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| A vista in GW2 |
First things first. I’m an adult gamer. If you don’t know what that means, go HERE. I love online games, and recently I’ve come upon Guild Wars 2, and for many reasons I believe that ArenaNet cracked the code. I loved Skyrim for the open-ended scope where your decisions seemed to really drive your story. I loved Mass Effect (and even SWtOR) for the story and strong character development. I loved early Dark Age of Camelot for their focus on accessible and meaningful realm conflict. Having said all of that, the cornerstone of any Massively Multiplayer Online RPG is end game progression, and that is where I want to focus. Guild Wars 2 (GW2) has turned progression on its ear and I believe for the better.
End game progression in an MMO is usually characterized by a
character reaching max level and then moving through a series of encounters in
order to obtain the highest levels of gear that the game can offer. Your accomplishment is gauged by the type of
gear you own, but that gear reflects the progressively higher level of skill
necessary to achieve those items. Additionally
those items that you obtain enable you to progress to the next tier of items
and so forth. Progression expands the
longevity of an online game, but that longevity can either become a
never-ending hamster wheel or can offer multiple possibilities that keep people
engaged.
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| My little Yurtil ready to take on a dungeon |
On first glance, you might think that GW2 doesn’t have end
game progression. There are no ‘raid’
dungeons that provide levels of high end gear.
All of their dungeons are 5-man max and start at level 30 (really 35,
but I’ll get to that later). However,
what isn’t clear is that the GW2 actually has a different type of
progression. There are 8 dungeons
currently in the game. Each of those
dungeons has a story mode and an ‘Explore’ mode that is slated at 5-levels
above the dungeon’s level. Explore mode
consists of 2-3 different ‘paths’ within the same dungeon. That gives around 30 different dungeon
experiences for a single character.
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| I came upon this in a random dungeon encounter |
GW2 automatically levels a character down to the level of a
zone so you can group with people below your level and still have a significant
challenge. Therefore, the dungeons in
GW2 start at level 30, but all characters level 30 and above can participate in
those encounters. The other BIG change
in GW2 is the elimination of the ‘holy trinity’ of tank/healer/dps
classes. Any combination of characters
can form a 5-man group and be successful.
Finally, dungeons in GW2 are HARD.
There may be a general strategy for success, but these dungeons are
tuned to accommodate multiple strategies and in most cases, you are lucky if
you only die a couple times per encounter.
The result is frantic, fun, and very intense. You feel a real satisfaction when you finish
a dungeon and there are times that you might just want to quit in frustration.
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| everywhere you go is beautiful |
Then why do you want to run dungeons in GW2? If you are leveling your character, the
experience is excellent. You gain about
a level of experience per run. If you
are max level, you still gain tokens for each ‘Explore’ run. Everyone who participates in and finishes a
dungeon run in ‘Explore’ mode gets a number of dungeon-specific tokens for each
run. Those tokens can be used to purchase
the highest level of armor and weapons from dungeon-specific vendors. Each set of armor and weapons looks
differently and has different stats.
Additionally, you can augment those stats with runes that you can
purchase at these vendors as well. Therefore,
you can build your unique look, with the stats that work best for you by
running these dungeons in ‘Explore’ mode multiple times.
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| More vistas. Beautiful artwork abounds. |
Progression in GW2 starts at level 30, but runs well through
level 80. Gear choices are huge and with
the addition of crafting, world-vs-world competition, small team pvp
competition, and the various challenges involving platforming puzzles and zone
unlocks there is a whole lot to keep the player engaged in just the base
game. Knowing that the original Guild
Wars had a number of expansions, there is a lot to keep a player involved, and
this is from a game that has NO subscription fee. That is why I’m loving GW2 and think that
ArenaNet has cracked the code with respect to MMORPGs. I would encourage all my gamer friends to
give it a try. The price is only the
cost of the game, the cost of any other console or PC game out on the market,
but the value of the game is huge.
