Guild Wars 2

Zerging is not the most fun in a game. But some people, no even more most people seem to like it.
My problem with this is more that it’s zerging like in earlier installments of the living story. Some variation wont hurt too much. This is not much different from the invasion part, the toxic part, and some of the pavillion in it.
How about some of the Champs of the marrionete mixed in there. Assault some fortifications the molten or aetherblades have setup somewhere. Rebuild a fortification where we enter the map and have them come attack it at given times.
Some tower defense style part of the map where it gets harder and harder untill you lose. Search & destroy named champs instead of anonimous ones.(with chance on unique items from him/her)

Eleri Tezhme.3048:

Zergs don’t have to happen, they don’t need to happen, if people make the effort to do something different. If this is a zergfest, it is because the players aren’t thinking outside the zergfest box.

The first run in the new LA I was a part of, (in an overflow, mind you) immediately after the patch, there was no tidal wave zerg of people, running mindlessly around. There were several commanders who each focused on a quadrant of LA, and people joined them there. Even with the miasma being already half full, we saved almost 900 citizens, and got most of the rewards. We did awesome, without a major zerg in sight.

Each time since then, I’ve seen nothing but Wall O Players zerging, less than 400 citizens rescued every time, and most of the events failing, because the zerg is off doing something else.

Don’t want it to be a zergfest? Stop zerging all over the map. Actively resist just being a zerg. Split into smaller groups and kill, kill, kill. Rescue more people, because that gets everyone more and snazzier rewards.

Exactly this.
I blame commander tags, they act as a zergmagnet most of the time. Commanders should split and organize the events instead of mindlessly running around…

This is pretty much Scarlet Invasions 2.0

It doesn’t really matter if a split and coordinated force can save a lot more citizens.
If bonus rewards are not clearly superior to the amount of extra bags a player can get from mass tagging on upscaled events, people will just zerg and/or focus on missing achievements.

If ANet wants to discourage zerging, they need to start looking at the loot system and how it interacts with event scaling.

somnyus.8914:

Eleri Tezhme.3048:

Zergs don’t have to happen, they don’t need to happen, if people make the effort to do something different. If this is a zergfest, it is because the players aren’t thinking outside the zergfest box.

The first run in the new LA I was a part of, (in an overflow, mind you) immediately after the patch, there was no tidal wave zerg of people, running mindlessly around. There were several commanders who each focused on a quadrant of LA, and people joined them there. Even with the miasma being already half full, we saved almost 900 citizens, and got most of the rewards. We did awesome, without a major zerg in sight.

Each time since then, I’ve seen nothing but Wall O Players zerging, less than 400 citizens rescued every time, and most of the events failing, because the zerg is off doing something else.

Don’t want it to be a zergfest? Stop zerging all over the map. Actively resist just being a zerg. Split into smaller groups and kill, kill, kill. Rescue more people, because that gets everyone more and snazzier rewards.

Exactly this.
I blame commander tags, they act as a zergmagnet most of the time. Commanders should split and organize the events instead of mindlessly running around…

yup. I was in an overflow with good commanders and it wasnt a zerg fest. we were spread out and taking care of business.

QQ

Jeff.4680:

Why is it every patch has to require a zerg to play?

I’m not a fan of zerging either. But it’s not “every patch”. It’s actually the minority of patches.

In the last year, patches gave us, yes, several “zerg updates”, but also dungeons, fractals, solo instances, party instances, PvP and WvW maps, scavenger hunts and much more.

If you look at the individual releases, the ones that introduced new zergable content are actually in the minority. While I personally didn’t like all of them, and some player types got more new content out of them than other player types, I find it extremely fair of ANet to release bits for everybody – including zerg content.

Pixelpumpkin.4608:

Jeff.4680:

Why is it every patch has to require a zerg to play?

I’m not a fan of zerging either. But it’s not “every patch”. It’s actually the minority of patches.

In the last year, patches gave us, yes, several “zerg updates”, but also dungeons, fractals, solo instances, party instances, PvP and WvW maps, scavenger hunts and much more.

If you look at the individual releases, the ones that introduced new zergable content are actually in the minority. While I personally didn’t like all of them, and some player types got more new content out of them than other player types, I find it extremely fair of ANet to release bits for everybody – including zerg content.

This. Absolutely this. It would be nice if a less lazy person than me were to check all the LS so far, the result would be a pool of different types of updates where zergy content was just one kind.

Again, hoping that players will be active and take charge in strategizing tactics, spreading out etc. is a noble idea, but ultimately people will take the path of least resistance. It’s like the Marionette event or Scarlet invasions, ANet is trying for the players to evolve as players but the mob mentality is just too strong. They are on the right path, but they probably would need to hold hands even more.

Zerging is sometimes fun if you are involved in a huge battle against a huge opponent or a big army, but it’s not fun if it’s the only means of playing events nowadays. I wish there were more small scale events or different variety of events in this update.

Gallrvaghn.4921:

Jeff.4680:

I really wish they would add more instanced stuff. Especially since I’m more fond of the story rather than mindless killing of mobs and picking up loot.

Yeah, but they’ve decided to expand on Living World content because Personal Story System was a flop. But sometimes I liked the calm, somehow challenging, and story driven (although story still needed improvement) of Personal Story Instances than zergy encounters.

I also wish they would have added some stuff for solo instances too and people can choose between the best of both worlds.

The problem with the PS wasn’t the concept itself, it was just the execution. They should have stuck with it and worked on polishing and improving it rather than turning a 180 and going with a different half-baked concept. Now we have two incompatible narratives that both feel kitten instead of one united one that feels well crafted and polished.

That said, the LW updates have been slowly improving in quality. If the trend continues it may turn out pretty decently. However, they still need to do a better job of implementing new features, bug fixes, and world polish instead of focusing so myopically on the LW.

Forget lag, what about the INSANE amounts of particles? I’m really confused as to how anyone could enjoy this. Never see who I’m attacking. Looks like the way most people deal with it is to bust out a ranged weapon. This fails so much.

No offense, but if you’re sick of “zergs” then actually do something about it by organizing a small group of 3-5 people and go on your own. You can still do a majority of content in the entire game with a few partners and have no really hard time, aside from moments where you’ll have to join a larger group to take down bosses.

Its not like we don’t have a choice in the matter in how we play. Don’t like a mindless zerg? speak up in chat with a few other players and try and organize a smaller group that hits events and spots where the zergs are not.

Saying you hate zergs and the game is being lazy is just as much of a lazy issue as the zergs themselves. Reminds me of people that lose in PvP and then want a certain class nerfed because they’re mad they lost.

I understand that not everyone is going to like every update, but I thought it was incredibly fun and interesting to see an entire playable city, get turned into something else. It shows that they’re invested in changing what we play. Me and my gf have loved it so far.

There are always the mindless zergs but there is plenty to do to help the event by making small groups and taking on some of the challenges. Even last night when I was getting my hierloom achievement done I was saving the civilians that don’t have an event on them and we got really close to 1000 civilians saved. Those bags are what give the real loot and mindless zerging to the events scale too high will limit the amount you save, limiting the amount of good item drops.

They have two weeks to develop content and I think they are slowly on the right path. Can these events be improved, yes I think there is plenty of potential.

The funny thing is they actually designed the event to be non-zerg friendly this time around. To actually achieve the 1500 civilians, you want teams of 5-10 all over the map (with the 10s attacking large events like miasma). It’s easier to complete the large events, and you absolutely need to grab every single non-event civilian as they respawn to get to 1500.

Unfortunately, the loot distribution is suffering from Scarlet invasion syndrome; You get more loot from the kills rather than completion. Therefore, no one will try to do the event to succeed just like the invasions.

ryokoalways.3450:

The funny thing is they actually designed the event to be non-zerg friendly this time around. To actually achieve the 1500 civilians, you want teams of 5-10 all over the map (with the 10s attacking large events like miasma). It’s easier to complete the large events, and you absolutely need to grab every single non-event civilian as they respawn to get to 1500.

Unfortunately, the loot distribution is suffering from Scarlet invasion syndrome; You get more loot from the kills rather than completion. Therefore, no one will try to do the event to succeed just like the invasions.

This. Anet didn’t try to reward zerging at all.

If people want to see zerging go away or get reduced, then they need to communicate more with the players around them instead of just sitting at the screen and complaining to themselves. Zergs are always going to happen in some form because in big events that involve many players who likely never check forums or wikis, they’ll flock to the action.

If you at least communicate all the time to players, you can give them direction.

ryokoalways.3450:

Unfortunately, the loot distribution is suffering from Scarlet invasion syndrome; You get more loot from the kills rather than completion. Therefore, no one will try to do the event to succeed just like the invasions.

I’ll elabotate on that for a bit.

The best run I’ve done with regard to the saving of citizens was just over 800. The award for that was 3 standard citizen’s rescue bags (the green ones). I believe the 15 bags of alliance supplies that were awarded when Magnus called it a day at the end are also determined by number of citizens saved, but I could be wrong. I’m assuming the better rescue bags mentioned on the wiki are awarded at 900, 1200, 1500. Point being, getting to 800 was not rewarding at all compared to loot drops.

I’ve done quite a few runs, and getting to 800 was by far the most I’ve seen, usually it’s a struggle to get near 500. Getting people organized seems like an impossible task. Overflows where 5 different languages are spoken, that doesn’t help. Achievements that run counter to the objective of rescuing citizens, also not helping. People camping the lighthouse or the moa spawn point are not going to help rescue many citizens.

When getting a big enough citizen count to get better rewards is unlikely verging on the impossible, why bother doing anything other than the thing that does fill your pockets? (And by the way, I get better loot roaming solo and picking my fights than running in a zerg. Probably because I have trouble tagging mobs because I stubbornly play a character I like rather than a character that would be good at tagging mobs, but whatever…)

Vargamonth.2047:

This is pretty much Scarlet Invasions 2.0

It doesn’t really matter if a split and coordinated force can save a lot more citizens.
If bonus rewards are not clearly superior to the amount of extra bags a player can get from mass tagging on upscaled events, people will just zerg and/or focus on missing achievements.

If ANet wants to discourage zerging, they need to start looking at the loot system and how it interacts with event scaling.

I think they just need to remove drops from killing mobs. Instead, all rewards are given out instantly when the players achieve the main objective. They can add MANY levels of reward so they are all within reach of each other. These baby steps will encourage the players to play the game like how Anet envisioned it to be.

25 refugees escaped. Reward!
50 refugees escaped. Reward!
75 refugees escaped. Reward!
100 refugees escaped. Reward!
125 refugees escaped. Reward!
etc

i wish people would read the patch notes at least and try to know what they’re talking about. copy-pasta from patch notes:

• Coordinate to stop three miasma deployments simultaneously to earn the Triple Threat achievement, which awards 10 Spinal Shards and bonus loot.
• Rescue enough citizens and work together with the entire map to earn five tiers of rewards.

• As players surpass each tier, contributors are rewarded Spinal Shards, Refugee’s Belongings, and Found Heirlooms.
• Tiers are set at 100, 300, 600, 1000, and 1500 citizens rescued.

• Those who remain until the miasma reaches lethality, participants will be rewarded with daily Dragonite Ore, champion bags, Blade Shards, and masterwork items.
• For players who attain the highest tier, there’s a chance for ascended materials and rewards from previous Living World releases.

so it might initially seem like another zerg fest, but to obtain the highest rewards, people need to coordinate and break into many little groups to do all the objectives. having many little tiers might be too easy.

though i wish it was ascended gear, not just materials.

edit for formatting

Adhal.3187:

Nausiation.1469:

lol k so OP wants a small group to retake an entire city. Thank god he isn’t a game developer.

Just like a small group conquers the dead city of Arah and Zhaitan?

Lorewise the pact sent ships before the player reached the dungeon, afaik. That’s why you see other ships fighting dragon champions while you’re taking care of your own dragon trio.

Riot Inducer.8964:

displacedTitan.6897:

Arewn.2368:

Successfully duo’d many events with my gf over the course of several attacks. You don’t have to go with the zerg if it ain’t your thing. This event is actually pretty solo/small group friendly.
Furthermore, to reach the highest reward tier (1500 survivors) I strongly suspect that zergs will have to break into relatively small groups(10 or so people?) in order to cover the map and complete everything.

No you are crazy, its 100% zerg like always… the fact that zerging gets you to only 500 survivors is just your imagination. Also the loot is terrible, I didnt get a precursor in the hour I played today.

If your definition of “good loot” is getting a precursor you must live in a world of constant disappointment and I’m sorry for you.

I was part of an overflow earlier that managed 2K citizens and even though my friends and I weren’t in a zerg for most of it I got nearly three times the amount of loot as the one I spent entirely in a zerg that only got 400 citizens.

I think his post was a satire.

I really miss the Jubilee zerg and the pre-aetherblade champ nerf scarlet invasion zerg

Enokitake.1742:

Lévis.5489:

The funniest thing is if you want to do anything in the city, you need to slip the zerg . And yet people just try to zerg everything.

Miroe.2054:

1. In “escape” you can search for survivors solo or in a small group
2. If your class is “boring” to solo, accept the zerg or reroll
3. I you want rewards, spread out, look for survivors and converge at events when they appear near you, then spread out again. The reward scales with the number of rescued citizens

How to “Escape from LA”:
1) Character Select: Guardian
2) Equip Staff. Follow the Zerg.
3) Spam 1 + heals + virtues + stability/aegs/regen shouts
4) Collect tons of loot. (138 Bags of Alliance Supplies last run + Full inventory normal drops)
5) Bring Mystic Salvage kit + black lion merchant + Storage Golem/Access Key.

No skill. All zerg. All reward.

Man, I ran that exact reciepe… I nailed over 250 bags in one hour + exotic drop + 5 rare drops. 300%+ magic find FTW. Not to mention that was my first and only run yet in there.

CHIPS.6018:

Vargamonth.2047:

This is pretty much Scarlet Invasions 2.0

It doesn’t really matter if a split and coordinated force can save a lot more citizens.
If bonus rewards are not clearly superior to the amount of extra bags a player can get from mass tagging on upscaled events, people will just zerg and/or focus on missing achievements.

If ANet wants to discourage zerging, they need to start looking at the loot system and how it interacts with event scaling.

I think they just need to remove drops from killing mobs. Instead, all rewards are given out instantly when the players achieve the main objective. They can add MANY levels of reward so they are all within reach of each other. These baby steps will encourage the players to play the game like how Anet envisioned it to be.

25 refugees escaped. Reward!
50 refugees escaped. Reward!
75 refugees escaped. Reward!
100 refugees escaped. Reward!
125 refugees escaped. Reward!
etc

What needs to be removed is the loot from mobs spawned by events (and grant a fixed and reasonable reward at event completion), or at least from any extra mob spawned by event scaling.
Some people is going to zerg because they like it, and even if not the best approach for the activity, there’s no problem on rewarding them for their effort.
What needs to be avoided is the zerg gameplay giving the best rewards even when it’s
counterproductive for the intended end goal (stopping an invasion, saving as many people as possible, …).

Regular mobs, which don’t scale and are next to nothing for a zerg (they don’t have enough HP for a lot of people to even tag them), should keep some drop to make them on par whith events.

Even if having the biggest part of the reward tied to the amount of citizens saved (be it through more reward tiers, as you suggest, or directly on the end reward chest) might sound perfect, it encourages A LOT of AFK farming, so it probably should stay as low as it currently is (except maybe for the top scores, unlikely to happen with too many afkers).

Jeff.4680:

I really wish they would add more instanced stuff. Especially since I’m more fond of the story rather than mindless killing of mobs and picking up loot.

There is actually quit a bit of story going on in this event, It is just hidden under the surface. which sucks but at the same time I kind of enjoy, You have to look and find it which makes it all that more special IMO.

On top of changes to how rewards are rewarded, adding an informative mission briefing to these world events will really help in showing the players what needs to be done. Discuss here.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/livingworld/lwd/Really-need-Mission-Briefings

iHungeri.4096:

i wish people would read the patch notes at least and try to know what they’re talking about. copy-pasta from patch notes:

• Coordinate to stop three miasma deployments simultaneously to earn the Triple Threat achievement, which awards 10 Spinal Shards and bonus loot.
• Rescue enough citizens and work together with the entire map to earn five tiers of rewards.

• As players surpass each tier, contributors are rewarded Spinal Shards, Refugee’s Belongings, and Found Heirlooms.
• Tiers are set at 100, 300, 600, 1000, and 1500 citizens rescued.

• Those who remain until the miasma reaches lethality, participants will be rewarded with daily Dragonite Ore, champion bags, Blade Shards, and masterwork items.
• For players who attain the highest tier, there’s a chance for ascended materials and rewards from previous Living World releases.

so it might initially seem like another zerg fest, but to obtain the highest rewards, people need to coordinate and break into many little groups to do all the objectives. having many little tiers might be too easy.

though i wish it was ascended gear, not just materials.

edit for formatting

No one likes to read. Adding a simple informative mission briefing will go a long way.

Vargamonth.2047:

CHIPS.6018:

Vargamonth.2047:

This is pretty much Scarlet Invasions 2.0

It doesn’t really matter if a split and coordinated force can save a lot more citizens.
If bonus rewards are not clearly superior to the amount of extra bags a player can get from mass tagging on upscaled events, people will just zerg and/or focus on missing achievements.

If ANet wants to discourage zerging, they need to start looking at the loot system and how it interacts with event scaling.

I think they just need to remove drops from killing mobs. Instead, all rewards are given out instantly when the players achieve the main objective. They can add MANY levels of reward so they are all within reach of each other. These baby steps will encourage the players to play the game like how Anet envisioned it to be.

25 refugees escaped. Reward!
50 refugees escaped. Reward!
75 refugees escaped. Reward!
100 refugees escaped. Reward!
125 refugees escaped. Reward!
etc

What needs to be removed is the loot from mobs spawned by events (and grant a fixed and reasonable reward at event completion), or at least from any extra mob spawned by event scaling.
Some people is going to zerg because they like it, and even if not the best approach for the activity, there’s no problem on rewarding them for their effort.
What needs to be avoided is the zerg gameplay giving the best rewards even when it’s
counterproductive for the intended end goal (stopping an invasion, saving as many people as possible, …).

Regular mobs, which don’t scale and are next to nothing for a zerg (they don’t have enough HP for a lot of people to even tag them), should keep some drop to make them on par whith events.

Even if having the biggest part of the reward tied to the amount of citizens saved (be it through more reward tiers, as you suggest, or directly on the end reward chest) might sound perfect, it encourages A LOT of AFK farming, so it probably should stay as low as it currently is (except maybe for the top scores, unlikely to happen with too many afkers).

Actually, if there are tons of AFKers, the group have no chance at the event rewards. And since the event kicks them out afterwards, they have to keep moving their characters back inside LA and then AFK again. After a while, it isn’t truly AFK anymore.

CHIPS.6018:

Actually, if there are tons of AFKers, the group have no chance at the event rewards. And since the event kicks them out afterwards, they have to keep moving their characters back inside LA and then AFK again. After a while, it isn’t truly AFK anymore.

Maybe not completely AFK but, for example, I’ve done a full heirloom run (which is another design mistake) where my contribution to the main rescue goal has been pretty much zero.
If the reward were solely based on overall saved citizens, then I would have got it on top of the heirlooms, outperforming everybody actively working on the evacuation without actually doing anything for it.

I’d implore them to look into placing all the rewards at the end of the event and remove mob loot entirely. It’s tiresome to have people intentionally fail the event just so they can scale up encounters and farm.

The game is also in dire need of a proper contribution system to combat the AFKers.

OP why don’t you go zerg your way into saving 1500 citizens then come back and tell us how you did it.

OP just like most people don’t play attention to detail and then come and whine about something that it is their own fault.

Honestly, I think part of the problem is people automatically zerg. I’ve had the most fun so far this patch away from the zerg rescuing people in small groups of three to four players. Its not like you need to be in a group of twenty to fight through the mobs.

Lutinz.6915:

Honestly, I think part of the problem is people automatically zerg. I’ve had the most fun so far this patch away from the zerg rescuing people in small groups of three to four players. Its not like you need to be in a group of twenty to fight through the mobs.

It’s actually a lot worse.

During my last participation, I gave a try to citizen rescue. I sat on the beach just right to the Bloodtide entrance, just killing regular mobs and saving citizens on respawn.
I counted 82 people rescued just by myself (other 10 or so being encouraged by people passing by), which ended being over 10% of the total amount (around 750).
While quite efficient at rescueing, I ended with 92 bags (77 from mobs, 15 from bonus reward), which isn’t bad but can easily be outperformed by zerg tagging (which happens to be far worse on citizen saving).

Unless the 1k – 1.5k rewards are awesome (which I don’t know) and, more important, likely to be achieved , there’s no point reward wise on anything but zerging.
This creates some kind of vicious circle where, if top score is unlikely to be achieved, people will join the zerg for better assured rewards, and the more people joining the zerg, the less likely that top score becomes.

So I went and read the patch notes… and that 1500 reward chest doesn’t sound awesome. I’d rather rely on my own personal RNG from the many mobs than one single chest. The extremely miniscule chance of ascended materials or drop from previous LS event is mostly likely on the same % as a ascended chest from any other world boss chest, dungeon end chest, or the like. In which case I will do those for the same drop rate. This LS will be for the AP and that is it. There aren’t enough champs to keep farming zergers to come back. That’s for sure. It’s no jubilee or pre-champ nerf scarlet invasion by any means. All the people in my guild taht I know of participating are doing it for the AP and will not go back once they are done since the loot just isn’t good enough (except for one guy out of 50).

I don’t look at the problem as being zergs. They’re part of the dynamic of MMOs which some players prefer. Nothing wrong with that.

Where I believe the problem lies is making content which exclusively caters to zerg play. Or, rather, favors zerg play as the most efficient method by which to gain in-game rewards.

There’s a lot more that could have been done with this latest Living Story content to have allowed it to cater to a broader range of play styles.

Zerg Play

Keep it similar to the way it is now; events which spawn multiple massive waves of enemies. Now add a twist. Each time one of these events is successfully completed, a miasma generator (rather than a miasma cannister) is destroyed. On destruction, it slows the miasma build-up timer by a set amount of time (5 minutes perhaps).

As it currently stands, the instance lasts ~50 minutes (ends 10 minutes before the hour; can look at it either way). It doesn’t matter if all miasma cannisters are destroyed or none of them are destroyed; 10 minutes before the hour, the instance ends and everyone is kicked out of LA. Therefore, there’s no motive for destroying the cannisters other than being an afterthought after having wiped the waves of enemies.

Instead, make destroying the generators a goal. Doing so rewards some kind of bonus as well as extending the time players can remain in the instance. If the devs still want to hard cap the timer, they can still do so. Successfully completing these events would now contribute to the overall success of the evacuation mission as a whole, though, by giving players more time to collect loot and/or evacuate citizens (which rewards loot, too).

Since the event is instanced, there’s no negative consequence to extending the length of the mission. It doesn’t lock anybody else out of it nor prevents another mission from starting and running in tandem should the first event go into “overtime” past the hour. Players in the current instance who manage to extend their time inside of LA can still join another instance that only recently began once the miasma builds to critical levels and they’re kicked out of their current instance. They won’t be entering the new instance immediately when it begins, but they’ll still get in relatively early in the event’s progress.

The zergs can still zerg and can still get their loot from the larger events. With this change, now, they’re actively contributing to the success of the mission as a whole (and the loot to be earned) by potentially extending the length of time players can remain in the instance.

Coordinated Group Play

Create events which can only be completed through successful coordination of effort by a group of players (lending itself well to guild groups, for example).

1) One example might be the repair and defense of a bridge that has been destroyed. Some members of the group must use buckets of water or backpack water tanks to extinguish a burning bridge and keep the flames at bay while repairs are made.

Other members of the group then run supplies to repair the bridge. Both ends of the bridge have to be repaired within a narrow time window or the repair effort fails and must begin anew. As the bridge is out, those doing the repairs on opposite ends of the span can’t use the bridge to get from one end to the other; they must split up and coordinate efforts.

Yet a third group is dedicated to defending the firefighting and repair crews against enemies who constantly attack both the players and the bridge.

Repairing the bridge counts as a successful event completion. It also serves as a shortcut for escaping citizens; either decreasing the distance they must run to safety and/or helping them avoid enemies. This, in turn, supports the overall evacuation effort which rewards bonus chests for every X citizens evacuated.

If the bridge is destroyed, it’s not a repeatable event (or at least not in the same location or not very frequently) in an effort to discourage those who would intentionally let the bridge fall just to farm the event (similar to the fiasco that was destructible bridges when Edge of the Mists was first introduced).

(continued)

(continued)

2) Another option for coordinated play would be an event that sees players manning cannons and shield generators spread throughout an area. The cannons are used to take down an attacking Aetherblade Airship while the shield generators shield the cannons from return fire and/or shield escaping citizens from the Aetherblade Airship barrage. The cannons and shield generators are not operated by the same individual; thus requiring coordinated attack and defense efforts.

This could even be done as an event-in-motion rather than restricted to a specific location. The airship pursues the evacuees while they run through the city. Players run with the evacuees, jumping on cannons and shield generators as they find them along the escape route; all-the-while fighting through the ground-based mobs along their path.

Getting the evacuees to safety counts towards the total “Citizens Rescued” amount but also rewards players for having successfully completed the event. Blasting the airship out of the sky gives a bonus reward.

Small Party Play

Rather than something as simple-minded as walking up to a downed citizen and rezzing them, maybe add a bit more challenge instead. There could be a multitude of creative rescue missions spread all throughout the city which would reward smaller parties or even individuals for their efforts.

1) One example could be a burning building wherein citizens are trapped. Players don fire extinguishers à la Citadel of Flame: Path 2 while fighting through enemy mobs to clear a safe path for the evacuees.

2) Another example may be citizens trapped underwater in a sunken ship. At intervals there are air bubbles caught inside the ship for the passengers to breathe. Players must lead the passengers from one bubble to the next while keeping them safe from attacking enemies.

The air bubbles get used up, though, over time (maybe they even get used up faster the more players are present, which would not lend itself well to zergs); so it’s not possible to linger indefinitely in one bubble. It becomes a running fight and a race against time to get the passengers off the ship and to safety.

3) Yet a third event may see citizens trapped in the ruins of a building at risk of collapse. The exit is blocked by rubble which will require players to seek out materials with which to build a makeshift lever and fulcrum to move the obstruction and/or buy a little more time shoring up the crumbling structure.

4) High above in the former sweeping arches of Lion’s Arch, citizens are caught without a means of escape. Lead them to safety by successfully jumping from catwalk, to platform, to beam, to cross-member, to brace, to teetering rubble pile.

Make the jumps and the evacuees play follow-the-leader, successfully leaping after you. Fail a jump and you can try again; once you’ve worked your way back to where you were, of course. But there’s a catch! The skyway is on fire and/or collapsing by bits and pieces. Take too long to make the jump and citizens will start plummeting to their deaths as the support beneath their feet gives way.

Closing Comments

All of the above are just quick little brainstorm ideas. I’m sure others could come up with dozens of suggestions for creative events and puzzles which would cater to all styles of play. The point being is the current event is rather shallow for something as game changing as the destruction of an entire city; zerg or rez a body you come across is what it amounts to at the end of the day.

Given this Living Story event had to have been in the planning and development stages for weeks if not months, would it really have been that difficult to design additional mechanics in support of more diverse play styles while adding some depth and purpose to the event? This is supposed to be a rescue mission yet is playing as nothing more than another rehash of “ball up and kill as many bad guys as you can before the timer runs out”. Nothing wrong with that by itself. Something wrong with that when there’s precious little else to do.

I realize it’s too late to make any changes to the existing Lion’s Arch Under Attack event. Using the above as an example, the hope is the devs will consider designing their next Living Story update with all play styles in mind.

Galen Grey.4709:

There is a reason why the event reward scales to 1500 villagers yet so far in most events i took part personally we didnt save more then 500 ! its more efficient to split up into small groups cause what the event needs to succeed is not 3 giant destructive forces that at times even end up coalescing, what it needs is small groups spreading out to cover as much area as possible.

Indeed, I think that the most effective means would be to have 5 people (one party) per escort event, 10-15 at the three control points, and another 10-15 at miasmas. Any more and the event scales too high to be completed quickly (more and more elites, plus the very rare – too rare to farm – champions), and having 1-3 others at the various places that large amounts of civilians spawn at (Crows Nest Tavern, Black Lion HQ, Corlios Plaza, to name a few).

But all I see is 1 or 2 zergs of 30+ people, which just scales events to such high amounts that it takes longer to complete the events than if it were even just 5 people!

Thi sgame has a little bit of everything for everyone if you dont like the zergs dont participate in the zergs all im gonna say.You will notice every few updates they add instanced stuff but guess what the same people normally complain because they have to get grouped to do it so its the same! excact complaint on everything they put our either its too many zergs or its too many instanced stuff.Normally a good balanced as the stories go sometimes they have small encounters sometimes instances and sometimes big zerg fests.

They should have just disabled Commander tags in the zone. Zerging mostly happens because of the tags, otherwise it’s well-designed with about 100 people spread across 4 or 5 tasks at once. There’s nothing worse than seeing 50 people hugging a commander, half of them even stay right on them WvW-style. All the events work best with 10-20 people, if people just scattered they’d have higher success.

Join Zerg, Tag enemies, Don’t bother reading the event information, get loot, repeat. How do people find this fun? Mindlessly tagging baddies for loot is mind numbing

So much rage on this thread.

Lets not forget that Teq was a thing, as well as the Great Jungle Wurm.
Both events require an ORGANISED zerg. Not everything is mindless zerg content.

Betrayedchalice.5198:

So much rage on this thread.

Lets not forget that Teq was a thing, as well as the Great Jungle Wurm.
Both events require an ORGANISED zerg. Not everything is mindless zerg content.

I agree but the Zerg for LA certainly seems like it

eleshazar.6902:

Agreed. Thought they learned with The Marionette fight…. Guess I was wrong.

The LS is made by four different development teams, and they each get about 3-4 months to develop a month’s worth of content. The Marionette fight was nice, but our positive feedback on the subject won’t effect the LS for at least 4 months.

I didn’t play the last patch, and I;m not planning on playing this one too, and I didn’t play the Tower thing, so nothing new has been released for “me” for the last 4(?) months.

I don’t like Zerging content, I like content that tests your individual skill and that requires team work.

Jeff.4680:

Why is it every patch has to require a zerg to play?

I guess it’s cool for everyone else, but personally I can’t even play this stuff. I’m on a university network, and my university hates zergs. I mean, I can’t even get skills off or talk in chat. Crazy lag. No, it’s not my frame rate.

Really getting nostalgic about Guild Wars 1 instances… :/

I quite sure this has been stated in the thread but I’m going to say it again. This living story does not require zerg play. The zerg mentality is completely player driven. You actually have a much better chance of succeeding if people spread out so the different events do not scale up.

Ayrilana.1396:

Jeff.4680:

Why is it every patch has to require a zerg to play?

I guess it’s cool for everyone else, but personally I can’t even play this stuff. I’m on a university network, and my university hates zergs. I mean, I can’t even get skills off or talk in chat. Crazy lag. No, it’s not my frame rate.

Really getting nostalgic about Guild Wars 1 instances… :/

I quite sure this has been stated in the thread but I’m going to say it again. This living story does not require zerg play. The zerg mentality is completely player driven. You actually have a much better chance of succeeding if people spread out so the different events do not scale up.

Yes and no. May have taken on a life of its own at this point, but it was sparked by the introduction of the invasions and the champion loot bags. This combination provided a incentive towards zerging to scale the events up so that more champs would spawn and so produce more loot bags.

I fear that the only way ANet can break this mentality is by very overtly make less rewarding to play as part of a zerg. This perhaps by stripping out mob loot and making all loot gains be based on how quickly a event is completed.

Also, they need more achievements that tie directly into the main goal of the LS rather than the side events.

I like the feeling of a big population working and playing together. Its unique to MMO games. There is plenty to do solo and in small groups, and having massive open world events is a welcome addition.

Eleri Tezhme.3048:

Zergs don’t have to happen, they don’t need to happen, if people make the effort to do something different. If this is a zergfest, it is because the players aren’t thinking outside the zergfest box.

The first run in the new LA I was a part of, (in an overflow, mind you) immediately after the patch, there was no tidal wave zerg of people, running mindlessly around. There were several commanders who each focused on a quadrant of LA, and people joined them there. Even with the miasma being already half full, we saved almost 900 citizens, and got most of the rewards. We did awesome, without a major zerg in sight.

Each time since then, I’ve seen nothing but Wall O Players zerging, less than 400 citizens rescued every time, and most of the events failing, because the zerg is off doing something else.

Don’t want it to be a zergfest? Stop zerging all over the map. Actively resist just being a zerg. Split into smaller groups and kill, kill, kill. Rescue more people, because that gets everyone more and snazzier rewards.

This. It’s up to the players—Anet’s not standing there with a gun saying “Zerg or die.”

The best results I’ve seen—the quickest miasma fights, the highest civilians rescued totals—have come when players haven’t zerged up, they’ve gone in small squads. There’s no setting for this, it’s not a switch that Anet throws; there’s only the will of the players. If there are zergs, it’s because players choose to be in them.

There are very few areas I haven’t been able to stay alive on my own, and I’m not that good a player—most of my LA forays have been with my ranger character.

Leave the zerg and have a good time.

I’ll say what’s on my mind about zerging during current release.

The main problem (for me at least) is that saving 1200 civils (previously 1500, doesn’t matter) is not at all profitable comparing to joining a zerg. RNG gods don’t like me, and I don’t like being “sentenced” to their will.

I was doing the LA today, twice. Both times most people (i guess), including me, were focusing on rezzing civils and encouraging them etc. Both times we got over 1200 civs rescued. My reward? Both times I got 3 metal scraps or whatever, about 10 dragonite ore, 1 rare and about 3 or 4 greens, plus 25 bags in the end. Like I said, RNG gods don’t like me.
I really tried to enjoy rescuing those civilians, because that is the main goal of this release after all, but I wasn’t satisfied in the end, not a single time. We rescued 1200 civs – ok, great, but so what? I got some crappy loot and I would get much more bags and other items, even crappy ones but ton of them, if I had joined the zerg.

The thing is – there is “no reward” for rescuing civils. Not even achievements, because all of them focus on the events in LA, but not the main big event of rescuing citizens. And not even a lore wise reward such as some interesting conversations with known npcs about our successful (or not) rescue mission. Nothing…

If there are no achievements nor lore-wise reward like i mentioned or other, then I want to make a profit in gold for that event. Of course some might say that from that “superb bag” you have a chance to drop items from previous releases, wow! But that is the problem – you have a chance and that means you might as well get nothing more than crap which is more probable… I prefer to have a better chance to drop some valuable items while zerging, because as I mentioned, I will get ton of loot, and more bags. More loot = bigger chances for better drops, and even when I get just crap, it’s still more crap than for not being in a zerg and focusing on rescuing civils, so still more money.

Don’t get me wrong, I like this release. The burning LA is “beautiful”, great design in my opinion. Events also are nice, but the main one – the one that this release is about – is, in my honest opinion, not rewarding story-wise, nor achievement-wise, nor in the end gold-wise, so all in all, it is no fun.

I tried, I really did… But the dark side has more cookies, so I’m gonna stick to it. “What is thy bidding, mighty Zerg?”

chemiclord.3978:

GW2 is about open world content, not instanced, and that was a decision they made very quickly upon release.

If that was entirely true, why would they bother putting in personal story instances? Or dungeon instances? Living Story instances? sPVP? Activities? There’s been plenty of instanced content and it works well. Not everything is open world and that is a good thing.

I’m not against them having open world content in their releases from time to time, but the OP has a point – pretty much all of their releases since the summer have favored open world (zerg-required) content. Casual players, small groups and people with low-end pc’s are being left out.

Nausiation.1469:

lol k so OP wants a small group to retake an entire city. Thank god he isn’t a game developer.

8 players made Goddess out of a human. Surely 5 can retake a city, especially if I’m involved.

PeterThomas.7243:

chemiclord.3978:

GW2 is about open world content, not instanced, and that was a decision they made very quickly upon release.

If that was entirely true, why would they bother putting in personal story instances? Or dungeon instances? Living Story instances? sPVP? Activities? There’s been plenty of instanced content and it works well. Not everything is open world and that is a good thing.

I’m not against them having open world content in their releases from time to time, but the OP has a point – pretty much all of their releases since the summer have favored open world (zerg-required) content. Casual players, small groups and people with low-end pc’s are being left out.

The Living World content is designed to get the maximum number of players logging in regularly to complete it. If it is one’s goal to keep players playing, and playing regularly, it is more cost effective to present large-group content than it is to present small-group content.

Also, the dungeons and personal story in GW2 have been routinely and thoroughly criticized. Living World is a reaction to player reactions to GW2 in the same way that Southsun mobs and Risen army revisions were a reaction to player complaints about the Risen lacking challenge. Such reactions are understandable.

The one problem with this is that if most new content is herd content, metrics are going to show that players prefer herd content.

I wouldn’t mind large scale attacks that required big numbers…what I hate about this current set up is the first week"zerg" I feel like those of us with a life outside of gaming is to some degree punished. If you can’t make it into game within the first few days to a week of a L/S update…don’t bother trying—the zerg has moved on.

I have missed a lot of meta rewards and the story line since the content can not be accomplished once the zerg has moved on. At this point, I’m like “meh” to the L/S, I’ve missed too much to be invested emotionally in what Scarlet is doing; plus a little upset I’ve missed so many one time awards (due to my “must have all things OCD” in game). I love GW1 and I love most everything about GW2 except this “L/S zerg required” content.

And because I already know I’ll get these responses:

1. Yes, I know I can go find a different game—I love Guild Wars so I am trying to stick it out to see if things get better.

2. Yes, I know L/S goes on for X-number of weeks, but a lot can not be done without an unreasonable amount of people…yes I know it is MY fault for not ignoring my real life responsibilities and being in game on release day, but we shouldn’t be punished for not getting in game the first day.

3. Maybe some of the issues I am experiences is due to my server (Dragonbrand). I am looking into moving servers, I just don’t yet know which server would be a better fit for me (leaning to TC).

DO NOT WORRY GUYS !!!!!

After zergfest season 1 ends we have a little break before zergfest season 2 starts again !!!!!

When you see a zerg in Guild Wars, it truly is impressive to watch and experience. It’s like one second you’re fighting single monsters by yourself and suddenly this HUGE wave of people come (and I mean HUGE) and help you kill what you were trying to kill by yourself and basically destroy everything in their path. It’s like one huge giant ant army killing everything in its path.

I love it! It’s glorious! Unstoppable! I feel mighty!

It definitely makes me feel part of the group in accomplishing something.

Once you experience the feeling of being part of that and working together to bring down enemies, there’s no returning to solo play in an MMO open world Living Story event. It just doesn’t compare. It’s like me going back to play Skyrim…I keep asking myself where are all the other people like in Guild Wars?

I say keep the HUGE ant army rolling. I enjoy it a lot.