Guild Wars 2

Like the title says. Fantastic job with the new story and fantastic job creating characters who are interesting interesting and that I care for!

Yes, thank you arenaNet, I was actually impressed to be honest.

Yes, I’m loving it! And there is enough hooks littered through to keep me guessing.

Enjoyed it. I am looking forward to more. Hopefully the story keeps going strong.

Well definitely an improvement over the personal story so far at least. My only complaint is that I want more.

I agree — I’m enjoying what we’ve gotten so far. The pacing has been a little slow up to this point, but I like the new characters and the story. If the Prelude and The Gathering Storm were released over a single month it would have kept the momentum going a little better.

CureForLiving.5360:

Well definitely an improvement over the personal story so far at least. My only complaint is that I want more.

I hear that.

I took a break from the personal story for a bit, but after having helped Rox and Braham and jumping back into the personal story… let’s just say it’s a good thing the writers are getting better at this. Don’t get me wrong, the personal story is fun and has some fantastic missions, but that dialog…

I am actually really curious to see, if the Molten Alliance was formed to combat something gross underground that’s not Primordus-related, what’s really going on.

So, yeah, this rocks. Good job.

I do have to offer some biting criticism on one point. Assuming it was true when Colin stated they are NOT working on an expansion at the moment, then there is something seriously wrong with the efficiency of current content creation efforts.

In five years of development they managed to create Personal Story, with modest branching, for five races. By my count, over 260 individual personal story elements. Even if they began working on the personal story right from the start, that’s about 6 personal story elements completed in a month. The game has been out for 7 months, so if they were working at full efficiency, they should have been able to create 42 personal story elements since launch. How many do we get in the entire Living Story to date? Two.

I liked both story elements revealed this month, but they really should have been able to deliver at least a four part story for each storyline for this month’s update and at least that many for next month as well.

This argument can be applied to Dynamic Events as well. How many thousands of DEs in the game? Promises that new DEs would be added constantly over the first year, with estimates that by the end of year one there would be 2x to 3x as many DEs in the game as at launch. How many new DEs since launch? Is it even a dozen?

I love this game to pieces but IF the line about not working on expansions yet is true, then there seems to be something extremely wrong with the way the company is managing it’s post launch development resources.

If they could have delivered even half of what one might reasonably expect, the game could be one of those rare MMOs that just snowballs to greater and greater popularity. With the current pace of ongoing development? Things are not looking good.

If you look at Ncsofts hiring page you’ll see that they’re hiring a lot of people. I’ll infer from that that most of the people responsible for content left a long time ago.

As well the genuinely talented team that did the SBA will be going to work on the Living Story (which makes no sense, they should just cancel this trash and put more resources in the SBA)

I also want to add my opinions to the Living Story;

It’s great! I enjoy the fact that there has been extra information added to the story as with the letters and showing of location. It feels more real than running blind, shouting in map chat if someone has seen anything.

Like it the way it is :^)

I’ve been very critical on chapter two but I just wanted to say that I really like the content of the new chapter. The instanced missions are really cool, the informations are guiding very well and we finally got a developing story. For me it’s awsome.

I agree, the characters presented in Flame and Frost are great! and the story is interesting so far!

Rox and Braham have what a majority of Story NPCs lacked. Personally I get similar vibes from Braham as I do from Forgal. I want to say I like Rox more, but I have a feeling Braham’s story will be more captivating.

Its been ok so far. tbh the most intriguing part to is was finding all those messages left by the whisper agent. Some were amusing but a lot of them hinted on what was happening below the surface. This is the kind of thing I like the most.

Now I want to know what the weapon is, why the dredge and legion are fighting amongst each other, and who is this force that is pushing them together because the agent said it wasn’t jormag.

I like the part where the legion burns one of the dredge when the dredge wanted the fire magic secrets. It sounds is if they really don’t like each other.

I hate it when the story is so transparent and all information is given to you at the start. I found the time between updates a little too long which is probably a good testament to me wanting to discover more. I really wish there was more discovery and depth in the lore in this game. Everyone loves a good story and most people love a good surprise.

And what’s the deal with Eir and her son? why so distant?

I’m glad someone started this thread. I too immensely enjoyed the stories and want to continue with both of the story lines. I hope we can look forward to more of this type content.

Getting better. Loved the little hints around the place (whispers dead drops) that elude to whats going on and to keep us interested for the next part.

Biggest issue is pacing. While i understand it takes time to make content id rather we have maybe one smaller additional part per week then a big release every month similar to War in Kryta in GW1 (extra missions each week).

Surprised to find people gushing over the Living Story. After attempting to get my friends into the game, it’s difficult to fully voice my disappointment.

I feel ArenaNet focuses on this insubstantial and inefficient temporary content at the expense of their world. Fantastic areas have languished with little or no way for players to interact with them. This is very different from the picture that was painted at release, where developers prided themselves on how simple adding content to their dynamic events would be.

Wooden Potatoes commented on this shallowness. Many places to explore, but not much substance to be had.

Newer systems not being integrated into the world shows the lack of polish and adds to the feeling of abandonment. One example would be karma vendors – you have a game where players scale appropriately but the rewards do not. The vendors would greatly benefit from the recent wvw item division of skins and stats.

And gushing is the word for this thread. I’m sorry, IMO the writing was pretty horrific, particularly Braham and his wholly unneeded entrance into the game as Eir’s son.

Anet please breathe life into the world anew with your updates.

No one-time events that ultimately fail to satisfy. Stop chasing this ephemeral Living Story that future and returning players cannot experience.

You should accept that people have different opinions. Like I said before I was critisising chapter two which I personally didn’t like very much. However I think it’s only fair to say when I’m happy with content then. And I personally like their atempt to keep people interested in the game with a story instead of relying on their reward stuff like the dailies, only.

About Braham: My opinion about this depends on how this storyline will develop. Until then I stay patient and wait what comes out of this.

You should accept the same. Just look at Fiontar’s well-written post and WoodenPotatoes’ video; I am not alone in my dissatisfaction of the direction ArenaNet has taken post-release.

I do accept your opinion as an opinion. And yeah maybe I’m a bit to sensitive on the word “gushing” or I understand it in a wrong way.

I agree with Jackard, the game should be expanded instead of adding temporary content. Colin told us that when we come back a year later, an area with once 100 events would offer 300. Imagine 3 times as much dynamic events in Ebonhawke than before… this would be so much fun. They could add small things which tell a story – questlike – and it would work for this game, I’m sure.

This strict “we add no quests to GW2” is a decision I’m not happy with. You could breath more life into the existing areas and tell wonderful stories which won’t disappear like a living story chapter.

Jackard.3071:

Wooden Potatoes commented on this shallowness. Many places to explore, but not much substance to be had..

Yes I saw that, it’s well worth watching, Wooden Potatoes is a massive GW fan who is so passionate about it. I find it interesting that he was talking about “traditional” quests (and he was not really talking about NPCs with an exclamation mark over their heads) and how the game could benefit from them in addition to the dynamic events and how ArenaNet stated they wanted nothing to do with “traditional” quests.

Now, here we have the Living Story, which basically does just that. Sure it adds new dynamic events to the game. It also adds “traditional” quests to the game. Now, they are slightly disguised in the same way that your personal story and renown hearts are thinly disguised “traditional” quests but that’s exactly what they are.

Each of the achievement trackers is basically a “traditional” quest.

• “Refugee Volunteer” is a single long quest requiring you to do 75 helpful things, help the wounded, repair signs, recover possessions.
• The “Lost and Found” and “Secret Contact” achievements are the basic “find stuff and bring it back to someone” quests you see in just about every MMO.
• The Rox and Braham story arcs are themselves a couple of, fairly brief, quest chains. A couple of the steps in those chains happen in instances that were created for them sure but it is a pretty “traditional” quest (albeit repeatable). These are marked with a gold star but they could be an exclamation mark.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with this. I find this type of content fun. I personally believe that these kind of quests (as in something that you start when you are ready) are the only coherent way to tell a story and are a good way to make the character feel like they’re truly involved in the world. As a counter example imagine arriving in step 3 of a 5 part dynamic event, you generally just go with the flow and that’s fine but you have no idea what went before. Why are you there? How did you get there? What’s really going on? You’re not really a part of it you just stumbled onto it. With a “traditional” quest you are part of it from from the beginning to the end.

I think this kind of content is a great addition but, let’s be honest here, they are just “traditional” quests with a different name (and are only available for a limited time). The only things missing are the steps where you go to an NPC to start the quest and then head back to hand it in when you’re done.

Actually, now that I think of it it’s not missing those steps, they are just handled through in game mail here.

well traditional quests have rewards…

…but I see where you are coming from. I haven’t looked at it this way yet.
Traditional quests aren’t repeatable – just like the living story achievements are temporary

Actually quite nice, now they could add in more interesting activities other than finding hidden stuff. Like the Halloween-Scavengerhunt-activities for example. Maybe then we would feel like there is actually a lot to do.

Toss me into the pot of people who are disappointed. A few minutes of smacking signposts and a couple ultrageneric story missions that are indistinguishable from any number of “follow this NPC and kill a few normal mobs” personal story missions or escort events fails to impress. The writing and character’s aren’t strong enough to really get me to care, let alone when something so minimal is stretched over several months. You spend a few minutes doing the content to clear up your UI and then completely forget about it until the next installment. I don’t feel like the Charr or Norn are being threatened and driven from their homes – I feel like there are just a bunch of annoying periscopes and dredge APCs cluttering up random spots in Wayfarer/Diessa that are just going to keep respawning until June or whatever. Everything else in the zone is business as usual.

I try to get friends back into the game but it’s difficult when I have this this to show them. The prospect of a couple more bog standard (and temporary) story missions isn’t exactly enticing when almost nobody has bothered with all of the personal story missions in the game as it is. SAB has shown us that ANet is capable of putting in something new, interesting, and worth spending a good chunk of time on. F&F has not.

Pifil.5193:

Jackard.3071:

Wooden Potatoes commented on this shallowness. Many places to explore, but not much substance to be had..

Yes I saw that, it’s well worth watching, Wooden Potatoes is a massive GW fan who is so passionate about it. I find it interesting that he was talking about “traditional” quests (and he was not really talking about NPCs with an exclamation mark over their heads) and how the game could benefit from them in addition to the dynamic events and how ArenaNet stated they wanted nothing to do with “traditional” quests.

I disagree with his conclusion that traditional quests are needed to fix the problem described, it would have been fine if Anet had followed through on their pre-release claims of continuing to enrich the game world with additional events and activities.

WoodenPotatoes is arguing against himself in that most NPC do hand out a lot of lore, but you’re not bludgeoned with it. By following event chains you’ll understand how the world works, by talking to people you’ll find depth. That’s what he claims. How he comes to the idea of hollowness from that is beyond me.

As far as the current F&F goes, it should stay. The zones where it plays out are more alive than ever. As far as living story goes, for 2 zones in the world it really worked out. Now it’s time to develop the entire world like that.

I also did the ‘mini dungeons’ (char and norn) 2 days ago and I am very happy with them as well. I did this so late because I find the living story interface a little difficult but the story, events, characters etc were just great!
I hope you guys find a effective way to create this content fast and cheap enough so we get even more. I know I could do this all day

Oh and please add a ‘leave dungeon, it’s over button to all of them

TL;DR;
Thumbs up, great fun!

marnick.4305:

WoodenPotatoes is arguing against himself in that most NPC do hand out a lot of lore, but you’re not bludgeoned with it. By following event chains you’ll understand how the world works, by talking to people you’ll find depth. That’s what he claims. How he comes to the idea of hollowness from that is beyond me.

As far as the current F&F goes, it should stay. The zones where it plays out are more alive than ever. As far as living story goes, for 2 zones in the world it really worked out. Now it’s time to develop the entire world like that.

Oh I agree with your statement completely!

I don’t have the attention span to care about content that comes out every at the end of each month, to be honest. I just do it, get the points, and go back to forgetting it ever existed until the next part. It’s not good design. Though, the latest part did make me a little happy but mad at the same time because THAT was how F&F should have started, not going up and down Wayfarer’s fixing signs. There was literally no impact for the first two parts. As a storyteller, what you guys should be doing is making things with more oomph and then fill in the things between that and the end. The Karkaland guys did it right, though it failed to do anything significant afterwards. Dying to invisible karka was probably the most amusing thing there.

Fiontar.4695:

In five years of development they managed to create Personal Story, with modest branching, for five races. By my count, over 260 individual personal story elements. Even if they began working on the personal story right from the start, that’s about 6 personal story elements completed in a month. The game has been out for 7 months, so if they were working at full efficiency, they should have been able to create 42 personal story elements since launch. How many do we get in the entire Living Story to date? Two.

I liked both story elements revealed this month, but they really should have been able to deliver at least a four part story for each storyline for this month’s update and at least that many for next month as well.

This argument can be applied to Dynamic Events as well. How many thousands of DEs in the game? Promises that new DEs would be added constantly over the first year, with estimates that by the end of year one there would be 2x to 3x as many DEs in the game as at launch. How many new DEs since launch? Is it even a dozen?

I believe that the concept of living story wasnt around since launch. i think they only recently started working on it, and that is why there is so little

I’ll add my good karma feels to this thread. I’ve really enjoyed the instances from Flame and Frost – especially Rox’s. They were full of character and left me hungry for more.

In fact, I wish they hadn’t been quite so short! I can’t wait to see if some of this event spills out into the regular world, creating new dynamic events and whatnot.

marnick.4305:

WoodenPotatoes is arguing against himself in that most NPC do hand out a lot of lore, but you’re not bludgeoned with it. By following event chains you’ll understand how the world works, by talking to people you’ll find depth. That’s what he claims. How he comes to the idea of hollowness from that is beyond me.

Wooden Potatoes is arguing more that areas where there are NPCs (all the cities, some of the towns, some other interesting locations as well.) have nothing to show for it.

You can in fact enter a jumping puzzle area, do it, get a chest and get out (no lore attached) or you can find these NPCs standing in a cave talking about stuff, but youre not engaged with them, as their conversation doesnt stick as there’s nothing to it.

It’s like an NPC saying the world’s gonna end. ANd you think, Lol that’s cool, and then you walk on because you know nothing will happen.

I’m also enjoing the F&F story. Continue this path for next stories, please. And better rewards!!

I love the characters and I really like how busy the wayfarers foothills and diessa feel with all the events going on. I have spent so much time in these zones on loads of characters.

Every time I see those fiery portals light up I’m always rushing over.