys would be much more expensive and need way more developer time. If people farm the same raids for months it will be cost effective. A lot of players wants complex character building and character progression at end game. But I think a lot of those ideas(if good enough to be fun) would be very expensive for the company. Raids = alot of entertainment for a reasonable price. I think this is the real reason so many companies focus on raid endgame. If price was no object players could learn to like and would embrace other alternatives.
I don't get it. There are raids and raid gear opens new ways of specialization. That's way more interesting than simple +x to stat y steps in a tiered gear system.
It's just not a gear treadmill and there aren't any gear requirements for dungeons. You should be level x to do a dungeon, but don't need x weapon or armor.
Comments
Now some people will make an argument that if you have raids, they might shift more boxes but....
1 raiders are a very tiny % of mmo players
2 why would they raid in gw2 when they can raid in all these other games for "phatlewt"
3 which brings me to - raiding just isn't that much fun, its a second job (or job replacement), the fun for most of those that raid cones from the "phatlewt" at the end of it.
Thats a great concept, Since Dungeons in GW2 already have 3 different explorable modes, why can't they just allow players to explore all three modes consecutively.
15 player raid, one dungeon, 3 passages, you decide how you want to split the groups. Since there is no healer, no tanks, if you have extremely skilled players that can tackle the bosses with just 3 players, you can have 6 , 6 and 3
Each requiring another to activate a switch that unlocks the final raid boss event, that requires all 15 to take down.
That would be one heck of a raid event.
Life is a Maze, so make sure you bring your GPS incase you get lost in it.
Taken totally out of context. Of course you omitted the part of the post where I was defending raiding from being attacked by someone who was very opinionated and making statements about raiding that only focuessed on why peopel hate it, but not why people like it.
And we won't even get into the fact that elitism isn't a result of raiding. it's a personality problem. Those same elitists will be in GW2. What are you going to blme it on when you run into the same people who loard titles over you in GW2?
And even look at your description of raids. "Scripted encounters" Yes, they are, but negative spin much?
I could call W v W v W a zergfest / rezfest
I think Banks had a great idea: end-game "raids" that are ramped-up open-world encounters. I would imagine ANET is already putting this in the game. The problem is that this kind of raid cannot satisfy anyone who wants there to be exclusive, superior content available only to a select few in the game. ANET's phiosophy is obviously about inclusivity, not exclusivity.
I would support PvE raids in the sense that they already exist as open-world, inclusive events, even if they were instanced like the WvWvW battleground is instanced. IOW, anyone can zone in and join the fight and be a part of the effort to take down a huge PvE boss, and get the same reward at the end.
I'm fine with doing content that takes time and effort just for cosmetic rewards. I'd prefer not to have traditional instance based raiding in GW2 though. Not because I hate raiding per se (although it's getting a bit old), but because I feel that there are plenty of MMOs that already focus on raiding and do a great job at that. Why reinvent the wheel when the developer resources that would go into raiding could be spend on other content that doesn't involve holding hands with 10-25 people for 2-3 hours?
I'm a big ol' fluffy carewolf. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
I, a self-admitted GW2 fanboy and proud of it, would say yes, with the following caveats...
Doesn't break balance, and doesn't cave in to demands for balance changes due to raid content.
Doesn't begin any type of progression treadmill.
Yeah... that's it basically. If a group of ten or so have content they can run that fits into and sticks with the design pholosophy of GW2 I have no issues with that at all. Right now there are five man raids, (known as explorer mode dungeons)... if it were possible for ANet to create for example a ten man instance that still can take the new active semi-chaotic combat into account and produce exciting gameplay, why not?
However, the combat system would make this a challenge, so it's a low priority, if one at all. Remember, there's no trinity, which has made larger raids easy to design.
Oderint, dum metuant.
Sure. I'm all for the adventure myself.
BOYCOTTING EA / ORIGIN going forward.
i voted no, simply because i have raided just about all content in EQ2 and quite honestly im bored of, if i wanted end game raiding there are plenty of games out there both old and new that offer this type of game play.
i would much rather they put all the time and effort it would need to make end game raid zones into developing the dynamic events system even more, some of these look like they could be a type of raid anyway as they scale up with more people but anyone can join in which im all for, also would like them to add content that everyone can enjoy not just a limited few so apart from DE's more dungeons/instances.
For me personally cosmetic gear is much more important than stat gear. Why? Because stat gear you replace all the time and it's all +1, +1, +1.... Gear that makes you look badass = pure win.
But no, I don't want raiding in any form. Dungeons of 4-6 people is perfectly fine. Raids are sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
BORING!
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
Imagine a game with 100 6 man dungeons that were fully fleshed out with a few branches for added variety. Add a random dungeon finder and you got me hooked.
Given GW2 design, this might be a possibility down the road.
That's just it though. We know very well from history that if you give the most vocal minority in the genre an inch, they will run with it for the next 100 miles. We see their influence in the genre not only in the games themselves, but also within the developer arena, with just about every major MMO offering Guild summits at some point, to discuss game direction. Who do you think comprises most of the guilds that participate? Raiding guilds of course. Do we ever see summits for soloers or small groupers or how about roleplayers and crafters? Despite the fact that we outnumber raiders easily 4 to 1, they get the most representation and concilliation from the developers in this genre.
And that is exactly why I am glad that ArenaNet chose not to cater to to raider playerstyle. Raiders have enough MMOs that already give them what they want. It's time for non-raiders to get what we want.
Personally, I never understood the logic of catering to raiders. Creating content for the lowest percentage while alienating the highest doesn't make sense to me.
so much raider hate in this thread
I for one would very welcome out-door raids (for anyone to join in) that does require a little bid more communication and that can be triggered in some way. Would be a great sunday evening activity and can maybe lead to some smaller guild alliances.
GW 1 didn't need raids, it's a PvP game at its core, why would GW2?
They're called Dynamic Events.
I wouldn't support raiding of any kind. They're are numerous MMO's out there catering to the raid crowd. I see no reason to include them in the one MMO that's trying to do things differently.
Some still thinking GW2 is raid game like WoW with tier1-2-3...ext:P
Nope, while there are most certainly huge boss (raid) events present. As far as i know they can not be triggered on purpose (as far as current information goes). So tackling an event like that can not be planned on a sunday evening
As far as i can see the more choice in a game the better, raids would add another choice for people. Having a few raids wouldnt stop development of other mechanics and would just be another activity in a game i hope will have much to do in. Why the hate for raids? i enjoy all aspects of a game, some dont and i can understand that but extra content is always good whether its for you or not is unimportant.
Raids in GW2, please no. I do not want to be forced to raid if I want a certain armor set. I don't dislike raiding itself, but I hate the organizing behind it. Getting a large group of people online at a specfic time every week always seemed more like a job than anything else.
GW2 to me is all about opening up game content for everyone. Raids are the opposite of that.
the best thing about gw2 is its lack of emphasis on raiding. raiding is an old fashioned, restrictive and elitist pasttime that really needs to be ejected from mmos to bring some fun and positive socializing back into the whole idea of gaming.
i want to join up with a bunch of guys based solely on the fact that they're pretty cool, rather than that i need them to get me through a raid and while we're at it - how's your min-maxing skill? and oh, i can't let you into our raid. you haven't got that bracer you need to get from dungeon x. come back l8r, noooooooob.
no thank you!
or, no thank q?
Not sure why people resent 'raiders' or 'raids'.
If WoW proved anything during its lifetime it is that majority of the playerbase wants to 'raid'.
During Wrath, 50%+ of the playerbase went to a raid instance. That's a fact.
Content is there to be 'consumed' and if the playerbase gravitates one area of content, it is smart business to expand that area.
Gdemami -
Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
actually, wow proved that a lot of people wanted to join in and see the content, but that only a very small percentage were actually able to. raiders have often spread the belief it's because everyone else is a noob, but the reality is the way raids are set up promotes elitism and excludes many from taking part because there ends up being a catch-22 of gear, time, and "knowing the fight."
for me, gw2's strength will lie in the fact that its versions of "raids" are all outside and easily accessible by everyone. everyone can join in. everyone can see the big beastie. everyone can fight it and be useful. it won't matter if they don't have the "right" gear, the "right" cookie cutter spec, or "know" the fight by watching it a zillion times on youtube until they satisfy some elitist guild leader's napoleon complex.
the problem is, raiders have promoted the belief that a raid is difficult. it's no more difficult than any other dungeon. the boss still leaps about like an extra from mario bros. the only real difficulty is getting a group together which can function. that's the only challenge. gw2 hasn't made the fights easy. by all accounts they look difficult. but they have taken the "difficulty" of finding a group out of it. it's gotten rid of the whole clique nature of guilds on a server.
now everyone really CAN raid! together! we'll all be able to get the same gear and be cool together! and with the rewards scaling with our skill and input, we'll know we got there by the power of our skillz, too! yay! we're all awesome now.
be happy.
The sense of achievement is natural for any human being. In every RPG of any kind, getting a "better" item or a new skill is something everyone welcomes. To just stop it at max level will be... well just something new, which i wouldn't put my money on for being a big success. Not that many people are interested in cosmetic rewards exclusively. You have to make people "grind" for something, even if it is PvP stuff, skills, territories etc. Doing stuff in order to obtain some kind of benefits and improve your character stands at the base of the genre.
Those who think the community is gonna be awesome and everyone will group and just do instances and events for nothing to gain but cosmetic things are proven wrong by the industry now. In older games, people grouped to grind hard mobs because they had to do it in order to level up. They camped dragons for hours in EQ because they needed the kill for a quest. I loved that model, things were difficult to achieve, but there always was the carrot on the stick. As soon as that model "improved" and solo-oriented games came along, it is easy to see that people don't group except when forced to, or "bribed" to, by offering them rewards (better gear, easier XP gain, questline completion etc.) The natural tendency is to go solo, not group. I am amused by those who think that players would just roam around areas, looking for events, with zero rewards for them. I wish GW2 proves me wrong, really.
Maybe because the content is there. And because of how they are rewarding the players.
If a game rewarded exploring or crafting or whatever most players(that enjoy and wants to play the game) would want to do it. Because they want the rewards. It depends on how the developers design the game and wants you to play.
Actually I am surprised only 50% of the players went to a raid considering WoW:s heavy focus on end game raids.
And among those 50% probably only a small minority are hard core progression raiders. Or people that think raiding is more interesting and important than anything. I would guess most of them are people that wants to sometimes raid but prefer other things most of the time. And wouldnt be very interested in raids if there was no rewards.
I think raids are a cheap way(for the company) to entertain people and give them something to do. Some other endgame activitys would be much more expensive and need way more developer time. If people farm the same raids for months it will be cost effective. A lot of players wants complex character building and character progression at end game. But I think a lot of those ideas(if good enough to be fun) would be very expensive for the company. Raids = alot of entertainment for a reasonable price. I think this is the real reason so many companies focus on raid endgame. If price was no object players could learn to like and would embrace other alternatives.
I don't get it. There are raids and raid gear opens new ways of specialization. That's way more interesting than simple +x to stat y steps in a tiered gear system.
It's just not a gear treadmill and there aren't any gear requirements for dungeons. You should be level x to do a dungeon, but don't need x weapon or armor.