So... Raiding sucks because you couldn't find a good guild and/or weren't willing deal with the fact that those poeple are in deed real people?
This will get me flamed but 90% of the complaints I have ever read about raiding is either I don't want to do it or I can't do it so it shouldn't be in the game. Views like that are ruining MMOs.
No, raiding sucks because it creates a vicious development cycle which ruins MMOs. Guilds run raids until their fingers bleed kitting out their characters. Once kitted out they get bored as there is no new shiny carrot for them to obtain and flaunting (at best) or ganking players (depending on the game) who have no chance because of gear innequality. They rile their guild to start slamming the boards and customer service demanding bigger and more shiny carrots. Developers see this as easy money as these guilds will buy new raid content through expansions no matter how poorly made the raid content is. Raiders go back to holding a 6 hour job every night banging out the new content for a chance at gear bliss.
Now this would be fine, but this cycle causes new gear to be obnoxiously overpowered compared to existing gear. The gear innequality continues... The longer the game goes the more idiotic the gear power becomes... The game starts to revolve around gear forcing anyone who wants to stay competative to raid.
Tell you what... I would be completely fine with raid content in the game as long as there was no rewards other than xp and karma... You know how many raiders would do the content... none. HC raid guilds care about one thing only... getting their next gear fix. Take that away and they have no reason to raid. Like the previous poster said... Raiding is boring... After running the same content 20 times there is no challenge. It is just another form of grind.
It simply has no place in GW2. Those that want raiding in the game will eventially demand GW2 become gear centric. It happens in every game where raiding is implamented.
-Atziluth-
- Never underestimate the predictability of stupidity.
Like this many things, the spirit of raiding is fantastic. The execution is highly flawed.
In spirit, raiding is about you and a massive group of people fighting an arduous, horribly challenging battle against overwhelming odds and being rewarded in kind.
In practice, raiding here's some of the things I've had to endure that make me hate the current iteration of raiding in most MMOs.
Being passed up for raid slots because the guild leader wants his wife's idiot brother to come in.
Wiping for 20+ hours a week on the same fight, generally because of 1-2 complete idiots that refuse to get even simple mechanics.
Being told "This is a massive upgrade for you, but not really one for me. But I still want it and I have 2x the DKP you do, so don't bother" (Oh, and the guy vendored the item a week later.
Loot drama
Player drama
Having to wait 45 minutes because the main healer was busy arguing with his wife.
Being the only person alive in teh goddamn Heigan dance for 15 minutes (as a tank) before the sucker finally killed me.
Seeing that (as a tank) I'm beating 4 DPS in damage, and one of them bitches it's my fault we hit an enrage timer 6 times. Oh, and the POS needs on my gear and wins it. then bails.
In short; Raiding would be great, if it weren't for the raiders.
Well that, and the mechanics are so dumb stupid anymore..I have literally gotten up, made a snack, come back, and my character is still alive and holding aggro.
Good guilds dont have these things I'm talking US 500 and above type guilds. Top server guilds. I know everyone can't get in a good guild for whatever reason, but I just wanted to point out that a lot of people don't have these problems with raiding.
Good guilds. Top server guilds. And then you say "a lot of people don't have these problems". You do realize, that you are talking about probably the top 0.5% (or less) of the player base here. The large majority is not in this position.
I was in one of the top guilds on my server in RIFT for raid progression (this is my most recent "hardcore raiding" experience) and there was still drama with loot at times. There was drama with leaders (especially when people quit playing), change of leadership, change of loot rules, etc. There was still drama with people getting cut due to favoritism or them just sucking. There was a shit load of wiping ... that is what a progression guild does ... bash your head against a brick wall until you figure out a strategy.
The truth of the matter is, there is a very small amount of the player base than even reaches this content ... let alone finishes it. Then, people whine, and the content gets dumbed down to easy mode. Then they put in a raid finder. It isn't "raiding" anymore at that point. That isn't what I call "raiding" nor what I want to see happen in any game. I want a CHALLENGE!
I want challenging content, but I don't want to see it dumbed down to sub-retard levels so anyone can complete it. Or else, what is the point? I think ArenaNet is doing a good job making everything accessible, and not "requiring" people to do certain things to be on par with other players.
Just giving some cool titles, or sweet looking armor is enough for me to want to complete the content, and that is what I am going to do. I can't wait to bash my bloodied forhead against a wall for hours on end trying to finish some dungeon/event boss. I am in it for the challenge
Some Dynamic Events later on will be "like Raids" for example the Shatterer encounter. I'm positive there will be more of those.
Exactly, there were "raid like" encounters I even had in the BWE. I don't want to spoil anything, but there was one bigass boss I got to fight in a swamp with tons of people. It was awesome.
And the Shatterer isn't even one of the "real dragons" ... there is a lot of room for some epic and awesome stuff in GW2, I can't wait to try it out.
If a raid gives the best loot and that loot is only really needed to raid harder content, then why do non-raiders care what loot drops in raids if it isn't something that they will need for the content they will experience. As long as the developers make content for everyone then why care?
I have no problem with this way of thinking if the raid gear only works in raids ... oh, but no raider will stand for that, will they? They want the advantage the uber gear gives them while doing the game's other content, also. Why? Because they "earned" it.
*****
Raids started as really fun, challenging encounters, something truly exceptional. The problem is that they've evolved. They are now one of the three pillars in developer plans to keep people happily p(l)aying. If raiding has a bad name now, blame Blizzard. They're the ones who re-invented the raid as hamster wheel, and of course, everyone whoi wants a piece of the pie thinks they need to do the same.
At the moment, I'm happy with what I know about GW2's content. While it would not hurt my feelings if dungeons were doable (and scaled) in larger groups, I suspect that with the game requirements as they are, the dungeons would have to feature less graphics on the part of the environment/mobs to still ping smoothly along with much larger groups of players. However, if dungeon "raids" were to become available, there should not be "greater" rewards for doing the instance with more people.
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man. -- George Bernard Shaw
For me the most fun part in my mmo-time was raiding in EQ I and the first years of WoW - I'm not talking about the whole loot treadmill and all the problems that go along with this, but having some tasks you can only complete in a coordinated group can be really rewarding. I even liked the whole 'pre-raid' preparation with all the gathering, questing etc. needed for buffs, potions and alike.
It became unbarable for me once all those group finder tools came into place, hardmode vs easymode, content made so that it can be done with different sized groups, the virtual item resets... it started to make all this into a much more anonymous item hunt.
For me among the biggest problems was that developers intially only focused on the very selected few who (for whatever reasons) menaged to take part of these raids and a large part was left out. There should be some unique rewards imho, but if this is more of visual nature and doesn't effect the other parts of the game it's a type of content for those players who enjoy it.
On a semi-related note: I enjoy smaller group content that is easily accessible for everyone too, but I loved as well the smaller group content that was really hard, took more than 1h+ to complete and required some preperation.
In short: I don't think raiding is bad at all - but you need to offer other enjoyable content for those who don't like that sort of thing. Content that is made for a large group of players working together is what makes these games 'mmo'rpgs for me.
Raiding is really bad in that it takes up so much time that's it's just no longer fun. When you have to organize your life around raid times for a game that's supposed to be fun, then they can just shove it.
If you have nothing else to do with your life, it's fine I guess. If they get cosmetic, cool looking gear for it, that is basically equivalent to other gear, then there is no problem with it. Those that want it can do it. Usually though the whole thing is such a chore that people only put up with it to be able to own others. And that is essentially the whole raid problem. It's just not a fun thing to do over and over again.
I've been thinking. As we get closer to the launch of GW2, I can't help at wonder why they cant' add in raiding to the game.
.......
So my question is, is raiding really bad, or is it's linear presentation giving it a bad rep? I think raiding can be done very well, especially in GW2 seeing how well they handle dynamic events. I wouldn't really mind having a 10-15 player group of friends without depending on certain classes or roles given the right environment and tools for us to feel accomplished and the sense of structed progression. Ofcourse the gear climb is always a problem, but it's always how the content was distributed I feel that made it seem pointless, frustraiting due to the trinity, or business model presented. Just a thought.
This topic has already been answered. It isn't that Anet doesn't like raiding, or that it thinks raiding is bad, it's that raiding goes counter to what they are doing, and as such doesn't fit very well into the game they are making.
The whole point of GW2 is to build a community, and encourage players to work together. While raiding can build A community, it doesn't really help the community as a whole. The whole concept of raiding revolves around gathering the best bunch of people you can find, to grind the best dungeon better than everyone else. This not only breeds competition between guilds, but also pits people within the same server against each other. Anet has created this game with the idea that players within the same server are working together, against other servers instead of their own. Adding in raids would be counter-productive to this design choice.
Most recent MMORPGs include some form of raiding, aka events for premade larger groups of players on a schedule. Those require to sacrifice a complete evening to a video game. I've been there, done that, notably in WoW, and I'm VERY glad GW2 doesn't include anything like that.
GW2 has "raid style" bosses as soon as level 15ish - but the difference is everybody can participate, and also everybody is rewarded. The WoW style raiding only breeds elitism and competition between the members of the same team (25 people come, only a few get rewarded? Come on!), while GW2's style of content promotes cooperative play and helping each other in the same team.
If you want to raid, WoW is that way, Rift that other way, EQ2 is also somewhere, LOTRO is still alive, and you even have TSW if you aren't afraid of Failcom. Thankfully GW2 offers something different in that domain too.
Respect, walk, what did you say? Respect, walk Are you talkin' to me? Are you talkin' to me? - PANTERA at HELLFEST 2023
Some Dynamic Events later on will be "like Raids" for example the Shatterer encounter. I'm positive there will be more of those.
Exactly, there were "raid like" encounters I even had in the BWE. I don't want to spoil anything, but there was one bigass boss I got to fight in a swamp with tons of people. It was awesome.
And the Shatterer isn't even one of the "real dragons" ... there is a lot of room for some epic and awesome stuff in GW2, I can't wait to try it out.
These aren't even close to raids. Someone who really likes raiding will not accept this as a substitue. There isn't any direct group coordination and they are mostly giant DPS spam fests. Just because someone rezzes you doesn't make it group content.
These aren't even close to raids. Someone who really likes raiding will not accept this as a substitue. There isn't any direct group coordination and they are mostly giant DPS spam fests. Just because someone rezzes you doesn't make it group content.
It's a level 15 (out of 80) event... people only have a few trait points and skills. Just like the first dynamic events are simple, and get more advanced as you progress, the first boss is not too hard so people can get used to the game mechanics.
I still don't remember any other MMO where you fight such a badass monster with "raid like" mechanics at level 15.
Respect, walk, what did you say? Respect, walk Are you talkin' to me? Are you talkin' to me? - PANTERA at HELLFEST 2023
I wouldn't be AGAINST having a few raids in GW2, so long as it's not the focus of what to do after leveling up to 80. It doesn't have to be uber awesome leet gear, could be just a unique set for those that happen to like getting achievements like that. The epic boss battles are a perfect example of what they could do, so they already have the setup in place...GW2 is an awesome game that gives lots of options, so why not throw the raiders a bone. Just my thoughts!
Some Dynamic Events later on will be "like Raids" for example the Shatterer encounter. I'm positive there will be more of those.
Exactly, there were "raid like" encounters I even had in the BWE. I don't want to spoil anything, but there was one bigass boss I got to fight in a swamp with tons of people. It was awesome.
And the Shatterer isn't even one of the "real dragons" ... there is a lot of room for some epic and awesome stuff in GW2, I can't wait to try it out.
These aren't even close to raids. Someone who really likes raiding will not accept this as a substitue. There isn't any direct group coordination and they are mostly giant DPS spam fests. Just because someone rezzes you doesn't make it group content.
Well, tbh, most raids are actually 'giant DPS spam fests'. There are exceptions, sure, but the vast majority are DPS races / spams. Also, these encounters in GW2 do involve coordination. Hell, even ignoring content like the Shatterer, or the Shadow Behemoth, people were complaining about how hard the frikkin' Fire shaman was.
These absolutely do need coordination. Sure there is room for random PUG players to just show up and repeatedly die, but these larger encounters need a certain amount of players to be smart about what they are doing, and coordinate on some lvl to be able to complete.
Sure, this will probably not be viewd as 'the same' by hardcore raiders. However, it won't be the difficulty and complexity of the boss fights that is different. It's the focus on controlled, specific groups, operating on a gear grind mechanic that is the change.
I've been thinking. As we get closer to the launch of GW2, I can't help at wonder why they cant' add in raiding to the game.
.......
So my question is, is raiding really bad, or is it's linear presentation giving it a bad rep? I think raiding can be done very well, especially in GW2 seeing how well they handle dynamic events. I wouldn't really mind having a 10-15 player group of friends without depending on certain classes or roles given the right environment and tools for us to feel accomplished and the sense of structed progression. Ofcourse the gear climb is always a problem, but it's always how the content was distributed I feel that made it seem pointless, frustraiting due to the trinity, or business model presented. Just a thought.
This topic has already been answered. It isn't that Anet doesn't like raiding, or that it thinks raiding is bad, it's that raiding goes counter to what they are doing, and as such doesn't fit very well into the game they are making.
The whole point of GW2 is to build a community, and encourage players to work together. While raiding can build A community, it doesn't really help the community as a whole. The whole concept of raiding revolves around gathering the best bunch of people you can find, to grind the best dungeon better than everyone else. This not only breeds competition between guilds, but also pits people within the same server against each other. Anet has created this game with the idea that players within the same server are working together, against other servers instead of their own. Adding in raids would be counter-productive to this design choice.
^QFT here. Its about community, and when you get to the nitty gritty of it, raiding separates communities. As many others have said, there are PLENTY of other choices if raiding is your most desirable feature.
I've been thinking. As we get closer to the launch of GW2, I can't help at wonder why they cant' add in raiding to the game.
As I see it, raiding isn't a feature that locks players into grinding, a horrible treadmill up a pointless latter, it was the companies that chose and implimented features that made it seem bad. For example, most raiding requires the trinity because they designed the treadmill around it and thus was able to create longevity in their game and bottlenecked players into the horrible gear grind. Some liked it, primarily those who were part of a guild dedicated enough to complete those task. But games that are progressive like GW2, I don't see why raids wouldn't be successful in it. With pass games, the raiding content was scalled based on gear level and being competent to a certain degree. Why can't raiding be skilled based and have a minior gear climb? I love the thought of progression, I actually like raiding, I just didn't like the fact that I could do a raid for 2 hours and get shafted out of loot for several reasons, or if I'm not in a dedicated guild get a raid spot or the stupid gold runs that make things even worse.
So my question is, is raiding really bad, or is it's linear presentation giving it a bad rep? I think raiding can be done very well, especially in GW2 seeing how well they handle dynamic events. I wouldn't really mind having a 10-15 player group of friends without depending on certain classes or roles given the right environment and tools for us to feel accomplished and the sense of structed progression. Ofcourse the gear climb is always a problem, but it's always how the content was distributed I feel that made it seem pointless, frustraiting due to the trinity, or business model presented. Just a thought.
there are events that are equivalent to a large raid. Dont know if this has been mentioned in the thread already. There are no systematic raids - but there are many other games that provide that kind of end game. With GW2 it just isnt the way the game is designed and it is not the intention of the game designers to have raids of the classic kind. Goin into gw2 with the mindset of being able to focus a guild on end game progression in the pve sphere is going to fail. It does not exist beyond the dungeon features that are for groups.
I've been thinking. As we get closer to the launch of GW2, I can't help at wonder why they cant' add in raiding to the game.
They can, but it's like topping a chocolate cake with chili. It's not that chili is a bad thing, it just doesn't go with chocolate cake.
GW2 is constructed under a design philosophy (recipe) meant to produce a particular kind of game (chocolate cake) that the industry hasn't seen before, and meant to appeal to players who are tired of the WoW (chili) design philosophy. A core part of that philosophy is that gear and stats do not make the character - player skill makes the character. Another part of the core philosophy is that everything that has to do with how powerful your character is, is available to everyone no matter their playstyle (casual, hardcore, soloer, uber-guilder). Another core design principle is that the entire game is the end game; as soon as you add an exclusive gear or stat progression to endgame raiding, you've buried that concept.
These are core design principles for GW2, like cocoa, flour, eggs and sugar for the chocolate cake recipe. Gear or stat progression climbs only available to those who can raid at the end-game is in conflict with these GW2 core design principles. Thus, it would be like topping a chocolate cake with chili; you ruin the cake, even if you like chili.
You might as well ask why can't arenanet put in a pure healer or tanking class; it would ruin the recipe. That doesn't make those things bad, it just means they are not suitable for this particular game.
I've been thinking. As we get closer to the launch of GW2, I can't help at wonder why they cant' add in raiding to the game.
.......
So my question is, is raiding really bad, or is it's linear presentation giving it a bad rep? I think raiding can be done very well, especially in GW2 seeing how well they handle dynamic events. I wouldn't really mind having a 10-15 player group of friends without depending on certain classes or roles given the right environment and tools for us to feel accomplished and the sense of structed progression. Ofcourse the gear climb is always a problem, but it's always how the content was distributed I feel that made it seem pointless, frustraiting due to the trinity, or business model presented. Just a thought.
This topic has already been answered. It isn't that Anet doesn't like raiding, or that it thinks raiding is bad, it's that raiding goes counter to what they are doing, and as such doesn't fit very well into the game they are making.
The whole point of GW2 is to build a community, and encourage players to work together. While raiding can build A community, it doesn't really help the community as a whole. The whole concept of raiding revolves around gathering the best bunch of people you can find, to grind the best dungeon better than everyone else. This not only breeds competition between guilds, but also pits people within the same server against each other. Anet has created this game with the idea that players within the same server are working together, against other servers instead of their own. Adding in raids would be counter-productive to this design choice.
This. Just reading through this thread, seems like every poster that really wants raids were a leader in "a Top raiding guild". Raids lead to elietism, where guilds that can get the best stuff start acting like this is important. I can see why they would act that way in a game. Lets face it, spending 6 hours a day playing a video game and you have nothing but pixels to show for it.. well most people in the real world would laugh. The game is the only place that it means anything at all. You start gettting social classes made, and then you might as well just call in blizzard to take over.
Anyways, they can either design one raid, or spread out 10 new DE's throughout the game. I would rather have the DE's.
Why can't raiding be skilled based and have a minior gear climb?
There's the problem. Either the best gear comes from raiding, or else it doesn't. You're proposing that it should. People interested in GW2 tend not to be looking for a generic WoW-clone--and mandatory raiding is one of the major complaints about WoW-clones.
Has there ever been a raiding game where you didn't have to go raiding to get the best gear? My experience has been that raiders insist that raiding should give the best gear, and getting the best gear in the game is most of the point of raiding. Most won't explicitly admit that, but will implicitly admit it when they claim that raiding needs to give the best gear, as otherwise, no one would do it.
^ Agreed. Im wondering why you are proposing raids give players that do them the best gear, when that was the whole problem with raids in the first place. :-/
And who knows, maybe Anet will introduce a 8 or 10 man dungeon at some point...after all GW1 was an 8 man system. But I wouldn't want the traditional raid style, and like that they have many world bosses, that bring the whole community together. We don't really know what they have planned for lvl 80 people...the content in GW1 after level 20 was incredibly substantial, so I am not worried at all how much content will be avaliable PVE for max level people
EDIT: I was in PALS in Laughing Skull in WoW for a long time, 10 and 25 raids, one of the top raiding guilds in the game. I don't want GW2 to have raids just because i found them fun (at times) in WoW. If Anet decides at some point down the line, that a raid-type dungeon would work best for a certain boss or group of bosses, then I have no problem with them doing that--but at the same time, I'm confident they'll decide the format for content wisely
Raiding is not inherantly good or bad it has just been the norm for many years. I and everyone I play with welcome the change and have loved every second we have spent in GW2.
People like to peacock. Raiders are no different. "look at me, I look so leet"
I never understood it. I hated not getting into hard mode instances because my GS was 50 too low. How the hell do I get my GS up if I can't move on to instances that drop better gear? That's the "raiding" mentality.
In my opinion, they could make a raid but for only cosmetic items. But then none of the raiders would do it as it doesn't make them leet enough.
I don't mind if they have raiding, but I am getting a bit tired of raiding being the best source of gear, even though it isn't harder than most group content. The hardest part of raiding is finding 10+ other players who aren't mentally handicapped.
I will say that I enjoyed raiding in EQ2, but that was mostly the scripts, which could easily have been done in a 6 player group. In fact my favourite fight was Varsoon who was a group mob.
So yeah, add raiding for all I care and have different armor skins, but don't make it the best source of gear. Will be interesting to see how many people are actually interested in raiding once the gear advantage is removed.
Comments
I dont see raiding as bad...if done right can be really fun.
I wouldnt mind seeing PvPvE raids (would have to be no longer than an hour and queable)
Something like Artrec Valley comes to mind, but more extensive of course.
Uhh... what?
No, raiding sucks because it creates a vicious development cycle which ruins MMOs. Guilds run raids until their fingers bleed kitting out their characters. Once kitted out they get bored as there is no new shiny carrot for them to obtain and flaunting (at best) or ganking players (depending on the game) who have no chance because of gear innequality. They rile their guild to start slamming the boards and customer service demanding bigger and more shiny carrots. Developers see this as easy money as these guilds will buy new raid content through expansions no matter how poorly made the raid content is. Raiders go back to holding a 6 hour job every night banging out the new content for a chance at gear bliss.
Now this would be fine, but this cycle causes new gear to be obnoxiously overpowered compared to existing gear. The gear innequality continues... The longer the game goes the more idiotic the gear power becomes... The game starts to revolve around gear forcing anyone who wants to stay competative to raid.
Tell you what... I would be completely fine with raid content in the game as long as there was no rewards other than xp and karma... You know how many raiders would do the content... none. HC raid guilds care about one thing only... getting their next gear fix. Take that away and they have no reason to raid. Like the previous poster said... Raiding is boring... After running the same content 20 times there is no challenge. It is just another form of grind.
It simply has no place in GW2. Those that want raiding in the game will eventially demand GW2 become gear centric. It happens in every game where raiding is implamented.
-Atziluth-
- Never underestimate the predictability of stupidity.
Good guilds. Top server guilds. And then you say "a lot of people don't have these problems". You do realize, that you are talking about probably the top 0.5% (or less) of the player base here. The large majority is not in this position.
I was in one of the top guilds on my server in RIFT for raid progression (this is my most recent "hardcore raiding" experience) and there was still drama with loot at times. There was drama with leaders (especially when people quit playing), change of leadership, change of loot rules, etc. There was still drama with people getting cut due to favoritism or them just sucking. There was a shit load of wiping ... that is what a progression guild does ... bash your head against a brick wall until you figure out a strategy.
The truth of the matter is, there is a very small amount of the player base than even reaches this content ... let alone finishes it. Then, people whine, and the content gets dumbed down to easy mode. Then they put in a raid finder. It isn't "raiding" anymore at that point. That isn't what I call "raiding" nor what I want to see happen in any game. I want a CHALLENGE!
I want challenging content, but I don't want to see it dumbed down to sub-retard levels so anyone can complete it. Or else, what is the point? I think ArenaNet is doing a good job making everything accessible, and not "requiring" people to do certain things to be on par with other players.
Just giving some cool titles, or sweet looking armor is enough for me to want to complete the content, and that is what I am going to do. I can't wait to bash my bloodied forhead against a wall for hours on end trying to finish some dungeon/event boss. I am in it for the challenge
Some Dynamic Events later on will be "like Raids" for example the Shatterer encounter. I'm positive there will be more of those.
Block the trolls, don't answer them, so we can remove the garbage from these forums
Exactly, there were "raid like" encounters I even had in the BWE. I don't want to spoil anything, but there was one bigass boss I got to fight in a swamp with tons of people. It was awesome.
And the Shatterer isn't even one of the "real dragons" ... there is a lot of room for some epic and awesome stuff in GW2, I can't wait to try it out.
I have no problem with this way of thinking if the raid gear only works in raids ... oh, but no raider will stand for that, will they? They want the advantage the uber gear gives them while doing the game's other content, also. Why? Because they "earned" it.
*****
Raids started as really fun, challenging encounters, something truly exceptional. The problem is that they've evolved. They are now one of the three pillars in developer plans to keep people happily p(l)aying. If raiding has a bad name now, blame Blizzard. They're the ones who re-invented the raid as hamster wheel, and of course, everyone whoi wants a piece of the pie thinks they need to do the same.
At the moment, I'm happy with what I know about GW2's content. While it would not hurt my feelings if dungeons were doable (and scaled) in larger groups, I suspect that with the game requirements as they are, the dungeons would have to feature less graphics on the part of the environment/mobs to still ping smoothly along with much larger groups of players. However, if dungeon "raids" were to become available, there should not be "greater" rewards for doing the instance with more people.
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man. -- George Bernard Shaw
For me the most fun part in my mmo-time was raiding in EQ I and the first years of WoW - I'm not talking about the whole loot treadmill and all the problems that go along with this, but having some tasks you can only complete in a coordinated group can be really rewarding. I even liked the whole 'pre-raid' preparation with all the gathering, questing etc. needed for buffs, potions and alike.
It became unbarable for me once all those group finder tools came into place, hardmode vs easymode, content made so that it can be done with different sized groups, the virtual item resets... it started to make all this into a much more anonymous item hunt.
For me among the biggest problems was that developers intially only focused on the very selected few who (for whatever reasons) menaged to take part of these raids and a large part was left out. There should be some unique rewards imho, but if this is more of visual nature and doesn't effect the other parts of the game it's a type of content for those players who enjoy it.
On a semi-related note: I enjoy smaller group content that is easily accessible for everyone too, but I loved as well the smaller group content that was really hard, took more than 1h+ to complete and required some preperation.
In short: I don't think raiding is bad at all - but you need to offer other enjoyable content for those who don't like that sort of thing. Content that is made for a large group of players working together is what makes these games 'mmo'rpgs for me.
Raiding is really bad in that it takes up so much time that's it's just no longer fun. When you have to organize your life around raid times for a game that's supposed to be fun, then they can just shove it.
If you have nothing else to do with your life, it's fine I guess. If they get cosmetic, cool looking gear for it, that is basically equivalent to other gear, then there is no problem with it. Those that want it can do it. Usually though the whole thing is such a chore that people only put up with it to be able to own others. And that is essentially the whole raid problem. It's just not a fun thing to do over and over again.
i'm quite happy that they don't waste ressources on raiding (and other useless things like 'housing' (lol)).
pvp is the main part. it should stay that way.
This topic has already been answered. It isn't that Anet doesn't like raiding, or that it thinks raiding is bad, it's that raiding goes counter to what they are doing, and as such doesn't fit very well into the game they are making.
The whole point of GW2 is to build a community, and encourage players to work together. While raiding can build A community, it doesn't really help the community as a whole. The whole concept of raiding revolves around gathering the best bunch of people you can find, to grind the best dungeon better than everyone else. This not only breeds competition between guilds, but also pits people within the same server against each other. Anet has created this game with the idea that players within the same server are working together, against other servers instead of their own. Adding in raids would be counter-productive to this design choice.
Most recent MMORPGs include some form of raiding, aka events for premade larger groups of players on a schedule. Those require to sacrifice a complete evening to a video game. I've been there, done that, notably in WoW, and I'm VERY glad GW2 doesn't include anything like that.
GW2 has "raid style" bosses as soon as level 15ish - but the difference is everybody can participate, and also everybody is rewarded. The WoW style raiding only breeds elitism and competition between the members of the same team (25 people come, only a few get rewarded? Come on!), while GW2's style of content promotes cooperative play and helping each other in the same team.
If you want to raid, WoW is that way, Rift that other way, EQ2 is also somewhere, LOTRO is still alive, and you even have TSW if you aren't afraid of Failcom. Thankfully GW2 offers something different in that domain too.
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- PANTERA at HELLFEST 2023
These aren't even close to raids. Someone who really likes raiding will not accept this as a substitue. There isn't any direct group coordination and they are mostly giant DPS spam fests. Just because someone rezzes you doesn't make it group content.
It's a level 15 (out of 80) event... people only have a few trait points and skills. Just like the first dynamic events are simple, and get more advanced as you progress, the first boss is not too hard so people can get used to the game mechanics.
I still don't remember any other MMO where you fight such a badass monster with "raid like" mechanics at level 15.
Respect, walk
Are you talkin' to me? Are you talkin' to me?
- PANTERA at HELLFEST 2023
I wouldn't be AGAINST having a few raids in GW2, so long as it's not the focus of what to do after leveling up to 80. It doesn't have to be uber awesome leet gear, could be just a unique set for those that happen to like getting achievements like that. The epic boss battles are a perfect example of what they could do, so they already have the setup in place...GW2 is an awesome game that gives lots of options, so why not throw the raiders a bone. Just my thoughts!
The Deep Web is sca-ry.
Well, tbh, most raids are actually 'giant DPS spam fests'. There are exceptions, sure, but the vast majority are DPS races / spams. Also, these encounters in GW2 do involve coordination. Hell, even ignoring content like the Shatterer, or the Shadow Behemoth, people were complaining about how hard the frikkin' Fire shaman was.
These absolutely do need coordination. Sure there is room for random PUG players to just show up and repeatedly die, but these larger encounters need a certain amount of players to be smart about what they are doing, and coordinate on some lvl to be able to complete.
Sure, this will probably not be viewd as 'the same' by hardcore raiders. However, it won't be the difficulty and complexity of the boss fights that is different. It's the focus on controlled, specific groups, operating on a gear grind mechanic that is the change.
Horizontal progression raiding can be extremely sattisfying.
Just add really rare cosmetic rewards, a great story line, extremely hard progression and achievements.
I think GW2 would be the perfect game to do this.
^QFT here. Its about community, and when you get to the nitty gritty of it, raiding separates communities. As many others have said, there are PLENTY of other choices if raiding is your most desirable feature.
there are events that are equivalent to a large raid. Dont know if this has been mentioned in the thread already. There are no systematic raids - but there are many other games that provide that kind of end game. With GW2 it just isnt the way the game is designed and it is not the intention of the game designers to have raids of the classic kind. Goin into gw2 with the mindset of being able to focus a guild on end game progression in the pve sphere is going to fail. It does not exist beyond the dungeon features that are for groups.
They can, but it's like topping a chocolate cake with chili. It's not that chili is a bad thing, it just doesn't go with chocolate cake.
GW2 is constructed under a design philosophy (recipe) meant to produce a particular kind of game (chocolate cake) that the industry hasn't seen before, and meant to appeal to players who are tired of the WoW (chili) design philosophy. A core part of that philosophy is that gear and stats do not make the character - player skill makes the character. Another part of the core philosophy is that everything that has to do with how powerful your character is, is available to everyone no matter their playstyle (casual, hardcore, soloer, uber-guilder). Another core design principle is that the entire game is the end game; as soon as you add an exclusive gear or stat progression to endgame raiding, you've buried that concept.
These are core design principles for GW2, like cocoa, flour, eggs and sugar for the chocolate cake recipe. Gear or stat progression climbs only available to those who can raid at the end-game is in conflict with these GW2 core design principles. Thus, it would be like topping a chocolate cake with chili; you ruin the cake, even if you like chili.
You might as well ask why can't arenanet put in a pure healer or tanking class; it would ruin the recipe. That doesn't make those things bad, it just means they are not suitable for this particular game.
This. Just reading through this thread, seems like every poster that really wants raids were a leader in "a Top raiding guild". Raids lead to elietism, where guilds that can get the best stuff start acting like this is important. I can see why they would act that way in a game. Lets face it, spending 6 hours a day playing a video game and you have nothing but pixels to show for it.. well most people in the real world would laugh. The game is the only place that it means anything at all. You start gettting social classes made, and then you might as well just call in blizzard to take over.
Anyways, they can either design one raid, or spread out 10 new DE's throughout the game. I would rather have the DE's.
^ Agreed. Im wondering why you are proposing raids give players that do them the best gear, when that was the whole problem with raids in the first place. :-/
And who knows, maybe Anet will introduce a 8 or 10 man dungeon at some point...after all GW1 was an 8 man system. But I wouldn't want the traditional raid style, and like that they have many world bosses, that bring the whole community together. We don't really know what they have planned for lvl 80 people...the content in GW1 after level 20 was incredibly substantial, so I am not worried at all how much content will be avaliable PVE for max level people
EDIT: I was in PALS in Laughing Skull in WoW for a long time, 10 and 25 raids, one of the top raiding guilds in the game. I don't want GW2 to have raids just because i found them fun (at times) in WoW. If Anet decides at some point down the line, that a raid-type dungeon would work best for a certain boss or group of bosses, then I have no problem with them doing that--but at the same time, I'm confident they'll decide the format for content wisely
Raiding is not inherantly good or bad it has just been the norm for many years. I and everyone I play with welcome the change and have loved every second we have spent in GW2.
People like to peacock. Raiders are no different. "look at me, I look so leet"
I never understood it. I hated not getting into hard mode instances because my GS was 50 too low. How the hell do I get my GS up if I can't move on to instances that drop better gear? That's the "raiding" mentality.
In my opinion, they could make a raid but for only cosmetic items. But then none of the raiders would do it as it doesn't make them leet enough.
I don't mind if they have raiding, but I am getting a bit tired of raiding being the best source of gear, even though it isn't harder than most group content. The hardest part of raiding is finding 10+ other players who aren't mentally handicapped.
I will say that I enjoyed raiding in EQ2, but that was mostly the scripts, which could easily have been done in a 6 player group. In fact my favourite fight was Varsoon who was a group mob.
So yeah, add raiding for all I care and have different armor skins, but don't make it the best source of gear. Will be interesting to see how many people are actually interested in raiding once the gear advantage is removed.