Personally, I enjoy the gating. As someone who started playing around a week before Heavensward launch, sure it was tough to see everyone so very far ahead of me, but I was never lonely for long. Lots of people seemed to be in the same boat, and it provided a good way to learn my job to a level that made me competent--not just for the content, but for my senior players.Â
This game, no matter how well I seem to think I know my job, requires a huge amount of situational awareness and positional practice that I am amazed with. When I run content I ran only a month ago it feels a thousand times easier--not just in how my better gear affects my play, but in how my overall ability to predict, execute and move as my jobs has improved through the design of the content. It really is humbling to feel just how easy something has become and how bad you must have seemed to other players when you began! It amazes me how kind and patient 99% of my fellow players have been while I've learned my jobs.Â
This community comes out of the slow and arduous process of mastery this game requires. For every elitist there have got to be ten awesome people who are just as good but so humble and kind because they know that they started in your position. I feel like this amazing community would be damaged if new players could somehow take a shortcut in to new content and we would mess up the skill development curve.Â
I think this philosophy and approach is a big part of why the game succeeds as is does. It would be a bit sad to lose the continuity! At the same time, I have faith that the team would do it wisely. There are, after all, plenty of ways to circumvent challenging yourself via FATE farming or other methods. I simply worry that ungating content would make some players be a bit meaner or exacerbate the elitism situation towards new players due to a perception that they haven't 'earned' their place.
This game, no matter how well I seem to think I know my job, requires a huge amount of situational awareness and positional practice that I am amazed with. When I run content I ran only a month ago it feels a thousand times easier--not just in how my better gear affects my play, but in how my overall ability to predict, execute and move as my jobs has improved through the design of the content. It really is humbling to feel just how easy something has become and how bad you must have seemed to other players when you began! It amazes me how kind and patient 99% of my fellow players have been while I've learned my jobs.Â
This community comes out of the slow and arduous process of mastery this game requires. For every elitist there have got to be ten awesome people who are just as good but so humble and kind because they know that they started in your position. I feel like this amazing community would be damaged if new players could somehow take a shortcut in to new content and we would mess up the skill development curve.Â
I think this philosophy and approach is a big part of why the game succeeds as is does. It would be a bit sad to lose the continuity! At the same time, I have faith that the team would do it wisely. There are, after all, plenty of ways to circumvent challenging yourself via FATE farming or other methods. I simply worry that ungating content would make some players be a bit meaner or exacerbate the elitism situation towards new players due to a perception that they haven't 'earned' their place.
