Lundi 26 novembre, comme l'avait annoncé la semaine dernière, Chris Whiteside, développeur chez Arenanet, à fait un "AMA" (Ask Me Any questions) sur Reddit.
Acceuilli par une liste impressionnante de questions abordant tous les aspects du jeu sans fard (y compris et surtout les controverses récentes sur le nouveau tier d'objet), il a répondu en direct à une partie d'entre elles. Je vous livre quelques réponses, en anglais dans le texte (désolé mais il est hors de question que je me tape une traduction ) :
Sur la progression verticale du jeu :
E1: Can we get a direct, on-the-record answer on where vertical progression will be headed? Specifically as it applies to gear-checks, gated content, and the addition of gear tiers? Will there be an amendment to the manifesto, or plans to retro-actively align with the manifesto again?
First of all in retrospect it would have been better to have included Ascended Gear at launch. It is designed to give users a progression path that is between Exotic and Legendary (Legendary Items will be at the same power level as Ascended) and the gap between them in terms of time is very large.
So to the question of vertical progression. So as we know there is already vertical progression in the game and we do intend to keep moving forward with this philosophy. However we have no intention of adding a new Rarity of Gear such as Ascended. Instead and as we evolve the game existing Rarity's will evolve over time. However these will not be common occurrences, for example full Ascended gear will be introduced over a long period of time and will be earn able through lots of different parts/activities of the game. We had intended for example for the first release of acsended items come from other parts of the game but sadly it did not work out this way. Moving forward this is how it will work however.
In regard to gear checks specifically all increases in the power curve will be minimal and therefore there should be no straying from the intended power curve that you see in the game now, in terms of trajectory.
In regard to gated content via gear then i think that this is something we are going to give more thought to. Specifically if the reward at the end of the activity applies to players that are not just looking to do a specific type of content. Note that this statement is somewhat contradictory to the philosophy laid out above if the required items do not drop elsewhere or the ultimate rewards don't either. This is something we are going to fix.
Personally i do not feel that the latest changes are against what we said in the manifesto. I do however feel that we do have to be very careful in regard to progression design turning into grind and i believe there are some instances of this kind of grind that predate the launch of the game. It is for this reason that we are looking to revamp some aspects of the game whilst connecting other parts increase the overall experience of fun in our progression mechanics.
ok so there is one answer (-: I am going to head over to another question and then come back. Thanks for your patience and any typos.
Chris
E2:Ascended gears are making a lot of people worry about an ever-increasing gear treadmill. Many players did not want the exotic/legendary system to change, and they don't like ascended gears. Was this expected? Can this be something fixed in a painless way? Can it happen?
Yes the response was definitively expected. We did not intent for the information to come out this way. Going back to my previous answer the issue is that we believe in the vertical progression system we had pre launch and that the introduction of an element into the system post launch was going to cause concern but something we believe in. That is why there is no plan for new Rarity Tiers of loot but there are plans to enhance or gain items within the existing rarity design whose properties continue on a shallow power curve. This said we certainly don't want to create a system where itemization blocks progression in the game globally and we also need to be careful of this in areas such as FotM if the primary reward isn't available elsewhere in the game. So in short its an exciting problem but one that has been poorly communicated and handled.
And for this i take responsibility and apologies. However the future of this philosophy and the design challenges it throws up are going to lead to a pioneering world and one that we are very excited about.
So anyway i kind of went of topic here so in short. We don't intend to have an item rarity gear treadmill, we intend for the progression for gaining these rewards to have lots of different avenues for different types of player and where possible lower no fun grind within the whole of the game.
I hope this answers that question. I will be right back.
Chris
E6:Fractals have become the end-all for making your character stronger. Players are vanishing from maps everywhere to grind grind grind for the now-strongest items they can get ahold of. It's disruptive to the community, the fun, and the manifesto. What is being done about this?
This ties back to what i was saying earlier in which Ascended Gear and really any progression related reward mechanism that impacts the world globally should be introduced (Where possible) across the game and inside the different type of player's activities specifically. Allowing players to continue doing the things they love without focusing player migration to a specific part of the world. The introduction of the Ascended reward in one part of the game was a mistake and one that i don't want to make again.
Soon Ascended Gear will adhere to these rules.
Chris
Mike O'Brien (le boss d'Arenanet) intervient pour faire une réponse complémentaire sur le manifesto original :
Hi! I'll respond to the top part since it's a quote from me.
Obviously the key phrase I'm going to point you to in that quote is, "if someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can't realistically acquire it". That really is the litmus test we've used. That's why, at ship, we gave better stats to exotic gear and didn't give better stats to legendary gear.
More generally, I hope we've been clear that GW2 is not a game with virtually no stat progression in it like GW1 was. That's why GW2 shipped with a higher level cap, and with a hard separation between PvE and PvP. In GW1 we never advanced the level cap through four campaigns/expansions. The game design didn't allow for it. But GW2 was designed without those restrictions, and we've always expected that we will someday raise the level cap in GW2.
That's why we've always said that GW2 rewards players through both progression and collection, whereas GW1 primarily rewarded through collection. Presumably players aren't shocked that GW2 rewards through progression, since it has a level 80 cap.
I wonder if the core sentiment is more this: It's only been two-and-a-half months! We don't even all have exotics yet, and already you're introducing another tier. Is this the start of a power progression curve that I'll never be able to keep up with?
I certainly appreciate that worry. I myself don't want a constant struggle, as exists in some other games, to keep my equipment viable.
Then we're left with a balancing act. Some progression is ok, but pushing players onto gear treadmill isn't ok and isn't what the game is about.
So I would ask you to judge us by details, and not by making slippery-slope arguments. We introduced a ton of new content in November, and the sum total of new progression rewards we added to go with it provided a 5-10% stat increase in 2 of 12 slots. I hope you'll agree that that kind of very shallow and gradual progression does not force people onto a gear treadmill.
I think it's important for GW2 to be able to have this kind of gradual progression. Of course we made some mistakes with the way we introduced ascended gear. (See ChrisW's answers for details.) But those are addressable issues. I don't think they invalidate the fundamental concept that GW2 can have gradual stat progression without being a gear treadmill game.
~ MO
Enfin pour bien enfoncer le clou :
Hi Idredd,
Thanks for taking the time to post your question.
I will try to be as clear as possible:
- We do not intend to deploy another tier/rarity of loot such as Rare>Exotic. However we also do not intend to make promises that can be misinterpreted moving forward.
- Ascended Gear will be introduced throughout next year,and accessible through many game play activities rather than just on. -Through infusions and existing Tiers there will be the opportunity to increase stats or abilities on a low power curve through multiple types of gameplay in GW2.
- The opportunity to enhance existing tiers of loot will not be through a regular cadence of monthly updates instead it is more likely to come from expansions or very big drops of content.
In retrospect Ascended should have been deployed pre launch and earn able throughout most activities in the game (which is how we are moving forward).
I believe there has been no change to our philosophy regarding end game gear. We have learnt lessons for sure which is one of the main advantages of a live game and no doubt we will learn lessons moving forward. This does not however dilute our commitment to create a pioneering, accessible and fun world for players as we continue to build out GW2. And we very much rely on your and the communities feedback as we execute on these philosophy.
Chris
Je m’arrête ici vu la longueur du post, mais il y a eu d'autres réponses sur d'autres sujet.
Pour résumer très rapidement, concernant le tier d'objet élevé et la progression verticale :
Le tier "élevé" était prévu dès le départ. Il n'y aura pas de nouveau tier après celui-ci. Une progression minimale sera toujours possible avec des ajouts sur les tiers existant ( à la infusion je suppose). Le jeu est conçu dès le départ pour monter le level cap (ils confirment dans une réponse que le level cap sera monté à terme). Les objets "élevé" seront introduit progressivement sur l'année, et ils seront accessible par toutes les activités du jeu (craft, McM, PvE, Donjon...).
Concernant le McM ils confirment qu'ils travaillent sur l'ajout de "nouveau contenu, progression et récompenses".
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