I completed Mad King's Clock Tower.

I am quite happy. Too bad I was 1 path shy in Mad King's Realm to complete the title.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/l...ascended-gear/

Rest in peace, GW2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyFyAqLtHq8

There's no official word on the actual capacity the gear will serve, or what form it will come in. I'd suggest at least waiting 3 days for the actual patch, so we can see it for ourselves, before calling for the death knell.

This new change completely killed my motivation and wish to log into the game.

How is this killing the game, exactly?

The argument is that it puts in a gear creep. Until this announcement, the highest stats you could get were exotics/legendaries. These weapons were not significantly higher stats than a yellow item. In other words, it wasn't as big a jump from yellow to orange as it is from, say, blue to purple in WoW.

Ascended gear is supposedly slightly better. As the image shows, though, the base stats are about the same as an Exotic/Legendary + Rune, so the stat boost is not really that much higher. The new gear type doesn't bother me.

What kind of bothers me is the Agony condition and the requirement for an Infusion. In GW1 you needed infused armor to progress, but it was part of the story in Prophecies. It wasn't just "your gear." Needing an infusion to progress easily through a dungeon just feels like a gear wall to me.

It's not gonna kill the game, it's just killing the game for me personally in my opinion, mostly cause I like PvE, but I went to play GW2 cause progression was mechanically harder, not statistically harder (well okay a bit, but there was a cap to it cause the gear had a cap)
What is the difference?
Mechanically harder = better and more interesting boss fights, with innovative and tricky mechanics
Statistically harder = Yet another grind fest and lazy design

I'm one of those who started playing GW2 cause I wouldn't be forced to play day in and day out to be among the great players, I could pop in once in a while, have a good time, be useful and enjoy my time in the game.
I'm not the hardcore gamer I used to be, hence my transition from hardcore PvP and PvE player, to casual PvE player, GW2 allowed me to enjoy the game at my own pace, this form of progression will only lead to me as a casual player being left behind, which is what I tried to get away from in WoW, WAR and so on.

We will be seeing more "Guild LFM you need X gear", less focus on player skill and more focus on gear progression.

This kills the game for me personally and I could imagine some out there feel the same way, though I honestly think they will make more money this way.

To be fair, the stats really aren't that much higher. A 2-3 point difference isn't going to change the game. I think it's the Agony and the need for Infusions that will cause problems more than the stats themselves.

I'm willing to bide my time and see how it comes out in implementation. This isn't the first time ANet has done something that got the playerbase up in arms, but turned out to be okay in the end.

I withdraw my previous statement. I just took a read of the entire article (which I hadn't done before), and it definitely reads like the precursors of the implementation of a gear treadmill.

What I think is amusing is this line right here:

It absolutely blows me away every time I hear this line from an MMO developer, especially an MMO developer who has made an MMO before. How can you not understand the dedication of time and effort some people will put in to getting these BiS items? The biggest roadblock is the amount of gold the materials cost, which has been easily subverted by Anet's inability to deal with gold sellers for such a long period of time.

Also, who the hell are all these players who are supposedly sitting on legendaries and twiddling their thumbs for something to do? I've never once seen somebody running around with a legendary weapon on the Tarnished Coast server. Unless I'm just woefully inattentive, I can't imagine more than a handful of people per server (at most) have these weapons thusfar.

And finally, my biggest complaint: If you're worried that such a large section of the playerbase are itching for more progression (which I suppose could be legitimate; I don't really have anything to do on my Ranger now that she's 80 other than farm Orr), then why are you violating the major design tenant of your game for the sake of progression, instead of granting the players more progression through expanding the world itself?

Oh right, I know the reason: because gear treadmills are easier to pump out as "content" than actual, real character progression.

*Sighs*

To be honest, I think everyone whining and complaining and upset about this "gear treadmill" is jumping the gun. Every time something is announced that appears to do something the players don't want, the players get all out of whack, well before they see what impact, if any, this has on the game.

So far the only difference this gear will make is with Agony. Everything else can be done without Ascended gear, and we don't even know if the Fractals can be done without Infusions. The stats on Ascended gear are no more than a few points per attribute higher than Exotic gear. All this talk about how it is ruining the game is premature because you are all making assumptions.

If this does make a major difference in the gameplay in EVERY aspect of GW2, then I think it is cause for concern. But as long as you can still do pretty much everything regardless of gear, I think this freaking out about how the game is doomed is just absurd. Plus, exotic gear isn't hard to get. I don't forsee Ascended gear being hard to get either.

Chill out, people. This game is not ruined, it won't be the end of the game, and they are not turning their backs on their design philosophy. Yeesh.