Guild Wars 2

So Kiel made good on her Fractal promise. Good for her. No new mail this time, you just have to know to go there.

Kiel’s kind of a jerk here to Dessa.

Disguised as an Inquest…better that than Flame Legion.

Stealthing and skipping away from that first unstable portal, we can overhear a conversation between a pair of Inquest.

And now for something annoying: these unstable portals. They pull you to them as they open near you, also spawning a few veterans around them as well. It’s not fun trying to get around here, fighting enemies with annoying amounts of health and trying to get where I need to go only to get suddenly yanked into a party of veterans, or into the “chaos lava” below.

Killed some veteran skritt, then Dessa says that the core’s too hot to get a sample. I need to disable two colliders before continuing.

So, into the repulsor lab. Things get explained okay…thankfully there are safety shields to guard against these repulsors that they put in a mini-labyrinth for some reason…Except they didn’t bother to mention that the console to disable the field around the collider is in another spot…and is timed, apparently.

Nilkemia.8507:

So, into the repulsor lab. Things get explained okay…thankfully there are safety shields to guard against these repulsors that they put in a mini-labyrinth for some reason…Except they didn’t bother to mention that the console to disable the field around the collider is in another spot…and is timed, apparently.

Yes, you are screwed. Can’t do that puzzle without two other people.

I did the same, tried to solo the story. But you can’t, even though the mobs aren’t all that difficult, because of the puzzle.

The convo between the two inquest guys was interesting to see. I didn’t see that when I did it. I didn’t see a lot of what you posted, actually, because it’s buggy.

I appreciate the screens, my party had started ahead of time so i missed almost all of it.

Ok…one disconnect later, and I returned, with a party this time, ready to do this right. Turns out there were two panels in the repulsor lab, the one I found was to deactivate the forcefield leading to another one that you must also use at the same time to lower the field so someone can use the big wall console…I think. Hooray for stupid puzzles.

Afterwards, there’s a button inside past that console to teleport out of the lab.

Oh, and I didn’t mention this earlier, but apparently Dessa had two previous krewemates working there who are now dead. It would’ve been nice if they were alive somewhere and we could rescue/talk to them, maybe learn something about the disaster or what was going on to lead up to it, but no…just dead NPCs with names. Whatever.

Another very annoying thing with this instance is that there are no waypoints or checkpoints in the level, meaning that if you died, you couldn’t respawn. They fixed this a few hours later..except it only respawns you back at the start if the whole party is defeated. So if too many die and can’t be revived (say, in the repulsor puzzle), the remaining members have to die, or the defeated members have to go back to the character select and get back in.

Sigh…how do you even overlook something like that? Really…

Moving on a ways from the annoying puzzle, we find a giant ooze named Subject 6. It spews out AoE, summons blue oozes that heal it, and has a shield stance with an explosive counter if you hit it during that. Another annoying gimmicky boss fight. Yay.

There was also a cooling rod in the room with the ooze, which is apparently needed to get through the super heated radiation of death room to the last collider. But since we only needed to shut down 2 colliders, that last one’s unnecessary.

Although, I suppose you could solo the instance, you’d have to just skip the repulsor puzzle, somehow beat Subject 6 all by yourself, then use the cooling rod to get through the death chamber…provided there wasn’t another stupid puzzle to open that. Who knows…

Anyway, now to go get the sample and…I know that voice..no..no..noo…NO NO NO NO NO NO!

NO Nonono NO NO!

Why..just why..really? I read all the joking that she’d be here, but I really thought that was all joking…I did not think that the writers would actually be that predictable at this point.

Haven’t they realized by now that most of us (at least on the forums, anyway) utterly despise this character? Give it up. You can’t make us like her or care about what she’s up to anymore. She had her chance and wasted it every time. We’re sick of her. Find whatever retcon singularity she popped out of and throw her back in.

The sad thing is, we don’t really learn anything besides “she was there”. We don’t know if she started the experiment, sabotaged it, or anything. She was just there for it. She’s apparently learned about some network of magical channels but so what? I don’t care anymore.

Another story with potential ruined. The Invasive Weed was here.

Oh, and there’s a boss. Apparently the energies turned into a final boss to fight on these holo-platforms above the reactor core. Why? Who knows. Just kill it.

It shoots beams at you and can make the platforms disappear temporarily (and eventually can get rid of them permanently when at low health). Obviously, falling off is instant death. Aside from that cheap gimmick, it doesn’t take too long to kill.

After you win, you’re in a white room of limbo in between fractals, I guess. Get the chest and get out. Sigh.

After getting out, there’s some more dialogue with Dessa and Kiel. Kiel wants to take Dessa with her for questioning, but Dessa leaves..then reappears, without remembering anything of the Thaumanova Fractal she just sent us to….interesting?

I missed some of these dialogues, thanks a lot for the screens!

So um….yeah..a complete letdown. Annoying gimmicks and puzzles, annoying and unnecessary amounts of enemies, the bosses aren’t anything memorable, besides the creepy looking final boss, and having Scarlet “Invasive Weed” Briar turn out to be behind this as well killed any interest I had in the Thaumanova Fractal. We learned nothing besides “Scarlet was here, oh and Dessa had some former krewemates that worked there. Too bad they’re dead.” Nothing worthwhile.

What’s especially annoying is that people who like doing Fractals have to get through this story instance in order to keep playing them, and people who don’t like Fractals but want to see the story are forced to be introduced to them in a very bad way. I actually have less interest in Fractals than I did previously…I didn’t think that was possible!

Sure, there are other things, like changes to Fractal levels, agony resist changes, and other stuff…but since I’m not playing Fractals anyway, that doesn’t matter to me as of right now, and not anytime in the near future.

There are new Gem Store armor skins…which are reskins of the Tier 3 Human Light Armor, and 2 karma armor sets…I think. Except they have a fiery glow now. Really, that’s it? Why not just adapt/redesign all the cultural armors so that all races could use them instead, or make new sets? Now it’s just reskins? Sigh….

I like this game, I really do. But this “Living Story” doesn’t work. It’s time for it to stop. The holiday stuff can and should keep going and be improved upon, but the Living Story…and Scarlet Briar..both need to go away.

It’s time for an expansion. Something for the Crystal Desert, the Tarnished Coast, the Maguuma Wastes, the Blood Legion Homelands, the Far Shiverpeaks. There are 5 other dragons and their minions still out there. What happened to that? What about the other mysteries and lore that remain unresolved to this day? I’m not even talking about Cantha and Elona here. Tyria itself still has so much you could explore. And yet, nearly a year has been wasted on the “Living Story”. I’m sick of trying to care, only to be let down every time.

Stop it. Stop with Scarlet. Stop with the Living Story. Give us some actually good content….Heh..as if. Who am I kidding?

Meanwhile, a ranger hunting in Frostgorge Sound comes across this…

Touching it knocks you back, and the object itself reprimands you for doing that. Okay…

The Invasive Weed’s next plot, I’m guessing? Whatever.