Does anybody else feel like this game lacks a sense of progression?

I actually like it since it kind of levels out the playing field. It makes it so it isn't impossible to earn xp in lower level areas. The lower levels I still find easier, even when I'm leveled down, than the upper level areas where I get downed more frequently. I dont really feel a lack of progression at all in relation to the lovering your level, and it actually keeps me interested in the game.

 

I think Guild Wars 2 is more of an items game then a numbers game. Aim is too look cooler than the next guy with Armours and Skins. End game is to get the Legendary weapon.
Guild wars 1 was all about skill and when GW2 dropped that I was fairly dissapointed but I am a skins kind of guy so I don't mind grinding so I can look good.

 

I understand where you're coming from but scaling down in lower-level zones shouldn't be really that much of a problem if you continuously upgrade your gear. GW2 is a very skill- and gear-based game, and it shouldn't be really too hard once you get the hang of it, especially when playing PvE. The assumption really is that when you go back and revisit lower-tier zones to farm you already have better gear and better experience playing your character.

In short, don't worry about it. Just get better gear from the Trading Post every 5-10 levels or and you'll be fine farming the lower zones.

 

I do have to agree, the sense of epic-ness one gets from walking into a low-level zone with your maxed out gear and annihilating mobs is pretty much gone from the game. Although, with all your level-related skills and trait-points, you are still far more powerful than another character who is actually at the level you've been downgraded to, but the monstrous difference is no longer noticeable. I'm really not digging the whole "Ascended Weapons" thing right now... Not really sure why, it's just not appealing to me. This game is exponentially more fun with friends though, it helps dull down the lack of progression!

 

I definitely agree! I run daily with a small group of friends I met in-game and it's always a blast whenever everyone's online. This is especially true when you're in WvW and doing defense. No one really likes doing it, but it's a lot more easier to do if you have friends to chat with while baby-sitting a tower or keep. Plus, MMOs are designed to have great social features so you'll be missing out if you don't interact with other people.

 

Yes, I love that actually that there is no sense of grinding in this game. To be honest, this game s kinda grindy, but it tirs not to let you feel this way with random events and meaningful quests.

 

The lack of progression for me stems from the insane money sinks they put into the game and not the actual leveling. Guild Wars 1 capped your level at 20 so you hit the cap pretty fast and people didn't really seem to mind. Guild Wars 2 on the other hand takes your gold wherever they try. Waypoint fees are ridiculously expensive, you can only get a money bonus for a dungeon once a day, and the trading post gimps you 15% every time you try to sell something. I know inflation needs to be prevented and whatnot, but I've never felt like the money sinks in this game give you anything worthwhile in return. They're just there for the sake of being money sinks. It's worse than paying taxes because at least taxes pay for stuff. This money just disappears.

 

Even though I don't play GW's anymore that is one of the main reason why I stopped playing, but this is not just a problem in GW a lot of MMO's have the same problem in my opinion.

 

I don't really have a problem with the level reduction for zones. Of course I main as a minion master necro, so having an army of zombies with me as we rampage through the events in the starting zones kind of helps that feeling

 

I agree with you. One of the main reason I play MMOs is to get strong and feel like a bawsse, one shotting low level enemies and things like that. It sort of defeats the purpose of even having leveled zones, since your level gets adjusted wherever you are anyway. I like the way Final Fantasy XIV handles it. For special things like Dungeons or Active Events, your level is scaled, but normally just walking around, you're just as powerful as you should be.

 

On the contrary, I feel there is a sense of progression that is almost forced on you through their main storyline and zone structure. Each zone feels like a level in a single player RPG, to me. You go from base to outpost to castle, collecting quests and completing them in around about the same area before you are guided to the next attraction.

In my opinion the game didn't feel very "free", if you wanted to progress quickly, you had to follow a very obvious path. I for one prefer a more freeform game where you are simply dumped into the world and not told what to do, so you can make your own adventure, but I can see the appeal of a theme-park structure.

 

I definitely felt constricted while playing the game. Money was tight until I reached max lvl and started grinding dungeons and whatnot. While I did enjoy levelling up, it went way too quickly and acheving max level didn't really seem like that much of an achievement. Neither did 100% World Completion. I stopped playing some 3 months ago because I felt like I've done everything there was to do and didn't feel like grinding for a legendary weapon.
Maybe when there's more content in a few months I'll come back.

 

I would say that the PvE in the game is not enough to make me want to keep playing. What kept me going and feeling a sense of accomplishment was WvW and my guild. Building up a WvW guild in GW2 can be a really cool thing. Your main reason is to be the best out there and win every fight. So I'd say that progression is fine, but the game doesn't give you that motivation.

 

On the contrary, I really like the down scaling. It would be nice if there was a toggle to disable it though. I like how I don't have to worry about out-leveling a zone. There still is a sense of progression because as you level, you can access higher level zones that would've been too hard previously. All down scaling does is preventing you from being overpowered in low level zones.

 

Don`t forget, Guild Wars 2 in its current form, is just at the beginning. There are still 4 or so elder dragons to kill and I`m sure the game will receive massive content in the years to come. Guild Wars 1 had 4 expansion packs if I remember correctly.

 

Totally, maybe not in the sense that my character was getting stronger, as I could feel it was, but rather I didn't feel like the story really progressed. I don't know why that is, maybe because I was trying to play all classes at once and I couldn't really identify with the one character like I had in Guild Wars. In Guild Wars with the maps the way they were you had to progress through the story to get to places on the map, thats not the case in Guild Wars 2 and I think the game suffers because of it.

 

The Sylvari are interesting to begin with and with the release of the new trailer, a lot of earlier speculation about them being tied to a hidden dragon has pretty much come true. Sure there's a lot lacking in tons of storylines but I think the Sylvari are the most developed if the current releases have anything to go by. That being said though, I'm not currently playing the game to get immersed into the lore so much as the PvP aspect since I've missed too much of the living story arcs.

 

I don't think there's any progression issues aside from end-game content being not diverse enough. There is so much content to do INGAME like 100% zones like old platforming games that the journey itself was ridiculously fun. Couple that with real time battle combat, and multiple characters the replayability is ten times that of GW1, and I still love GW1 more.

I love WvW and PVP options. The world map in WvW is epicly designed for a battleground too, so that progression in PVP can help supplement PVE action.

I love the auto-levelling down. It helps you play with friends.

 

I think that Guild Wars 2 was the only game where I DID actually sense progression and a lot of fun. I think that the game has a lot of content, massive amounts of contents where you have so much to do, that you wouldn't even be bored. Playing with my friend really helped me because it makes it more fun and more interesting exploring around the game.