1:41:03 Preach is talking to you, Asmongold LMAO 1:52 Why Preach starts to play GW2 5:52 What did Preach think about GW2 when it 1st came out 11:05 Teapot reminds the player how grindy HoT was at 1st launch.... 400HP nerf to 250HP to unlock new spec.... 24:09 and it happened to Preach's story again yesterday Anet... but I guess you were watching bc you made Preach couldn't pull his favorite mount skin until the last ticket lmao 28:57 Talk about the damage output system 30:47 Teapot explains why it is so difficult to balance the classes 35:24 Talk about the elitist within GW2 community... You can check out the comments of those ... not so popular gw2 content creators' channels. There are some elitists who leave comments that look like bullies to me. I'm not sure who they follow or believe in but they like to implement their thoughts to others and deny other ways to play a class even though the vid is about open world content. (36:27 Chat starts to spam certain lines here, I guess there are many disagreements and I hope Preach can notice that as well) 42:1348:44 Why Preach doesn't really like the raid structure(?) system in GW2 1:01:34 Talk about the issue of the damage meter absent 1:14:50 Preach's raid experience in gw2 so far 1:26:24 Preach's experience of the story so far 1:47:00 1:57:01 lol 1:48:50 Leadership of Anet 2:00:40 What surprises Preach in GW2... 2:10:23 How long would Preach plan to stay in each game for the MMOs project? And how about GW2? 2:14:47 Preach loves mini games in Gw2
Yea I also believe the first statement was kinda directed at Asmongold. I mean everyone calls him the "biggest MMO streamer and content creator" yet he has never ever played GW2 which is a solid, consolidated MMO, one that has for certain achieved the test of time. I've heard Asmongold a couple of times talking about GW2 and why he hasn't played it and tbh he has shared some fair takes and some others that I'm like "wtf are u talking about brother". For example, he has said that he has seen GW2 videos/streams and that the game doesn't seem interesting to him at all (which is fair I think, kinda), but sometimes he has said super weird stuff like I remember once he said something like "I have a friend who played (or plays?) GW2 and told me the game is trash because it doesn't respect your time" like wtf? The only thing I kinda agree is the issue regarding games that have inconveniences that are solved through the cash shop (in the case of GW2 being bank tabs, bag slots, etc) which I personally don't like but I feel like the game is so good you kinda forget about it because you're too busy having fun. I think that he probably hasn't tried GW2 because he's too lazy I mean he played FFXIV and left like in the middle of Stormblood (iirc?), probably he's just too hooked to WoW (being his main game together with PoE I think) and also because hes just trapped in the reaction content swamp/quicksand due to how easy and profitable it is, then I assume there is the org, family stuff, health issues, etc, etc so yea probably trying GW2 or finishing FFXIV aren't even close in his list of priorities in terms of content, and that considering as far as I've seen, he's focusing in new MMOs more rather than playing older ones that are already consolidated.
I started playing GW2 after watching some of Preach's playthrough. I found Teapot while trying to learn some more details of the game. I'm excited to listen to your discussion!
I’m very glad to hear preach. He’s got a lot of experience and isn’t a push over. TeaPot is very knowledgeable about GW2 and has a lot of love, but also has a big personality about the game. He usually persuades others to agree and I like that preach points out the flaws with the game and trying to hear the rebuttals. I think this is needed to improve the game overall and it’s great to see these two!
@@dropsey3007 Im pretty certain the hair plugs were apart of a Challange, to do with a Money raiser For charity lol, He didnt go out and get hair plugs randomly. his stream kept telling him to get them, And during a charity raiser he had hair plugs as one of them, which his audience delved into, i dont think he was ever insecure about balding lol.
The part Preach said about boons contributing to 60% of others' damage is kinda true. There are so many times in raids when one of the boondps dies and the group be like " Alac/Quick died let's gg" Even though if we look at the DPS meters, boon dps can do like 60% of pure DPS builds, yet we choose to stick to relying on 2 people for quickness and alac and hope they dont die (I know deaths should not happen in good groups).
Originally, when content had no roles, after someone died, everyone died anyway, and this created a small group of elite who kicked out of the team after one mistake so boons in their current form is the answer to that situation that everyone is needed. Even when your boon DPS dies, it's still worth having
True in raids probably- but my in my 6ish months q-healing- I've died plenty of times and never have we had to gg outside of Boneskinner. (And in the situation I am thinking of, we had someone switch to HS and it was cake). Lets face it- tank or heals die in any mmo and essentially the group is done... so its not as big a worry as it might seem.
Awesome. Been watching preaches playthrough and was waiting for his appearance on teatime. Been interesting seeing the game from a new players perspective.
Nike not getting Preach's point is quite on brand. Preach is not complaining about having these roles of Qdps or Adps, the problem steems from your own dps being way more dependant on the boons being well stacked than your own personal performance. This is a COMMON complaint in the forums and reddit and in-game, where several players, me included, want the game to use boons more as a bonus than as a mandatory thing, and most of your dps coming out of good skill usage and gear. There's nothing wrong with you having like 80% of your potential dps done if you are boon-less, but when the boon system QUINTUPLIFIES YOUR DAMAGE, there's something really fucking wrong with it. Yeah, WoW has tanks, and tanks are mandatory, but your personal dps doesn't depend on the tank pressing his Shield Block correctly. I am completely in favour of buffing personal dps while bringing the boon system down a notch, so you don't really depend so much on the performance of others to deal way more damage.
People forget this game was originally designed so that the boons provide moments of burst dps, then its over - very pvpish in design. THAT is why quickness was originally not a boon (it was its own category of buff), gave 2x attack speed and only ONE class (mesmer, time warp) had the ability to give it to the group on a long cooldown back in vanilla gw2. That is also why on launch people struggled with dungeons and orr because no one understood how powerful boons are. Over time people discovered how to permanently maintain certain boons (might, in particular with phalanx strength originally), and when HoT came out it became EVERY boon. Anet should have but didn't nip the issue in the bud when it first occurred, but I think its too late now - the playerbase has acclimated to it too much that removing it would feel pretty bad - hitting things without quickness already feels pretty unfun.
Two fantastic content creators having a great conversation. Being a long time fan and player of both GW2 and WoW, watching preach go in blind has been an enjoyable watch. I've enjoyed how he tried to stay true to the original launch sequence of the game. And I think he's done a pretty good job of looking at the game with a critical eye. Plus watching him stumble into some of those assumptions has been at times comical. But what I most enjoy is the contrast. (Which took place in this conversation, much to the chats dismay.) I have played something like 12 MMO's, with accounts in WoW, GW2, ESO, & EVE hitting thousands of hours. That experience shows they all do MMO's similar enough that it looks the same on the surface. But the moment you delve into any kind of detail, you realize each game is vastly different. So the fun becomes seeing how different Dev teams solved similar problems. You see that in the raid discussion around the trinity or boon systems. Really, neither are perfect, both offer serious flaws. But they were two methods to approach a similar problem set. In fact, the boon system was created as a reaction to WoW's trinity design. One directly influenced the other. And so we can also see how the genera has shifted over time, as later developers learned from the strengths and weaknesses of the previous. It's not to say one is right and another is wrong, rather one is an apple while the other is an orange. Stepping back simply shows the advantages and disadvantages to choices made. And exploring those satisfies an intellectual curiosity as an MMO fan. I will say having played quite a few now, I would have to agree with him. I think what GW2 does best: It allows each player to find something interesting and set there own goals. That is a double edge sword, it's why the game comes of as casual. As the game isn't forcing your path through it. But, it offer tremendous freedom for those who don't need there hand held as they walk to the next ride. I can't say that for any other MMO with the same emphasis, save perhaps EVE. That and I truly adore my WvW
Watching Preach try to get gold on one of the time trials for hours, without maxing his glider masteries..... he is going to go batshit for roller beetle races and griffon challenges.
Great episode. How interesting that Preach didn't seem to care for flying mounts. Maybe it's because he just hasn't accessed them yet? The Griffon & Skyscale are game-changing and so much fun. GW2's mount system and flying mounts (specifically) are probably my favorite aspect of the game.
They are a grind unless u have gold for griffon. They ruin some of GW2 beautiful world when I just wheeze past everything. Preach is combat and raid mechanic guy. Doesn’t care much about flying beside first few time probably. And he had a bad experience with flying mount in mordemoth fight Or who knows he might get addicted to the race time trial
Skyscale is the worst thing that Anet added to the game, change my mind. It just destroyed so much of the beautiful open world experience and also many great fights such as Dragon's Stand. I personally think Griffon was the perfect flying mount for this game, considering we already had Springer to reach the high ground.
@@TheAsheron Interesting take! I guess everybody is different. I love the Griffon mount and didn't mind the grind/collection for it. It has a ton of personality and I like how much it rewards skillful piloting. Skyscale, on the other hand, was significantly more effort to get, but at least there's a super cute part of the quest (spoilers for Preach) and that was enjoyable.
@@epto For sure, I can't disagree that Skyscale totally changes certain encounters. You're spot on. Griffon is personally my favorite mount (by far), but alternating between Skyscale/Griffon depending on the situation works well. Once the Skyscale has all of its masteries unlocked, it pairs super well with Griffon.
Flying is pretty controversial in wow so that might influence his opinions, it pretty much empties out the open world zones except for a 30 foot radius around the easiest world quests, blizz seems to be unhappy that they can't put the genie back in the bottle, everytime they launch an expac without flying there's a very vocal crowd that complains until flying is implemented, then open world pvp and most non instanced content dies and the rest of the community complains I have played very little of dragonflight even though it seems to be one of their best expacs, this is just my impression from plenty of playtime pre shadowlands
Some comments from someone that has played both wow and ff xiv as well as gw2. (done end game in all 3 games) My journey in gw2 started when the game came out, but was dissapointed as there was not any pve end game content that I enjoyed came back each expansion but never truly stayed. Until end of dragons when I decided to try out the game again. Been loving it currently (playing it alongside of ff xiv). I actually think in terms of casual perspective for people it is probably the best mmorpg game available if you still wish to do end game content in addition to everything else amazing that the game has to offer story, pvp, exploration, fashion and so on. Since in a sense you never get behind of the curve, as gear is stagnant in a sense since once you reach ascended gear status which does not take long at all. You are pretty much set for eternity. Thus, gearing is insanely easy in my opinion as well as most raids, strikes and fractals are also quite easy (obviously few exceptions) However, in regards to Teapots comment about gatekeeping and elitism. I would VERY heavily pushback his argument. There is an insane amount of end game pve gatekeeping. 1) Commander tag, I literally bought this via real money, just because I got tired of trying to organize pug groups without it. Had so many bad experiences of people joining and telling us that they wont tell us their role since we do not have a commander. Or just someone joining, taking over and then kicking us out, or merging us with some random other group. 2) I would say majority of raid groups/strike groups are KP locked. Most groups demand some freaking 250 kill proof on a boss that is very easy. (another topic would be the worst system in existence of having to hold on to some random trophies from bosses or integrate some external website tool to showcase your kills of a boss) I quite rarely see groups that say everyone welcome outside of stuff like IBS3. 3) his argument about people not caring. They definitely do. I usually like to try off meta builds in easy strikes like IBS3/DS and so on. But even there I have been complained to so many times (before the strike has even started so not an issue about dps or healing) about not playing meta. 4) People even look at your ach points and assume you are total trash. Before even seeing your performance. 5) I probably would had never raided unless I made my own groups and I studied the encounters alone. Totally unrelated but on the boon topic, I merely hate the fact that its constant stacking more or less. Makes the game much less exciting.
BASED. I’ve experienced everything you have almost to the “T”. I get a lot if pushback when I’ve brought this up in game and in other comments. Maybe it was not like this when most of these vets were new but but it’s def like this now in my experiences.
I had a lot of these experiences years ago shortly after HoT launch. Obviously people have gotten even more anal about gatekeeping skill level. I can honestly say I have met some of my best friends in GW, but also some of the most vile people in existence. Just a weird fucking community 🙃
100% and it gives the players that want to give more of their time, just rewards for that additional expense. It's a win for everyone. Arenanet is the gold standard in innovation and content quality, generally speaking.
@@jgsource552cosmetics meaning what? Both games have cosmetics you can acquire via activities/achivements and microtransactions, GW2 however let's you trade gold for gems/gems for gold
Just want to clarify before I mention this, I don't think Preach's take is inherently bad, it just might need to be something he gets used to if he keeps playing GW2. Most professions have an option for everything. Everything but warrior and necro has group alacrity (and healing pepepga), everything but ranger has group quickness. Most people can try playing a more important role without changing profession, and playing multiple roles can be quite fun. For example, if Preach likes his sword/sword revenant, then he can play his DPS vindicator, OR he can do quickness DPS herald, without really changing playstyle for Shiro and his weapons. He provides quickness, might, fury, protection, and can change his non-Glint legend for something like Jalis (dwarf) for stability or ventari (centaur) for the bubble. Alternatively, he could play Renegade for an alacrity source, and both renegade and herald can potentially provide healing roles with quickness or alacrity respectively.
It's something that flows easily for veterans, because many of us have collected a huge variety of builds and are happy to fill whichever role. It makes sense why Preach would be concerned as a new player, since he lacks that information and has focused entirely on one build. I do hope he branches out a bit as he leans how easy it is to play multiple things.
The conversation Preach at 41:30 is really interesting to hear now about how needing certain boons may force you onto a build or class that is not fun. I felt this way for ages when Firebrand, chrono or alacren were the main boon providers, it became hard to justify bringing anything else because these classes were objectively better than any other option and not bringing them meant your whole team had a harder time. The one big W since end of dragons came out (and a little bit before if you think about scrapper, mirage and druid getting quickness/alacrity boons) is that ArenaNet recognized this trend and spread out the boon providers to more classes and specializations.
Bad ass teatime I love what preach has said about everything and as always teapot is award winning entertainment, hands down favorite content creator/streamer
Little late to this one but MY GOD such a great conversation. I love how Mighty get's so excited when he has an epiphany and wants to say something lol. Real genuine stuff and a lot of fun seeing two wrinkly brains going at it for over 2 hours. Love you guys!
"If you like MMO and you don't play guild wars, you're hurting yourself" is SOOO TRUE man. I just started week ago and i feel like an absolutely goober not trying it before.
Preach's point on quest hubs as apposed to the more explorative approach is very interesting. As gamers we actually are almost programmed to follow instructions rather than create our own paths, and I like that Guild Wars 2 does the ladder.
Even though I play WoW mainly, I think GW2 remains to be under appreciated. Probably due to that classic Anet marketing. And great interview Teapot, you're the only reason I pretty much keep up with the game nowadays lol
Best inv. Mngmnt: Always log in or log out with a bank run.. stop by a nearby merchant and purchase a few salvage kits… breakdown materials and throw into material storage…. stop by the karma merchant for some gathering picks, axes, and harvesting sickles (I buy the ones that yield extra leather on gathering & organize them in the last bag for efficiency)….. do some crafting to reduce full material storage…… now you can go adventuring (takes about 10 extra minutes if you do this in either of your logins or logouts)
Preach is right on the money when he talks about how the boon system kinda streamlines the game (and consequently the endgame community's mentality). I remember how it was when I was learing IBS Strike Missions (one-boss instances) and the leader teaching is was like "Just super-tight stack with everyone and dodge this attack on first part, and then you just be mindful of this other mechanic on phase 2". And he was reight. There is about 10 attacks/mechanics in each boss fight (always about 2-4 overlaping on each phase) but there is only 2 mechanics that are worth paying attention two (and they don't even overlap) because everything else is powered through healing+mitigation powering through it and even supposedly phases being skipped (or lasting too short to be worried about) due to the party DPS being so much higher than what was expected when the fight was designed. I hate when mechanics are entirely skipped/ignored by team composition. And I don't blame players, I blame devs who let it happen.
The game wasn’t like this up to the end of the hot era I remember on fractals back then, everyone played the fights and the mechanics. This week I did a fractal and got scolded because I wasn’t stacked to sit there and face tank. I was surprised because back in the day you actually needed to fight and dodge in the fights
2:05:27 I remember when Southsun Survival first came out, there was a dev in the match I joined, and I killed him. It was one of the most exhilarating online game experiences I've ever had. I felt like the chosen one, even though it was totally meaningless objectively, the fact that the devs played with us players was so cool. And the fact that I killed one made it all come to life for me, a bit paradoxically.
i had a similar experience in wvw, i pushed agains smc and i saw that anet symbol on that one random ranger on the ramparts and I was like "fuck they know *I'm* here, and *I* exist and matter and I'm gonna take that damn castle now"
This was a lovely watch. Having watched Preach for about a decade and having watched Teapot since I started GW2 only about a year or two ago, this was a fun collaboration.
I've been really enjoying Mike's playthrough of the game, so nice to see him start to genuinely enjoy it as well. Have been looking forward to this chat with him as well to get more of his thoughts.
One change that I would much welcome in GW2 is if they would increase buff distances by 2x or even 3x their normal range. They already made unique-class buffs into "global buffs" (boons) in order to make a cap for buffs. So right now, even in WvW or open-world bosses, wouldn't matter much if buffs would be wide-ranged because there is alreasy a cap in both buff stacks and number of targets. Then, make mechanics separate the party on the arena and let them come together on windows where they are being healed and/or the mechanic pulls them to one place. Make mechanics matter and, if you don't want to be extreme against powering-through strats/comps, then make main boss mechanics apply a special type of vulnerability debuff that can't be cleansed, but that stacks and will only be removed by not being hit by such mechanics for a time (one minute maybe). This will make healing/mitigating through viable but up to a certain limit. I just don't want most bosses in the endgame being about 25% unique and 75% of the same.
the price of freedom bit is 100% true. I have multiple level 80 chars with 75 mastery. I often find myself logging in and saying " my hero point runs are done...now what? raids, where, dungeons, no one is running them, fractals? what's that". I guess I just have a hard time finding the drive to do anything, because there's really no sense of direction or reason in the game. at least for me.
49:00 that's actually a very good point, and also exactly how we wvw roamers don't play, everyone plays their own build they like and has fun but not optimal at all when it comes to buffing eachother. I would probably much more likely join strikes / raids if I could just play my own / fav build that I like to play instead of needing to meet all these req.
To enable this, the game would have to be made so that each class had one build, which would make the game boring meanwhile in endgame context each class has between 3 and 6 build which are meta at this time so why change it
I strongly agree that WvW was the place that let players be more experimental with builds. And even if the build is the dumbest thing ever, a player can still apply some skill and be mostly effective.
@@chilliewhk yes very true, if you know what you are doing off meta builds can be harder to counter. Also for raids / strikes teapot and other tubers already proven that many builds can work well. I also love the Sui Won with all dps core ele and there I believe there where some other variants aswell.. These are examples of players having fun and even if you are not the most efficient it shouldn't matter, unless of course it is your personal preference to play this way. I dunno.. If I didn't have kids and work I would be able to find and or build a relaxed group of flexible happy people, I personally just hate it whenever I end up in a fractal / strike / raid that runs it only to be most optimal for the sake of farming efficient... To me that feels like work.
@@woof3065 A large part of more high end players is that they're also just good players. I knew guys that could swap to any class on demand and bring the same good performance on all of them. The only thing that detracts from skill is relying and maintaining on some very powerful boons. So the end result is the skill gap that Preach noticed when he saw how experienced groups clear the same content. I ruined the game for myself because I became obsessed with efficiency, and finding myself with guilds that promoted efficiency/skill but were so toxic to each other when 1 person fell behind. Players will optimize the fun out of a game given the right motivation.
@@chilliewhk yes exactly! You hit the nail right on the head. This is the kind of content I would enjoy with relaxed people like Teapot and other open minded chill guys.. But I just don't know them and I can't play on fixed appointments. In wvw I experienced the same.. 1 guild I was in first was more try hard with defined roles and there was lots of yelling and toxicity when we lost or someone made a mistake.. In the guild I am now with everyone being roamers and not depending on each other that much it's very chill. Rarely some1 get's mad if he's completely ignored / not helped. I personally always run builds and play in a way that I can help myself, because I know you can't rely on people that much, everyone plays there own game, has their focus on something that might be different from yours. If you want to play very well together you need to be on voice chat and know each other and be friends (to some level) to keep it fun.
One of the important parts, i think Preach is kind of missing out on in his playthrought, is all of the EKSTRA content zones have, that are there for collections and achivements, there so much good content there, that it makes many of the zones very replayable.
I agree that he is probably skipping a lot of cool stuff, but he also has goals set to clear the raids. I will say that if he really enjoys the game he will come back to play it.
wdym lol map is fucking god awful, "wait how the hell do i get to this event? COME ONNN I NEED THAT HERO POINT WHERE IS IT!?!?!?!" spend 3 more minutes going down levels "BRUHHHHHHH IT'S AT 10% NOW WHERE THE HELL IS IT I'VE BEEN ON THE SPOT ON THE MAP FOR 5 MINS GOING UP AND DOWN AND EVERY WHICH WAY WHERE IS THIS?!?!!?!?!? how in god's name is that fun lol
@@zeening The confusing 2d map and placement of objectives in what were supposed to be hidden or hard to get to areas contributed to a lot of frustrations. But map design and content placement are 2 different things :)
Something that I think doubly hurt guild wars 2 early on was living world. I know people loved it but it was very contrary to the “play how you like” format. I played since a few months after launch and missed season 1 because I didn’t know it was happening since I was too busy doing the things I wanted (map exploration etc). The fact that living world was there then it was gone meant that if you missed it then you missed out, which means that you absolutely should be doing it while it’s active. Of course, you had to finish the personal story to fully appreciate season 1, too. Obviously the cool part was the content stream, which is now one of the game’s current problems for established players, but the change of approach away from temporary content was really good long-term, I think.
Tera Online to me had the best Raiding experience. It had the tank in the front taking all the damage and Aggro. While the main dps are on the back of the boss dealing back damage while supports healing everyone. Not to fund of this all stack in one spot
gw2 is pretty much the only mmo that does that lol ff14 couldn't be more different but obviously very different gameplay and combat, even old janky shit like LOTRO doesn't do that though
@@euclxd8033 really? you tried to be petty and correct someone but are so dumb you made a mistake and had to go back and edit it? classic, you realize we can all see you edited it right?
Btw raids *were* in the original game! Not the raids you know but they happened in the way of world bosses. Even now, the best group content is in world bosses. The raids ingame are just larger dungeons that give currency. The original structure actually worked we just again like it is said alot of times in the stream, we just didn't get it. The game was meant to be good and it was meant to be beautiful and we are meant to just experience it. That's what I like about gw2
What's the big thing with GW2 going on right now? I see SO MANY players coming back including myself. Tomorrow it'll be 2 years and I'm coming back to give it a shot. Burnt myself out trying to grind ranked PvP as a solo lol. Hope to see everyone on the battlefield!
It's interesting to hear about Preach's opinion on boons since I've never thought of it that way, I've always assumed I'll always have the boons and most of the time I do. Searching for two alacs and two quicks has never seemed annoying or weird to me, it's just what you do. What I don't find true (for me) is "playing something I don't enjoy" because my squad needs some buffs. One of the joys is playing a wide variety of builds so I don't burn myself out playing the same thing over and over again. This is made easy because a vide variety of classes can now heal, a vide variety has access to quick/alac. I never mind healing or playing offensive support, I may play alacren one day but alac specter the next, just to keep it fresh. This may seem annoying early when you don't have any alts or other builds set up yet, but once you do you'll enjoy yourself.
For him it might be a problem just because he's new here and doesn't know how easy it is to alt in this game and have several classes and professions that can do every role. After finishing the entire story mode, dressing a new character with the necessary equipment is a matter of a few hours, not weeks as in other games.
Right, also I feel like players aren’t as rigid as other MMOs. What I mean is, let’s say you want to join a strike but they need quick which your class can’t provide. No worries, you just make/find a new group. If it’s niche content or too early/late in the day, still no problem. You can join the group and tell people that you’d really like to join but can’t do quickness, and just ask if someone would be willing to do that instead. Or, given how alt friendly the game is, if you’re serious about pve you can just have an alt. It’s very unlikely that you can’t cover ANY roles with 2-3 characters.
I feel it's kinda missing the point though. It's not a matter of how easy it is to play an alt or not. It's whether you want to. If you're the type who only likes the way one class plays then you're going to be sol in this case. Even ff14 has people like this who only play one job and that's despite that you're character can literally be all jobs at once and many roles share gear. They still don't want to swap from one to another. Which is fine. Everyone has their own playstyle. But, that is a part of what he's talking about here I think.
@@Khaoticsuccubus Then those people are actively hurting their chances to fit into groups, and frankly their understanding of the game as part of the instanced late game content is knowing the game, what classes can and can not do, etc. That's fine though, people can still find groups as pure [I refuse to play any other class I am the Reaper I move for no man] dps and ignore everything else, I just think that's stupid and they should rethink their approach to instanced content.
1:26:30 The absolute heresy! the first two story steps (lvl 1-20) are the absolute best the story has ever been in GW2. back then, our characters actually had character. After that, they devolved into see-good-am-happy, see-bad-am-angry paper-thin personalities.
Yeah some super special kind of love was given to that early progression though I still like mid core progression a bit more (around the time your character chooses their faction and starts doing things as part of the faction - up to Claw Island). But all this just shows how many different things are in the game for different players. I'm really looking forward to doing sylvari and norn story some time because I haven't tried them yet. And some other player would skip that entirely with boost and create one more human male to play WvW with a new build.
You are absolutely right about that. It had an air of personal depth and seriousness, with a story that actually brought you into a kind of 'grown up world', if I may say. Frankly I was disappointed that all the future stories (after HoT&PoF) made it a lot more fantasy-faerytale-like, with less of an air of seriousness to it. I sincerely hope they would go back towards the professionalism and character development of the origin story. Thanks for mentioning that.
Dude, I would love if Gw2 borrowed from Lost Ark with the boats and made a bit of a minigame with islands, "the mist" or w/e. Or made the boats guild sized and have a whole map filled with water, with only a little bit of the shore is earth, and water toxic or something with massive bosses that might unlock some guild stuff. Or underwater places that is insanely deep and not toxic but dark or something. Entire cities could be down there
Preach raises a good point about playing specs you don't enjoy. When we started progging HT CM I was on quick herald and I hated its playstyle (i dislike rev in general) and I asked to swap to firebrand which I am much more comfortable on. I caught so much flak from people over that solely because herald was that strong.
This is a difficult one, there is a balance between getting stuff done and progressing quickly compared to playing the build you want and it's very much up to each group to figure out how they want to go about doing things. Firebrand VS herald on HT CM is not the end of the world, but there is a huge difference between playing a vindicator vs a power daredevil on HT CM, and if everyone makes large tradeoffs because they prefer a certain build the group effectiveness will plummet. TL:DR Hard content complicates 'play what you want'
@@MightyTeapot and that's all well and good. But it does make me less interested in playing hard content. I can clear KO CM, but I basically might as well not play DPS on it because I don't play Virtuoso and that is far and away the best DPS build for that fight.
@@TFalconwing That's not really accurate, any (preferably ranged, and some melee can do very well too) DPS will be just fine for KO CM, the only time where virt is mega crazy is the first 3 minibosses which is not the major progression point (the mech + sniper is) Balance is understood extremely poorly by the community and gets massively exaggerated.
@@MightyTeapot Well, perhaps that particular example is something the community needs more education on because when I got title on that fight every DPS was a virtuoso and every week since when we do our CM clear most of the DPS are virtuosos. I have cleared it on DPS firebrand and condi soulbeast and scourge and it was very clear that I was outclassed on most phases by the virts, with the exception of the very first Li phase. At least in my experience and from my observation virt is the ideal choice for this example.
@@TFalconwing Virt is the ideal choice, and when it comes to hard content people will usually pick the ideal choice, even if it's only by 5-10% because that's better for the team, and people are trying to do their best for the team.
Oh nice, I can finish it over here now. Thanks! I only got halfway through the discussion and damn was it interesting. And fun. And just all round enjoyable.
The issue I have with GW@ is I can't find friends to play with. I also suffer from fomo and it feels like I've missed so much when I don't play for 1-2 years.
To add to the topic about power creep.... There is normal player. There is mighty Teapot who is highly professient and doing 10 times normal player damage and then there is special kind of showflake called Lord Hizen going and solo killing everything.
I hate to be the one that brings this up but.....marketing. I understand it's silly and some use it as a band aid on any problem in GW2, but I think it's a logical conclusion cause whenever I mention or recommend GW2 to a friend the first thing they say is "oh is this game still alive" literally every person I recommend the game to. I feel like GW2 is never really in the aether like other games like warframe, and whenever it does appear the gaming sphere it's related to the release of another popular game (WOW dragonflight meme).
As someone that started GW2 San a guardian learning boons became very easy since that class use booms a lot with that said I’m still trying to learn when to use them in group content
41:25 onwards is spot-on and absolutely hit the nail on the head on why high-end group content turned me off, I main a Warrior and I didn’t like how in raid settings I’m forced to fulfil the role of a bannerslave solely for the boons. Like, I’m a warrior, lemme smash things up with my greatsword instead of being a buffing cheerleader goddammit
because dps warrior doesn't exist in your reality? snowcrows.com/en/builds/warrior/berserker/power-berserker snowcrows.com/en/builds/warrior/spellbreaker/power-spellbreaker snowcrows.com/en/builds/warrior/bladesworn/power-bladesworn ?????
@@linkazzatore not at least 5 years ago when I last played the game, nah - iirc at the time Condi Berserker + bannerslave was by far the best choice and I was forced to spec to it which I hated ngl glad to see it's changed since then though!
@@hyperionnova2854 6 years ago builds without banners existed already and condi bs also doesn't run banners snowcrows.com/en/builds/warrior/berserker/condition-berserker
There is a huge influence of gw1 i to gw2, in the sense that gw1 was a classic that had a loyal base so Arenanet could not go to a wow copy. It’s the freedom, the story, the heritage. Dificult to put in words. Gw1 is Gw2 DNA.
gw2 needs to stop everything for a while and put all their money into ADS. ffs so many ppl still believe in misconceptions about the game its ridiculous
The core Tyria should go through a update before that, Theres a lot of people that can be convinced to try GW2 who have never touched it, but im sorry current core Tyria would make them stop playing, its actually awful.
The biggest issue with raiding is that for certain bosses you can't run certain builds. Unlike other mmos, the build is highly specific to the classes specializations, however for many classes, some specializations and the base of the class can have many very meta builds. Builds are not just trees and classes, gw2 is the most versatile game and each "class" can have like 8 meta builds, each requiring a LOT of investment EACH! In wow and ffxiv you can just switch between your tank and dps gear with minor variations in stats that are just as readily available as prior, but in gw2 you need a high investment into ascended gear, infusions, ascended weapons, ascended accessories and grinding the whole world to unlock your skills and then they are all HIGHLY specific to a specific build. There are a LOT of different stat combinations and getting the exact ones you need is a massive pain. Imagine you've grinded for a whole set of condition damage gear, with some alacrity pieces, not all of the set is directly transferable in 100% of cases. Then you are suddenly told you need to switch class half way through a raid because the boss phases so consistently that condition damage cannot ramp up enough and you're dps will be none-existent... You don't have a power build and maybe your class doesn't have a power build, with the only other builds having some highly specific support stats... you actually cannot continue. Bosses can have big/small hitboxes which dictates how much dps your build can do, in certain cases people need VERY niche builds such as the notorious "hand kiter" in the Deimos fight that only works for that one fight in a single raid. The meta is constantly changing and unlike other mmos where your class/build is just a bit worse or better... in gw2 your build just changes entirely and you may need to often change your entire gear. At least for pugging which is more elitist/meta-hungry than you will be told, by anyone. What is good about gw2s builds is that they more often than not absolutely and utterly change everything about the class, all the skills you use, all the weapons you use, the roles you have and all the gear/weapon requirements. It's not like wow or ffxiv, it is far far more verstaile than any other mmo. Every expansion gives all the classes a new specialization which can spawn 1-3 new builds. You'll always need new weapons for alternate specs in a class. Number of high meta builds per class at this time: Revenant has 4. Guardian has 3. Warrior has 3. Thief has 4. Ranger has 3. Engineer has 4. Necromancer has 2. Mesmer has 5. Elementalist has 5. This is the current meta builds, but each class has a few more other builds that are still perfectly viable, but not in the eye of the meta. They can still preform very well too. The issue is not all of these is viable for all of the bosses of all raids. Many will suffer extremely bad performance and even be obselete from fight to fight, and this is highly disappointing. Some builds like deadeye thief is wicked fun and cool and can hit massive numbers. You turn into a sniper and you can use a range of tools to optimize and protect yourself in your given position.
I'd need to see the source, but if the power difference between an average player and a player that knows all the optimizations is a difference of 10 times DPS, that explains a LOT for why the game's group content is as painfully easy or desperately requires playing meta. I just want to do group content that is fun and exciting without having to stick to a rotation and steal a build.
Speaking as someone who played GW1 last year in its entirety, and started GW2 last November... been having a blast. Love it. I'm up to the mid point of Living World Season 2. But my biggest criticism in terms of the story stuff? The writers desperately, desperately need to get over themselves. No, you didn't write a good character. No, I don't care about Trahearne; he's painfully, obnoxiously and persistently dull. No, I don't care about Braham and Rox. Why would I? They're not Ogden Stonehealer - they haven't proven themselves to me by actually being a vital member of my team, going through actual challenging content and keeping me alive. Half the time, they don't even acknowledge my presence, even during major story beats. What the hell happened to the heroes? Even the core campaign henchmen from GW1 were better teammates; with genuinely entertaining quips, and actual combat competence. And they never forgot who the protagonist was - ME. Us. The players. Destiny's Edge are the worst. And their entire concept is terrible. Their backstory build-up in the dungeon content? "Before you start this dungeon and actually have fun, you have to listen to a couple of these total strangers whine about their personal stuff and put that before the mission". Great work, guys; really compelling "heroes" - who abandon each other repeatedly because of personal stuff that has nothing to do with the player. And the real insult at the end? The big celebratory "you defeated Zhaitan" cutscene? Shows you walking with Destiny's Edge. Not you walking with your actual human party members, if you're playing with friends as I am - just you and Destiny's Edge. Even though they did nothing (oh, sorry, Thackery stupidly cut a rope from the bottom and nearly died for no reason, good job Thackery), and even though they never once invite you to actually join their team. The game's writing and story content is absolutely at its best when it's not self-indulgent, and either focuses on the player, or focuses on the big epic stuff. You know why everyone loves Tybalt? He's a bro. He's not smug, he's not a Mary Sue, he's just another dude who seems genuinely thrilled to be working with you, talks directly to you, and serves as a conduit for adventure instead of a "please wait until we've stopped talking" exposition dump. And the saddest thing? 90% of the core campaign, and most of the living world stuff I've done so far, would have worked absolutely fine... with none of these "hero" characters. All it required was an NPC to send the player on a mission, and let the player discover the story themselves, and directly interact with the characters associated with it. The story never needed these overtly writer-ego-driven inserts to act as middlemen. Didn't need to make the player the "Commander", and then think it's fine to ignore them. Just needed to acknowledge their agency. Needed to let them do some major story beats... alone. No hand-holding. Just say, have the Queen or the Pale Tree or whoever ask the player - as an independent but dependable adventurer - to go deal with something, to go check it out. To follow a thread. That's all it needed. Imagine, for example, if nobody knew the origin of the zombies in the core campaign. Imagine if nobody knew Orr had risen. Imagine if you, alone - because none of the major players were willing to divert resources - had to go on a long journey to the south, down the coast, to find the origin... and you, as the player, discovered this lost place, and had to report your findings, and find a way to convince the various factions and races to join forces. Imagine how much more compelling that would be, than having Trahearne tell you "Oh, I totally already knew all about Orr, and I know exactly what to do next, and I know how to use this magical sword, and this prophetic dream is all about me uniting the factions, and it's my calling to become the marshal."
I love to hear that someone else loves Xera. I always thought it was one of the coolest raid encounters but so many people in the game seem to hate it. I guess they hate it due to difficulty and maybe because of leyling gliding? But it’s often the first boss I showcase to final fantasy players to entice them to try the game.
The hardest part of explaining GW2 to an existing MMO player is that /waaay/ to many people think "MMO = Progression Raiding". That is not GW2 and that is the reason I still play it.
A good idea that would fix the issue of boons being too strong and too necessary would be to lower their efficacy and buff base damage and tanking across the board
It was like that in the beginning for two years and the game was too hard you could also lead to a situation where you give players too much power and then it would be easier than now = boredom I mean it's hard to balance Personally, I would bet on more interactive opponents and leave the current system unchanged More mechanics where you have to split up and enemies that move constantly and attack, forcing me to dodge and move The current problem is that the boss just stands there and waits for him to die and that's why support is so strong because you can stack on the boss whit little to no consequences
you can design a boss and encounter without trinity it is just much harder but is ultimately way way more rewarding to players when done good. when fractals first launched t his is how they worked. especially once you went past ag limit and everything could one shot you, everyone had to make sure they dodge everything or you failed.
I kind of have to disagree with Teapot's assessment of GW2's raiding scene not being elitist or gate-keeping. I have tried to get into raiding on multiple occasions, but for a beginner, it is too much to get into. Not because the encounters are to hard necessarily, but rather because finding a group that will take you in is super difficult. If you want to find one through the lfg, most of them have ridiculous requirements concerning kp or other aspects that someone new cannot possibly fulfill. I can pick the correct build, study up on the wiki, but almost no group will take me in just because I've not cleared it like 50 times. Most people recommend me to try raiding with a guild, and I tried, but most guilds have fixed times or schedules for when they do raid trainings, and I mostly can only decide spontaneously if I have time or not. Raiders should be more open towards new people IMO, raids are not rocket-science, but you have to give people a chance to actually SEE the mechanics for themselves to actually comprehend them. Sorry for the rant there, it just has frustrated me for a while now, because I want to play it, but the community makes it so hard for me to join in to the point of giving up on it.
The boon thing makes a lot of sense it does take away that self-control over your own performance. Teapot's point about build diversity could have had a bit more back and forth because you don't have to raid as a specific class or specialization, you have the flexibility to build your class to be effective in the role it's just someone needs to provide those buffs, as every mmo has key abilities/buffs/aspects that the party needs. It's like saying in Wow oh you don't bring threat so you can't tank, you don't cleanse/hot/heal you can't support like....yeah...the party needs those things and you can't all stack DPS in Wow either. Altering your spec for a piece of content is one of the best things about GW2, you can play 1 specialization so many different ways between Open world/ raiding/ PVP/WvW and STILL be able to switch to other specialization/weapon sets/utility abilities on your one class. In Wow let's say you're a Shaman and you want to play Enh/Ele but your raid needs a healer....well you're going Resto mate. But in GW2 it's more like depending on the game mode Resto may have different builds that play completely different, say like a traditional healer one and another that's more totems and buffs. You go Enhance and you might have a 2H burst dps build and a Dual wielding Dot DPS build and then the way you build DPS specs for PVP/WvW/Open World/Raids all play very differently. So the build diversity is huge there in comparison to 3. You're talking 5-6 across Core + 3 elite specs, in each game mode.
I remember beta and launch days as a member of Somnium coming from SWTOR with Kaeyi Dream and Mintchiplol, etc, with Kaeyi getting tight with the game devs and all us guikdies totally getting inside benefits out of it, lol. Kaeyi even got a dungeon boss named after get. Those were unforgettable times! It's been hard to be motivated to come back because the nostalgia for bygone days will be rough! Haven't talked to Kaeyi mint, or most other guikdies for years. It won't feel the same.
Even after ten years playing GW2 I still feel like boons aught to feel like a cherry on top of the build sundae. Instead it feels like we're always chasing the biggest cherry and our gear and skills and rotation are just a touch of ice cream on top of the cherry.
Learning a bunch of raid builds and learning how effective a class can be is definitely a big part of the fun in this game. Trying out all the classes and playstyles is greatly encouraged! But only after the first playthrough being blind, I think the biggest strength of the early game is just the freedom and exploration- there's no tutorials on purpose, it does not hold your hand for the most part and encourages to just use the wiki when you get stuck, the rest is all for you to figure out and enjoy.
The biggest issue with no one playing raids is that the LFG is utter trash and NO ONE uses it, so if anyone wants to raid they have to dig around for 3-4 different discords to find a group just to raid
1:41:03 Preach is talking to you, Asmongold LMAO
1:52 Why Preach starts to play GW2
5:52 What did Preach think about GW2 when it 1st came out
11:05 Teapot reminds the player how grindy HoT was at 1st launch.... 400HP nerf to 250HP to unlock new spec....
24:09 and it happened to Preach's story again yesterday Anet... but I guess you were watching bc you made Preach couldn't pull his favorite mount skin until the last ticket lmao
28:57 Talk about the damage output system
30:47 Teapot explains why it is so difficult to balance the classes
35:24 Talk about the elitist within GW2 community...
You can check out the comments of those ... not so popular gw2 content creators' channels. There are some elitists who leave comments that look like bullies to me. I'm not sure who they follow or believe in but they like to implement their thoughts to others and deny other ways to play a class even though the vid is about open world content.
(36:27 Chat starts to spam certain lines here, I guess there are many disagreements and I hope Preach can notice that as well)
42:13 48:44 Why Preach doesn't really like the raid structure(?) system in GW2
1:01:34 Talk about the issue of the damage meter absent
1:14:50 Preach's raid experience in gw2 so far
1:26:24 Preach's experience of the story so far
1:47:00 1:57:01 lol
1:48:50 Leadership of Anet
2:00:40 What surprises Preach in GW2...
2:10:23 How long would Preach plan to stay in each game for the MMOs project? And how about GW2?
2:14:47 Preach loves mini games in Gw2
Lei the MVP
@@fluffyfood Hey! Fluffy lol Good to see you here
@@Dark_Wizard_of_Mu No problem xD I enjoy watching it a lot so I hope ppl won't miss what I think is interesting as well ;D
Yea I also believe the first statement was kinda directed at Asmongold. I mean everyone calls him the "biggest MMO streamer and content creator" yet he has never ever played GW2 which is a solid, consolidated MMO, one that has for certain achieved the test of time. I've heard Asmongold a couple of times talking about GW2 and why he hasn't played it and tbh he has shared some fair takes and some others that I'm like "wtf are u talking about brother". For example, he has said that he has seen GW2 videos/streams and that the game doesn't seem interesting to him at all (which is fair I think, kinda), but sometimes he has said super weird stuff like I remember once he said something like "I have a friend who played (or plays?) GW2 and told me the game is trash because it doesn't respect your time" like wtf? The only thing I kinda agree is the issue regarding games that have inconveniences that are solved through the cash shop (in the case of GW2 being bank tabs, bag slots, etc) which I personally don't like but I feel like the game is so good you kinda forget about it because you're too busy having fun. I think that he probably hasn't tried GW2 because he's too lazy I mean he played FFXIV and left like in the middle of Stormblood (iirc?), probably he's just too hooked to WoW (being his main game together with PoE I think) and also because hes just trapped in the reaction content swamp/quicksand due to how easy and profitable it is, then I assume there is the org, family stuff, health issues, etc, etc so yea probably trying GW2 or finishing FFXIV aren't even close in his list of priorities in terms of content, and that considering as far as I've seen, he's focusing in new MMOs more rather than playing older ones that are already consolidated.
@@BaghNakh1 yeah, agree(sigh
Thank you for the great comment ;D
Preach identifying boon power creep as problematic almost instantly on trying the game. Funny that.
Finally we get these two together, so nice.
Yeah. Dumb and Dumber
Daddy 1 and daddy 2
I started playing GW2 after watching some of Preach's playthrough. I found Teapot while trying to learn some more details of the game. I'm excited to listen to your discussion!
Glad to hear Preach having a great time in Guild Wars 2!
I’m very glad to hear preach. He’s got a lot of experience and isn’t a push over. TeaPot is very knowledgeable about GW2 and has a lot of love, but also has a big personality about the game. He usually persuades others to agree and I like that preach points out the flaws with the game and trying to hear the rebuttals.
I think this is needed to improve the game overall and it’s great to see these two!
i dont trust people with hair plugs to much insecurity
@@dropsey3007 so you must got a lot of them?
@@dropsey3007 Im pretty certain the hair plugs were apart of a Challange, to do with a Money raiser For charity lol, He didnt go out and get hair plugs randomly.
his stream kept telling him to get them, And during a charity raiser he had hair plugs as one of them, which his audience delved into, i dont think he was ever insecure about balding lol.
Two of my favourite content creators coming together, love to see it!
The part Preach said about boons contributing to 60% of others' damage is kinda true.
There are so many times in raids when one of the boondps dies and the group be like " Alac/Quick died let's gg"
Even though if we look at the DPS meters, boon dps can do like 60% of pure DPS builds, yet we choose to stick to relying on 2 people for quickness and alac and hope they dont die (I know deaths should not happen in good groups).
Originally, when content had no roles, after someone died, everyone died anyway, and this created a small group of elite who kicked out of the team after one mistake so boons in their current form is the answer to that situation that everyone is needed.
Even when your boon DPS dies, it's still worth having
True in raids probably- but my in my 6ish months q-healing- I've died plenty of times and never have we had to gg outside of Boneskinner. (And in the situation I am thinking of, we had someone switch to HS and it was cake). Lets face it- tank or heals die in any mmo and essentially the group is done... so its not as big a worry as it might seem.
Awesome. Been watching preaches playthrough and was waiting for his appearance on teatime. Been interesting seeing the game from a new players perspective.
I started playing because of Preach. Really glad for this podcast
Nike not getting Preach's point is quite on brand. Preach is not complaining about having these roles of Qdps or Adps, the problem steems from your own dps being way more dependant on the boons being well stacked than your own personal performance. This is a COMMON complaint in the forums and reddit and in-game, where several players, me included, want the game to use boons more as a bonus than as a mandatory thing, and most of your dps coming out of good skill usage and gear.
There's nothing wrong with you having like 80% of your potential dps done if you are boon-less, but when the boon system QUINTUPLIFIES YOUR DAMAGE, there's something really fucking wrong with it.
Yeah, WoW has tanks, and tanks are mandatory, but your personal dps doesn't depend on the tank pressing his Shield Block correctly.
I am completely in favour of buffing personal dps while bringing the boon system down a notch, so you don't really depend so much on the performance of others to deal way more damage.
I’m curious why you do not want to be dependent on others ?
People forget this game was originally designed so that the boons provide moments of burst dps, then its over - very pvpish in design. THAT is why quickness was originally not a boon (it was its own category of buff), gave 2x attack speed and only ONE class (mesmer, time warp) had the ability to give it to the group on a long cooldown back in vanilla gw2. That is also why on launch people struggled with dungeons and orr because no one understood how powerful boons are. Over time people discovered how to permanently maintain certain boons (might, in particular with phalanx strength originally), and when HoT came out it became EVERY boon. Anet should have but didn't nip the issue in the bud when it first occurred, but I think its too late now - the playerbase has acclimated to it too much that removing it would feel pretty bad - hitting things without quickness already feels pretty unfun.
@@ghostapi874 because you have no agency over your own performance.
Two fantastic content creators having a great conversation.
Being a long time fan and player of both GW2 and WoW, watching preach go in blind has been an enjoyable watch. I've enjoyed how he tried to stay true to the original launch sequence of the game. And I think he's done a pretty good job of looking at the game with a critical eye. Plus watching him stumble into some of those assumptions has been at times comical.
But what I most enjoy is the contrast. (Which took place in this conversation, much to the chats dismay.) I have played something like 12 MMO's, with accounts in WoW, GW2, ESO, & EVE hitting thousands of hours. That experience shows they all do MMO's similar enough that it looks the same on the surface. But the moment you delve into any kind of detail, you realize each game is vastly different. So the fun becomes seeing how different Dev teams solved similar problems. You see that in the raid discussion around the trinity or boon systems. Really, neither are perfect, both offer serious flaws. But they were two methods to approach a similar problem set. In fact, the boon system was created as a reaction to WoW's trinity design. One directly influenced the other. And so we can also see how the genera has shifted over time, as later developers learned from the strengths and weaknesses of the previous.
It's not to say one is right and another is wrong, rather one is an apple while the other is an orange. Stepping back simply shows the advantages and disadvantages to choices made. And exploring those satisfies an intellectual curiosity as an MMO fan.
I will say having played quite a few now, I would have to agree with him. I think what GW2 does best: It allows each player to find something interesting and set there own goals.
That is a double edge sword, it's why the game comes of as casual. As the game isn't forcing your path through it. But, it offer tremendous freedom for those who don't need there hand held as they walk to the next ride. I can't say that for any other MMO with the same emphasis, save perhaps EVE. That and I truly adore my WvW
Watching Preach try to get gold on one of the time trials for hours, without maxing his glider masteries..... he is going to go batshit for roller beetle races and griffon challenges.
Gw2 hands down a great game but I do really want a normal LFG dungeon finder
Great episode. How interesting that Preach didn't seem to care for flying mounts. Maybe it's because he just hasn't accessed them yet? The Griffon & Skyscale are game-changing and so much fun. GW2's mount system and flying mounts (specifically) are probably my favorite aspect of the game.
They are a grind unless u have gold for griffon. They ruin some of GW2 beautiful world when I just wheeze past everything. Preach is combat and raid mechanic guy. Doesn’t care much about flying beside first few time probably. And he had a bad experience with flying mount in mordemoth fight
Or who knows he might get addicted to the race time trial
Skyscale is the worst thing that Anet added to the game, change my mind. It just destroyed so much of the beautiful open world experience and also many great fights such as Dragon's Stand. I personally think Griffon was the perfect flying mount for this game, considering we already had Springer to reach the high ground.
@@TheAsheron Interesting take! I guess everybody is different. I love the Griffon mount and didn't mind the grind/collection for it. It has a ton of personality and I like how much it rewards skillful piloting. Skyscale, on the other hand, was significantly more effort to get, but at least there's a super cute part of the quest (spoilers for Preach) and that was enjoyable.
@@epto For sure, I can't disagree that Skyscale totally changes certain encounters. You're spot on. Griffon is personally my favorite mount (by far), but alternating between Skyscale/Griffon depending on the situation works well. Once the Skyscale has all of its masteries unlocked, it pairs super well with Griffon.
Flying is pretty controversial in wow so that might influence his opinions, it pretty much empties out the open world zones except for a 30 foot radius around the easiest world quests, blizz seems to be unhappy that they can't put the genie back in the bottle, everytime they launch an expac without flying there's a very vocal crowd that complains until flying is implemented, then open world pvp and most non instanced content dies and the rest of the community complains
I have played very little of dragonflight even though it seems to be one of their best expacs, this is just my impression from plenty of playtime pre shadowlands
It's great to see so much passion for such a great MMO.
24:55 Don't think we didn't see that Smirk Teapot after Preach said it'd eventually get fixed XD.
Some comments from someone that has played both wow and ff xiv as well as gw2. (done end game in all 3 games)
My journey in gw2 started when the game came out, but was dissapointed as there was not any pve end game content that I enjoyed came back each expansion but never truly stayed. Until end of dragons when I decided to try out the game again.
Been loving it currently (playing it alongside of ff xiv). I actually think in terms of casual perspective for people it is probably the best mmorpg game available if you still wish to do end game content in addition to everything else amazing that the game has to offer story, pvp, exploration, fashion and so on. Since in a sense you never get behind of the curve, as gear is stagnant in a sense since once you reach ascended gear status which does not take long at all. You are pretty much set for eternity. Thus, gearing is insanely easy in my opinion as well as most raids, strikes and fractals are also quite easy (obviously few exceptions)
However, in regards to Teapots comment about gatekeeping and elitism. I would VERY heavily pushback his argument. There is an insane amount of end game pve gatekeeping.
1) Commander tag, I literally bought this via real money, just because I got tired of trying to organize pug groups without it. Had so many bad experiences of people joining and telling us that they wont tell us their role since we do not have a commander. Or just someone joining, taking over and then kicking us out, or merging us with some random other group.
2) I would say majority of raid groups/strike groups are KP locked. Most groups demand some freaking 250 kill proof on a boss that is very easy. (another topic would be the worst system in existence of having to hold on to some random trophies from bosses or integrate some external website tool to showcase your kills of a boss)
I quite rarely see groups that say everyone welcome outside of stuff like IBS3.
3) his argument about people not caring. They definitely do. I usually like to try off meta builds in easy strikes like IBS3/DS and so on. But even there I have been complained to so many times (before the strike has even started so not an issue about dps or healing) about not playing meta.
4) People even look at your ach points and assume you are total trash. Before even seeing your performance.
5) I probably would had never raided unless I made my own groups and I studied the encounters alone.
Totally unrelated but on the boon topic, I merely hate the fact that its constant stacking more or less. Makes the game much less exciting.
BASED. I’ve experienced everything you have almost to the “T”. I get a lot if pushback when I’ve brought this up in game and in other comments. Maybe it was not like this when most of these vets were new but but it’s def like this now in my experiences.
I had a lot of these experiences years ago shortly after HoT launch. Obviously people have gotten even more anal about gatekeeping skill level.
I can honestly say I have met some of my best friends in GW, but also some of the most vile people in existence. Just a weird fucking community 🙃
Loved watching this, thank you
I 100% want to see a follow-up to this after they finish the other raid wings.
I agree on the boon system.. don't like it at all. The active combat is great the passive buff system is not
Guild wars respects the time u put into the game which is why I enjoy it so much
100% and it gives the players that want to give more of their time, just rewards for that additional expense. It's a win for everyone. Arenanet is the gold standard in innovation and content quality, generally speaking.
Completely agree.
my question is if i can earn cosmetics from just playing the game.. I hate how i have to buy cosmetics with real $ in destiny 2, eververse is trash :/
@@jgsource552cosmetics meaning what? Both games have cosmetics you can acquire via activities/achivements and microtransactions, GW2 however let's you trade gold for gems/gems for gold
God damn, i loved your interaction and discussion with preach, one of my favourite teatime tbh
loved it! cant wait for him to finish all raids, strikes and addons for a second teatime
Just want to clarify before I mention this, I don't think Preach's take is inherently bad, it just might need to be something he gets used to if he keeps playing GW2.
Most professions have an option for everything. Everything but warrior and necro has group alacrity (and healing pepepga), everything but ranger has group quickness. Most people can try playing a more important role without changing profession, and playing multiple roles can be quite fun.
For example, if Preach likes his sword/sword revenant, then he can play his DPS vindicator, OR he can do quickness DPS herald, without really changing playstyle for Shiro and his weapons. He provides quickness, might, fury, protection, and can change his non-Glint legend for something like Jalis (dwarf) for stability or ventari (centaur) for the bubble. Alternatively, he could play Renegade for an alacrity source, and both renegade and herald can potentially provide healing roles with quickness or alacrity respectively.
It's something that flows easily for veterans, because many of us have collected a huge variety of builds and are happy to fill whichever role. It makes sense why Preach would be concerned as a new player, since he lacks that information and has focused entirely on one build. I do hope he branches out a bit as he leans how easy it is to play multiple things.
I didn't think necro had group alacrity.
@@alexjordan3830 right, I forgor. Mb
THIS IS HUUUUGE!!! Guild wars 2 is SO amazing, I'm glad it's getting the reignition it deserves.
Taken while, even if the first one was better lol
The conversation Preach at 41:30 is really interesting to hear now about how needing certain boons may force you onto a build or class that is not fun. I felt this way for ages when Firebrand, chrono or alacren were the main boon providers, it became hard to justify bringing anything else because these classes were objectively better than any other option and not bringing them meant your whole team had a harder time.
The one big W since end of dragons came out (and a little bit before if you think about scrapper, mirage and druid getting quickness/alacrity boons) is that ArenaNet recognized this trend and spread out the boon providers to more classes and specializations.
made an alacren for that same reason
Bad ass teatime I love what preach has said about everything and as always teapot is award winning entertainment, hands down favorite content creator/streamer
Little late to this one but MY GOD such a great conversation. I love how Mighty get's so excited when he has an epiphany and wants to say something lol. Real genuine stuff and a lot of fun seeing two wrinkly brains going at it for over 2 hours. Love you guys!
"If you like MMO and you don't play guild wars, you're hurting yourself" is SOOO TRUE man. I just started week ago and i feel like an absolutely goober not trying it before.
On God.
I’ll give you exotics if you give me your account information like Teapot wanted before he booted half of Hardstuck
Please still play the game
Preach's point on quest hubs as apposed to the more explorative approach is very interesting. As gamers we actually are almost programmed to follow instructions rather than create our own paths, and I like that Guild Wars 2 does the ladder.
Wow players not understanding gw2 because it isn’t exactly like wow (the only mmo they’ve played) never gets old
Great interview, looking forward to more once Preach is even further in!
Even though I play WoW mainly, I think GW2 remains to be under appreciated. Probably due to that classic Anet marketing.
And great interview Teapot, you're the only reason I pretty much keep up with the game nowadays lol
Oh my god! I've watched both of you for ages! Finally a crossover episode🎉
Best inv. Mngmnt:
Always log in or log out with a bank run..
stop by a nearby merchant and purchase a few salvage kits…
breakdown materials and throw into material storage….
stop by the karma merchant for some gathering picks, axes, and harvesting sickles (I buy the ones that yield extra leather on gathering & organize them in the last bag for efficiency)…..
do some crafting to reduce full material storage……
now you can go adventuring (takes about 10 extra minutes if you do this in either of your logins or logouts)
Preach is right on the money when he talks about how the boon system kinda streamlines the game (and consequently the endgame community's mentality).
I remember how it was when I was learing IBS Strike Missions (one-boss instances) and the leader teaching is was like "Just super-tight stack with everyone and dodge this attack on first part, and then you just be mindful of this other mechanic on phase 2". And he was reight. There is about 10 attacks/mechanics in each boss fight (always about 2-4 overlaping on each phase) but there is only 2 mechanics that are worth paying attention two (and they don't even overlap) because everything else is powered through healing+mitigation powering through it and even supposedly phases being skipped (or lasting too short to be worried about) due to the party DPS being so much higher than what was expected when the fight was designed.
I hate when mechanics are entirely skipped/ignored by team composition. And I don't blame players, I blame devs who let it happen.
Yea they should work on that.
The game wasn’t like this up to the end of the hot era
I remember on fractals back then, everyone played the fights and the mechanics. This week I did a fractal and got scolded because I wasn’t stacked to sit there and face tank. I was surprised because back in the day you actually needed to fight and dodge in the fights
2:05:27 I remember when Southsun Survival first came out, there was a dev in the match I joined, and I killed him. It was one of the most exhilarating online game experiences I've ever had. I felt like the chosen one, even though it was totally meaningless objectively, the fact that the devs played with us players was so cool. And the fact that I killed one made it all come to life for me, a bit paradoxically.
i had a similar experience in wvw, i pushed agains smc and i saw that anet symbol on that one random ranger on the ramparts and I was like "fuck they know *I'm* here, and *I* exist and matter and I'm gonna take that damn castle now"
This was a lovely watch. Having watched Preach for about a decade and having watched Teapot since I started GW2 only about a year or two ago, this was a fun collaboration.
I've been really enjoying Mike's playthrough of the game, so nice to see him start to genuinely enjoy it as well. Have been looking forward to this chat with him as well to get more of his thoughts.
One change that I would much welcome in GW2 is if they would increase buff distances by 2x or even 3x their normal range. They already made unique-class buffs into "global buffs" (boons) in order to make a cap for buffs. So right now, even in WvW or open-world bosses, wouldn't matter much if buffs would be wide-ranged because there is alreasy a cap in both buff stacks and number of targets.
Then, make mechanics separate the party on the arena and let them come together on windows where they are being healed and/or the mechanic pulls them to one place. Make mechanics matter and, if you don't want to be extreme against powering-through strats/comps, then make main boss mechanics apply a special type of vulnerability debuff that can't be cleansed, but that stacks and will only be removed by not being hit by such mechanics for a time (one minute maybe). This will make healing/mitigating through viable but up to a certain limit.
I just don't want most bosses in the endgame being about 25% unique and 75% of the same.
the price of freedom bit is 100% true. I have multiple level 80 chars with 75 mastery. I often find myself logging in and saying " my hero point runs are done...now what? raids, where, dungeons, no one is running them, fractals? what's that". I guess I just have a hard time finding the drive to do anything, because there's really no sense of direction or reason in the game. at least for me.
I was really looking forward to this tea time. Good job guys!
49:00 that's actually a very good point, and also exactly how we wvw roamers don't play, everyone plays their own build they like and has fun but not optimal at all when it comes to buffing eachother. I would probably much more likely join strikes / raids if I could just play my own / fav build that I like to play instead of needing to meet all these req.
To enable this, the game would have to be made so that each class had one build, which would make the game boring meanwhile in endgame context each class has between 3 and 6 build which are meta at this time so why change it
I strongly agree that WvW was the place that let players be more experimental with builds. And even if the build is the dumbest thing ever, a player can still apply some skill and be mostly effective.
@@chilliewhk yes very true, if you know what you are doing off meta builds can be harder to counter. Also for raids / strikes teapot and other tubers already proven that many builds can work well. I also love the Sui Won with all dps core ele and there I believe there where some other variants aswell.. These are examples of players having fun and even if you are not the most efficient it shouldn't matter, unless of course it is your personal preference to play this way. I dunno.. If I didn't have kids and work I would be able to find and or build a relaxed group of flexible happy people, I personally just hate it whenever I end up in a fractal / strike / raid that runs it only to be most optimal for the sake of farming efficient... To me that feels like work.
@@woof3065 A large part of more high end players is that they're also just good players. I knew guys that could swap to any class on demand and bring the same good performance on all of them. The only thing that detracts from skill is relying and maintaining on some very powerful boons. So the end result is the skill gap that Preach noticed when he saw how experienced groups clear the same content. I ruined the game for myself because I became obsessed with efficiency, and finding myself with guilds that promoted efficiency/skill but were so toxic to each other when 1 person fell behind. Players will optimize the fun out of a game given the right motivation.
@@chilliewhk yes exactly! You hit the nail right on the head. This is the kind of content I would enjoy with relaxed people like Teapot and other open minded chill guys.. But I just don't know them and I can't play on fixed appointments. In wvw I experienced the same.. 1 guild I was in first was more try hard with defined roles and there was lots of yelling and toxicity when we lost or someone made a mistake.. In the guild I am now with everyone being roamers and not depending on each other that much it's very chill. Rarely some1 get's mad if he's completely ignored / not helped. I personally always run builds and play in a way that I can help myself, because I know you can't rely on people that much, everyone plays there own game, has their focus on something that might be different from yours. If you want to play very well together you need to be on voice chat and know each other and be friends (to some level) to keep it fun.
One of the important parts, i think Preach is kind of missing out on in his playthrought, is all of the EKSTRA content zones have, that are there for collections and achivements, there so much good content there, that it makes many of the zones very replayable.
I agree that he is probably skipping a lot of cool stuff, but he also has goals set to clear the raids. I will say that if he really enjoys the game he will come back to play it.
Tangled Depths the best map, Anet deserves a big fat award for their HoT maps, yes ❤🎉
I think HoT are some of my favorite maps ever. So vertical and intricate and beautiful!
Thanks!
wdym lol map is fucking god awful, "wait how the hell do i get to this event? COME ONNN I NEED THAT HERO POINT WHERE IS IT!?!?!?!" spend 3 more minutes going down levels "BRUHHHHHHH IT'S AT 10% NOW WHERE THE HELL IS IT I'VE BEEN ON THE SPOT ON THE MAP FOR 5 MINS GOING UP AND DOWN AND EVERY WHICH WAY WHERE IS THIS?!?!!?!?!? how in god's name is that fun lol
@@zeening this may sound crazy, but some people like exploring
@@zeening The confusing 2d map and placement of objectives in what were supposed to be hidden or hard to get to areas contributed to a lot of frustrations. But map design and content placement are 2 different things :)
Something that I think doubly hurt guild wars 2 early on was living world. I know people loved it but it was very contrary to the “play how you like” format. I played since a few months after launch and missed season 1 because I didn’t know it was happening since I was too busy doing the things I wanted (map exploration etc). The fact that living world was there then it was gone meant that if you missed it then you missed out, which means that you absolutely should be doing it while it’s active. Of course, you had to finish the personal story to fully appreciate season 1, too.
Obviously the cool part was the content stream, which is now one of the game’s current problems for established players, but the change of approach away from temporary content was really good long-term, I think.
This was a joy to listen in on
Fantastic Episode here, great insight, loved every second keep up the good work teapot/preach
Tera Online to me had the best Raiding experience. It had the tank in the front taking all the damage and Aggro. While the main dps are on the back of the boss dealing back damage while supports healing everyone.
Not to fund of this all stack in one spot
*too fond
but yeah I agree
gw2 is pretty much the only mmo that does that lol ff14 couldn't be more different but obviously very different gameplay and combat, even old janky shit like LOTRO doesn't do that though
@@euclxd8033 really? you tried to be petty and correct someone but are so dumb you made a mistake and had to go back and edit it? classic, you realize we can all see you edited it right?
Btw raids *were* in the original game! Not the raids you know but they happened in the way of world bosses. Even now, the best group content is in world bosses. The raids ingame are just larger dungeons that give currency. The original structure actually worked we just again like it is said alot of times in the stream, we just didn't get it. The game was meant to be good and it was meant to be beautiful and we are meant to just experience it. That's what I like about gw2
watching preach's journey made me come back to the game ♥
Arena Net should make End of Dragons themed Raid.
What's the big thing with GW2 going on right now? I see SO MANY players coming back including myself. Tomorrow it'll be 2 years and I'm coming back to give it a shot.
Burnt myself out trying to grind ranked PvP as a solo lol.
Hope to see everyone on the battlefield!
It's interesting to hear about Preach's opinion on boons since I've never thought of it that way, I've always assumed I'll always have the boons and most of the time I do. Searching for two alacs and two quicks has never seemed annoying or weird to me, it's just what you do.
What I don't find true (for me) is "playing something I don't enjoy" because my squad needs some buffs. One of the joys is playing a wide variety of builds so I don't burn myself out playing the same thing over and over again. This is made easy because a vide variety of classes can now heal, a vide variety has access to quick/alac. I never mind healing or playing offensive support, I may play alacren one day but alac specter the next, just to keep it fresh.
This may seem annoying early when you don't have any alts or other builds set up yet, but once you do you'll enjoy yourself.
For him it might be a problem just because he's new here and doesn't know how easy it is to alt in this game and have several classes and professions that can do every role.
After finishing the entire story mode, dressing a new character with the necessary equipment is a matter of a few hours, not weeks as in other games.
Right, also I feel like players aren’t as rigid as other MMOs. What I mean is, let’s say you want to join a strike but they need quick which your class can’t provide. No worries, you just make/find a new group. If it’s niche content or too early/late in the day, still no problem. You can join the group and tell people that you’d really like to join but can’t do quickness, and just ask if someone would be willing to do that instead.
Or, given how alt friendly the game is, if you’re serious about pve you can just have an alt. It’s very unlikely that you can’t cover ANY roles with 2-3 characters.
I feel it's kinda missing the point though. It's not a matter of how easy it is to play an alt or not. It's whether you want to. If you're the type who only likes the way one class plays then you're going to be sol in this case.
Even ff14 has people like this who only play one job and that's despite that you're character can literally be all jobs at once and many roles share gear. They still don't want to swap from one to another. Which is fine. Everyone has their own playstyle. But, that is a part of what he's talking about here I think.
@@Khaoticsuccubus Then those people are actively hurting their chances to fit into groups, and frankly their understanding of the game as part of the instanced late game content is knowing the game, what classes can and can not do, etc.
That's fine though, people can still find groups as pure [I refuse to play any other class I am the Reaper I move for no man] dps and ignore everything else, I just think that's stupid and they should rethink their approach to instanced content.
1:26:30 The absolute heresy! the first two story steps (lvl 1-20) are the absolute best the story has ever been in GW2. back then, our characters actually had character. After that, they devolved into see-good-am-happy, see-bad-am-angry paper-thin personalities.
Yeah some super special kind of love was given to that early progression though I still like mid core progression a bit more (around the time your character chooses their faction and starts doing things as part of the faction - up to Claw Island). But all this just shows how many different things are in the game for different players. I'm really looking forward to doing sylvari and norn story some time because I haven't tried them yet. And some other player would skip that entirely with boost and create one more human male to play WvW with a new build.
You are absolutely right about that. It had an air of personal depth and seriousness, with a story that actually brought you into a kind of 'grown up world', if I may say. Frankly I was disappointed that all the future stories (after HoT&PoF) made it a lot more fantasy-faerytale-like, with less of an air of seriousness to it. I sincerely hope they would go back towards the professionalism and character development of the origin story. Thanks for mentioning that.
Dude, I would love if Gw2 borrowed from Lost Ark with the boats and made a bit of a minigame with islands, "the mist" or w/e. Or made the boats guild sized and have a whole map filled with water, with only a little bit of the shore is earth, and water toxic or something with massive bosses that might unlock some guild stuff. Or underwater places that is insanely deep and not toxic but dark or something. Entire cities could be down there
Maybe that's the new expansion anet is working on...who knows😮
Preach raises a good point about playing specs you don't enjoy. When we started progging HT CM I was on quick herald and I hated its playstyle (i dislike rev in general) and I asked to swap to firebrand which I am much more comfortable on. I caught so much flak from people over that solely because herald was that strong.
This is a difficult one, there is a balance between getting stuff done and progressing quickly compared to playing the build you want and it's very much up to each group to figure out how they want to go about doing things.
Firebrand VS herald on HT CM is not the end of the world, but there is a huge difference between playing a vindicator vs a power daredevil on HT CM, and if everyone makes large tradeoffs because they prefer a certain build the group effectiveness will plummet.
TL:DR Hard content complicates 'play what you want'
@@MightyTeapot and that's all well and good. But it does make me less interested in playing hard content. I can clear KO CM, but I basically might as well not play DPS on it because I don't play Virtuoso and that is far and away the best DPS build for that fight.
@@TFalconwing That's not really accurate, any (preferably ranged, and some melee can do very well too) DPS will be just fine for KO CM, the only time where virt is mega crazy is the first 3 minibosses which is not the major progression point (the mech + sniper is)
Balance is understood extremely poorly by the community and gets massively exaggerated.
@@MightyTeapot Well, perhaps that particular example is something the community needs more education on because when I got title on that fight every DPS was a virtuoso and every week since when we do our CM clear most of the DPS are virtuosos. I have cleared it on DPS firebrand and condi soulbeast and scourge and it was very clear that I was outclassed on most phases by the virts, with the exception of the very first Li phase. At least in my experience and from my observation virt is the ideal choice for this example.
@@TFalconwing Virt is the ideal choice, and when it comes to hard content people will usually pick the ideal choice, even if it's only by 5-10% because that's better for the team, and people are trying to do their best for the team.
If preach had pack runes and multiple builds.
I loved Preach's comments on the release cadence.
Preach is living below the poverty line but living the dream
Unrelated but I left GW2 after HoT, came back pretty recently. I've been enjoying my time playing too, it's a fun time to play the game.
love this one, both of you are great
GW2 Fractals were like precursor of WoW m+
Oh nice, I can finish it over here now. Thanks! I only got halfway through the discussion and damn was it interesting. And fun. And just all round enjoyable.
The boon meta is dumb
Great episode. Made me forget about all the work I'm supposed to do 😅
Awesome podcast guys, keep it up!
The issue I have with GW@ is I can't find friends to play with. I also suffer from fomo and it feels like I've missed so much when I don't play for 1-2 years.
To add to the topic about power creep.... There is normal player. There is mighty Teapot who is highly professient and doing 10 times normal player damage and then there is special kind of showflake called Lord Hizen going and solo killing everything.
Very good conversation. More of this.
As a WoW Player, I can say, not having difficulty settings is a good thing...
I hate to be the one that brings this up but.....marketing. I understand it's silly and some use it as a band aid on any problem in GW2, but I think it's a logical conclusion cause whenever I mention or recommend GW2 to a friend the first thing they say is "oh is this game still alive" literally every person I recommend the game to. I feel like GW2 is never really in the aether like other games like warframe, and whenever it does appear the gaming sphere it's related to the release of another popular game (WOW dragonflight meme).
As someone that started GW2 San a guardian learning boons became very easy since that class use booms a lot with that said I’m still trying to learn when to use them in group content
It's a long LONG ways away but I can't wait for the day Preach gets to sink his teeth into the absolutely bonkers Legendary system of this game.
41:25 onwards is spot-on and absolutely hit the nail on the head on why high-end group content turned me off, I main a Warrior and I didn’t like how in raid settings I’m forced to fulfil the role of a bannerslave solely for the boons.
Like, I’m a warrior, lemme smash things up with my greatsword instead of being a buffing cheerleader goddammit
because dps warrior doesn't exist in your reality?
snowcrows.com/en/builds/warrior/berserker/power-berserker
snowcrows.com/en/builds/warrior/spellbreaker/power-spellbreaker
snowcrows.com/en/builds/warrior/bladesworn/power-bladesworn
?????
@@linkazzatore not at least 5 years ago when I last played the game, nah - iirc at the time Condi Berserker + bannerslave was by far the best choice and I was forced to spec to it which I hated ngl
glad to see it's changed since then though!
@@hyperionnova2854 6 years ago builds without banners existed already and condi bs also doesn't run banners snowcrows.com/en/builds/warrior/berserker/condition-berserker
There is a huge influence of gw1 i to gw2, in the sense that gw1 was a classic that had a loyal base so Arenanet could not go to a wow copy. It’s the freedom, the story, the heritage. Dificult to put in words. Gw1 is Gw2 DNA.
gw2 needs to stop everything for a while and put all their money into ADS. ffs so many ppl still believe in misconceptions about the game its ridiculous
To be fair, even the community that actively plays the game is rampant with misconceptions.
The core Tyria should go through a update before that, Theres a lot of people that can be convinced to try GW2 who have never touched it, but im sorry current core Tyria would make them stop playing, its actually awful.
The biggest issue with raiding is that for certain bosses you can't run certain builds.
Unlike other mmos, the build is highly specific to the classes specializations, however for many classes, some specializations and the base of the class can have many very meta builds.
Builds are not just trees and classes, gw2 is the most versatile game and each "class" can have like 8 meta builds, each requiring a LOT of investment EACH!
In wow and ffxiv you can just switch between your tank and dps gear with minor variations in stats that are just as readily available as prior, but in gw2 you need a high investment into ascended gear, infusions, ascended weapons, ascended accessories and grinding the whole world to unlock your skills and then they are all HIGHLY specific to a specific build. There are a LOT of different stat combinations and getting the exact ones you need is a massive pain.
Imagine you've grinded for a whole set of condition damage gear, with some alacrity pieces, not all of the set is directly transferable in 100% of cases. Then you are suddenly told you need to switch class half way through a raid because the boss phases so consistently that condition damage cannot ramp up enough and you're dps will be none-existent... You don't have a power build and maybe your class doesn't have a power build, with the only other builds having some highly specific support stats... you actually cannot continue.
Bosses can have big/small hitboxes which dictates how much dps your build can do, in certain cases people need VERY niche builds such as the notorious "hand kiter" in the Deimos fight that only works for that one fight in a single raid.
The meta is constantly changing and unlike other mmos where your class/build is just a bit worse or better... in gw2 your build just changes entirely and you may need to often change your entire gear. At least for pugging which is more elitist/meta-hungry than you will be told, by anyone.
What is good about gw2s builds is that they more often than not absolutely and utterly change everything about the class, all the skills you use, all the weapons you use, the roles you have and all the gear/weapon requirements. It's not like wow or ffxiv, it is far far more verstaile than any other mmo. Every expansion gives all the classes a new specialization which can spawn 1-3 new builds.
You'll always need new weapons for alternate specs in a class.
Number of high meta builds per class at this time:
Revenant has 4.
Guardian has 3.
Warrior has 3.
Thief has 4.
Ranger has 3.
Engineer has 4.
Necromancer has 2.
Mesmer has 5.
Elementalist has 5.
This is the current meta builds, but each class has a few more other builds that are still perfectly viable, but not in the eye of the meta. They can still preform very well too.
The issue is not all of these is viable for all of the bosses of all raids.
Many will suffer extremely bad performance and even be obselete from fight to fight, and this is highly disappointing.
Some builds like deadeye thief is wicked fun and cool and can hit massive numbers. You turn into a sniper and you can use a range of tools to optimize and protect yourself in your given position.
Surprised he still going at it. I gotta say, watching a WoW talking head trying to figure out guild wars 2 is really entertaining lol
This was a good-ass TeaTime.
Watching this with auto generated subtitles is pure gold. 5:06: "I'm like I've fallen madly in love with girl lost too"
BEST TEATIME EPISODE Pog
I'd need to see the source, but if the power difference between an average player and a player that knows all the optimizations is a difference of 10 times DPS, that explains a LOT for why the game's group content is as painfully easy or desperately requires playing meta. I just want to do group content that is fun and exciting without having to stick to a rotation and steal a build.
Speaking as someone who played GW1 last year in its entirety, and started GW2 last November... been having a blast. Love it. I'm up to the mid point of Living World Season 2. But my biggest criticism in terms of the story stuff? The writers desperately, desperately need to get over themselves. No, you didn't write a good character. No, I don't care about Trahearne; he's painfully, obnoxiously and persistently dull. No, I don't care about Braham and Rox. Why would I? They're not Ogden Stonehealer - they haven't proven themselves to me by actually being a vital member of my team, going through actual challenging content and keeping me alive. Half the time, they don't even acknowledge my presence, even during major story beats.
What the hell happened to the heroes? Even the core campaign henchmen from GW1 were better teammates; with genuinely entertaining quips, and actual combat competence. And they never forgot who the protagonist was - ME. Us. The players.
Destiny's Edge are the worst. And their entire concept is terrible. Their backstory build-up in the dungeon content? "Before you start this dungeon and actually have fun, you have to listen to a couple of these total strangers whine about their personal stuff and put that before the mission". Great work, guys; really compelling "heroes" - who abandon each other repeatedly because of personal stuff that has nothing to do with the player.
And the real insult at the end? The big celebratory "you defeated Zhaitan" cutscene? Shows you walking with Destiny's Edge. Not you walking with your actual human party members, if you're playing with friends as I am - just you and Destiny's Edge. Even though they did nothing (oh, sorry, Thackery stupidly cut a rope from the bottom and nearly died for no reason, good job Thackery), and even though they never once invite you to actually join their team.
The game's writing and story content is absolutely at its best when it's not self-indulgent, and either focuses on the player, or focuses on the big epic stuff. You know why everyone loves Tybalt? He's a bro. He's not smug, he's not a Mary Sue, he's just another dude who seems genuinely thrilled to be working with you, talks directly to you, and serves as a conduit for adventure instead of a "please wait until we've stopped talking" exposition dump.
And the saddest thing? 90% of the core campaign, and most of the living world stuff I've done so far, would have worked absolutely fine... with none of these "hero" characters. All it required was an NPC to send the player on a mission, and let the player discover the story themselves, and directly interact with the characters associated with it. The story never needed these overtly writer-ego-driven inserts to act as middlemen.
Didn't need to make the player the "Commander", and then think it's fine to ignore them. Just needed to acknowledge their agency. Needed to let them do some major story beats... alone. No hand-holding. Just say, have the Queen or the Pale Tree or whoever ask the player - as an independent but dependable adventurer - to go deal with something, to go check it out. To follow a thread. That's all it needed.
Imagine, for example, if nobody knew the origin of the zombies in the core campaign. Imagine if nobody knew Orr had risen. Imagine if you, alone - because none of the major players were willing to divert resources - had to go on a long journey to the south, down the coast, to find the origin... and you, as the player, discovered this lost place, and had to report your findings, and find a way to convince the various factions and races to join forces.
Imagine how much more compelling that would be, than having Trahearne tell you "Oh, I totally already knew all about Orr, and I know exactly what to do next, and I know how to use this magical sword, and this prophetic dream is all about me uniting the factions, and it's my calling to become the marshal."
I love to hear that someone else loves Xera. I always thought it was one of the coolest raid encounters but so many people in the game seem to hate it. I guess they hate it due to difficulty and maybe because of leyling gliding? But it’s often the first boss I showcase to final fantasy players to entice them to try the game.
Escorts at the beginning of w3 can suck the life out of anyone
The hardest part of explaining GW2 to an existing MMO player is that /waaay/ to many people think "MMO = Progression Raiding". That is not GW2 and that is the reason I still play it.
A good idea that would fix the issue of boons being too strong and too necessary would be to lower their efficacy and buff base damage and tanking across the board
It was like that in the beginning for two years and the game was too hard you could also lead to a situation where you give players too much power and then it would be easier than now = boredom
I mean it's hard to balance
Personally, I would bet on more interactive opponents and leave the current system unchanged
More mechanics where you have to split up and enemies that move constantly and attack, forcing me to dodge and move
The current problem is that the boss just stands there and waits for him to die and that's why support is so strong because you can stack on the boss whit little to no consequences
Cant wait for Halloween :D. Love playing Halloween in GW2 !. Awesome fun !.
you can design a boss and encounter without trinity it is just much harder but is ultimately way way more rewarding to players when done good. when fractals first launched t his is how they worked. especially once you went past ag limit and everything could one shot you, everyone had to make sure they dodge everything or you failed.
I kind of have to disagree with Teapot's assessment of GW2's raiding scene not being elitist or gate-keeping. I have tried to get into raiding on multiple occasions, but for a beginner, it is too much to get into. Not because the encounters are to hard necessarily, but rather because finding a group that will take you in is super difficult. If you want to find one through the lfg, most of them have ridiculous requirements concerning kp or other aspects that someone new cannot possibly fulfill. I can pick the correct build, study up on the wiki, but almost no group will take me in just because I've not cleared it like 50 times. Most people recommend me to try raiding with a guild, and I tried, but most guilds have fixed times or schedules for when they do raid trainings, and I mostly can only decide spontaneously if I have time or not. Raiders should be more open towards new people IMO, raids are not rocket-science, but you have to give people a chance to actually SEE the mechanics for themselves to actually comprehend them.
Sorry for the rant there, it just has frustrated me for a while now, because I want to play it, but the community makes it so hard for me to join in to the point of giving up on it.
1:09:40 --- Heh, "chrono jail", I remember... except me, a chrono tank back then, locked myself in and threw away the keys XD
The boon thing makes a lot of sense it does take away that self-control over your own performance. Teapot's point about build diversity could have had a bit more back and forth because you don't have to raid as a specific class or specialization, you have the flexibility to build your class to be effective in the role it's just someone needs to provide those buffs, as every mmo has key abilities/buffs/aspects that the party needs. It's like saying in Wow oh you don't bring threat so you can't tank, you don't cleanse/hot/heal you can't support like....yeah...the party needs those things and you can't all stack DPS in Wow either. Altering your spec for a piece of content is one of the best things about GW2, you can play 1 specialization so many different ways between Open world/ raiding/ PVP/WvW and STILL be able to switch to other specialization/weapon sets/utility abilities on your one class.
In Wow let's say you're a Shaman and you want to play Enh/Ele but your raid needs a healer....well you're going Resto mate. But in GW2 it's more like depending on the game mode Resto may have different builds that play completely different, say like a traditional healer one and another that's more totems and buffs. You go Enhance and you might have a 2H burst dps build and a Dual wielding Dot DPS build and then the way you build DPS specs for PVP/WvW/Open World/Raids all play very differently. So the build diversity is huge there in comparison to 3. You're talking 5-6 across Core + 3 elite specs, in each game mode.
I remember beta and launch days as a member of Somnium coming from SWTOR with Kaeyi Dream and Mintchiplol, etc, with Kaeyi getting tight with the game devs and all us guikdies totally getting inside benefits out of it, lol. Kaeyi even got a dungeon boss named after get. Those were unforgettable times! It's been hard to be motivated to come back because the nostalgia for bygone days will be rough! Haven't talked to Kaeyi mint, or most other guikdies for years. It won't feel the same.
Even after ten years playing GW2 I still feel like boons aught to feel like a cherry on top of the build sundae. Instead it feels like we're always chasing the biggest cherry and our gear and skills and rotation are just a touch of ice cream on top of the cherry.
Learning a bunch of raid builds and learning how effective a class can be is definitely a big part of the fun in this game. Trying out all the classes and playstyles is greatly encouraged! But only after the first playthrough being blind, I think the biggest strength of the early game is just the freedom and exploration- there's no tutorials on purpose, it does not hold your hand for the most part and encourages to just use the wiki when you get stuck, the rest is all for you to figure out and enjoy.
Well, if you do 10% of your class' potential you aren't blinded out of the community, if you do 10% of your class' potential you are the community xd
I loved this collab!
Preach doesn't know what we've been through
crazy how dumb ppl in chat be like "how is his issue with the boon system any different than bringing a tank in wow"... jesus, how do you breathe.
The biggest issue with no one playing raids is that the LFG is utter trash and NO ONE uses it, so if anyone wants to raid they have to dig around for 3-4 different discords to find a group just to raid