I had some extremely high expectations for this patch, and I can’t say everything was met in the way I wanted, but I’m still enjoying myself. BUT, ANet told us that this patch would tie together every living story and make sense out of the things we didn’t completely understand… I didn’t learn anything though!
Likely, more to come once the Playhouse becomes available.
I really hope so. I knew beforehand that this update would bring together all living story threads so far, but I still found myself going out into the world after the closing ceremony, seeing Molten Alliance, and thinking “wait..what?”.
I don’t understand why they’re all fighting for her, and also, why Scarlet can just come back once you “kill” her. When she dies, why do her invasions not stop? When she dies, why does she just come back during the next invasion. It..just..doesn’t..make..sense.
Scarlet isn’t a well developed villian. Besides a couple minor mentions, she came out of nowhere. There were some really cool theories about how Livia or Ellen Kiel could have been Scarlet, which I think would have been more interesting.
On top of that, do we even know what her motivation is? So far it just seems like she’s a bad guy doing bad things cause that’s what bad guys do.
It’s all so one dimensional, black and white writing with no twists or surprises.
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Agreed, no back story behind scarlet so far => why should I bother?
GW2 seems to have turned into a ‘join a zerg and run from champ to champ’ game => boring, mindless and annoying. Not to mention if I didn’t have a new computer I wouldn’t be able to play this content at all.
More timed events => more annoyance.
I’d prefer:
All maps spawn invasion => less players on each, more challenge, more tactics required
Instead of Champs only dropping rewards, every event drops a reward => solo as well as zerg play encouraged, to each his own.
FOR GODS SAKE give us the option to turn off other players effects! I can’t see anything.
As things stand right now, I"ll play gw2 to see what living story brings every two weeks, other than that since I explored the entire map, I’m off to better games. And even the living story might not hold me here for long, it’s much too shallow so far.
So other than getting 1000’s of minions butchered for no apparent goal other than terrorism essentially, what is Scarlets actual goal and purpose? How does she have a multi-national alliance size army and warships from seemingly nowhere?
Scarlet isn’t a well developed villian. Besides a couple minor mentions, she came out of nowhere. There were some really cool theories about how Livia or Ellen Kiel could have been Scarlet, which I think would have been more interesting.
On top of that, do we even know what her motivation is? So far it just seems like she’s a bad guy doing bad things cause that’s what bad guys do.
It’s all so one dimensional, black and white writing with no twists or surprises.
Thing is: if you make a complicated story, especially with temporary content like this, then ‘casuals’ or people that simply don’t play so much, perhaps take a break here and there, will have a hard time understanding it. Also. Livia could have never been Scarlet.
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So other than getting 1000’s of minions butchered for no apparent goal other than terrorism essentially, what is Scarlets actual goal and purpose? How does she have a multi-national alliance size army and warships from seemingly nowhere?
Perhaps it will be expanded upon with a week? Two weeks? I think we should draw conclusions afterward, give proper feedback and Anet can learn from it. It’s a bit too soon to draw them imo. Maybe...a couple weeks down the line she comes back again like most LS stuff that returns after a while?
Blood And Metal is a guild on Gunnars Hold that is all about metal, punk,hard rock etc.. Join us!
I was hoping for the OP to say “I was right all along!”
Anyway, Scarlet says that the Aetherblades work for her (“…because they like to live”. Funny, since we killed so many of them). About the Molten Alliance, well, she is clearly the “snake-nosed, silver-tonged, quick-talking person of the city” that the prisoners talk about.
To me, it feels like the NPCs don’t want us to know anything, just to go there and kill stuff for them. I feel a bit left out (story-wise, of course).
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The really hilarious plot gaffe is that the first thing Jennah or our character should have suggested doing was going and talking to The Pale Tree about who she is. That would have been a great way to figure out how to approach the situation and flesh out more of the plot about who she is. It all just seems so disjointed. I am sure we will get more info later, but for now it feels like the end of Guild Wars 1 did when EotN ended. We got an ending but it just begged for more questions and those questions never got answered. The same thing seems to be happening here. I know that I want an actual story with a concise beginning, middle, and end. Even if it isn’t a story I like, at least it will make sense and be well laid out. This is just kinda messy for now. I will reserve total judgment for when the event ends. Surprise me with story for once ArenaNet! I love the rest of the game, but the storytelling is kinda lacking in the coherent department.
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The really hilarious plot gaffe is that the first thing Jennah or our character should have suggested doing was going and talking to The Pale Tree about who she is. That would have been a great way to figure out how to approach the situation and flesh out more of the plot about who she is. It all just seems so disjointed. I am sure we will get more info later, but for now it feels like the end of Guild Wars 1 did when EotN ended. We got an ending but it just begged for more questions and those questions never got answered. The same thing seems to be happening here. I know that I want an actual story with a concise beginning, middle, and end. Even if it isn’t a story I like, at least it will make sense and be well laid out. This is just kinda messy for now. I will reserve total judgment for when the event ends. Surprise me with story for once ArenaNet! I love the rest of the game, but the storytelling is kinda lacking in the coherent department.
Sometimes though, if well done, more questions are better than all doors closed and nothing left unanswered. At least I have that with movies and such.
Blood And Metal is a guild on Gunnars Hold that is all about metal, punk,hard rock etc.. Join us!
I had some extremely high expectations for this patch, and I can’t say everything was met in the way I wanted, but I’m still enjoying myself. BUT, ANet told us that this patch would tie together every living story and make sense out of the things we didn’t completely understand… I didn’t learn anything though!
It’s funny how people assume we’ll know everything about the villain in the first chapter, and when we naturally don’t, they call it weak writing. Some people have no patience for storytelling.
The really hilarious plot gaffe is that the first thing Jennah or our character should have suggested doing was going and talking to The Pale Tree about who she is. That would have been a great way to figure out how to approach the situation and flesh out more of the plot about who she is.
Queen Jennah: “Great Mother, Pale Tree, who is this Scarlet Briar blowing up my city?”
The Pale Tree: “She was Trahearne’s ex-girlfriend. I am thinking of instituting a new rule of not falling in love with other sylvari, it never works out. Look what happened with Faolain . . .”
Queen Jennah: “I’m thinking about a rule like that myself.”
Logan Thackeray: “. . . why do you look at me when you say that?”
It all just seems so disjointed. I am sure we will get more info later, but for now it feels like the end of Guild Wars 1 did when EotN ended. We got an ending but it just begged for more questions and those questions never got answered. The same thing seems to be happening here. I know that I want an actual story with a concise beginning, middle, and end. Even if it isn’t a story I like, at least it will make sense and be well laid out. This is just kinda messy for now. I will reserve total judgment for when the event ends. Surprise me with story for once ArenaNet! I love the rest of the game, but the storytelling is kinda lacking in the coherent department.
One of the problems writing a story for an MMO is trying to find a way of leaving a definitive “end” while still giving you room to grow on it later. The Prophecies campaign left ways for that to happen, and Factions was a stretch, but not so much anything else . . .
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Perhaps it will be expanded upon with a week? Two weeks? I think we should draw conclusions afterward, give proper feedback and Anet can learn from it. It’s a bit too soon to draw them imo.
I don’t agree. I think it’s actually a fair point to say, “As of right now, the story has not been entirely satisfying to me because it’s playing it too close to the vest with the reveals,” even before the story has completely finished.
Even if that opinion changes in response to the overall plot, a huge part of storytelling is not just the end summary but the pacing. If the pacing feels off to the player, that’s important feedback for the writing team to have.
If ANet is planning on episodic releases (which seems to be how they’re operating currently,) each individual episode needs to be somewhat satisfying, not just the story as a whole in retrospect. This is particularly the case if the storyline is going to be extended over weeks or months. If a lot of players aren’t feeling a connection to the ongoing narrative, the writers may need to rethink some things.
It’s funny how people assume we’ll know everything about the villain in the first chapter, and when we naturally don’t, they call it weak writing. Some people have no patience for storytelling.
This isn’t what happened though. Anet said that this living story would tie up the loose ends. It didn’t. If they wanted this to simply reveal scarlet and have later patches tie up the current story arc, they should have said “will reveal the person behind all the recent events” instead of “will tie it all together”. Because as of right now we have no idea who, how, why, or what the combined forces of scarlett even are
It’s funny how people assume we’ll know everything about the villain in the first chapter, and when we naturally don’t, they call it weak writing. Some people have no patience for storytelling.
Grab a book. Read one sentence every two weeks and then, once read, promptly rip that sentence from the book and throw it into a fire. That’s the problem with storytelling in the Living Story. By the time we have a resolution to a story, we have lost interest or have completely missed key plot points due to their removal from the game.
Well, that and the poor writing. I haven’t seen writing this bad since the Star Wars prequels.
It’s funny how people assume we’ll know everything about the villain in the first chapter, and when we naturally don’t, they call it weak writing. Some people have no patience for storytelling.
Grab a book. Read one sentence every two weeks and then, once read, promptly rip that sentence from the book and throw it into a fire. That’s the problem with storytelling in the Living Story. By the time we have a resolution to a story, we have lost interest or have completely missed key plot points due to their removal from the game.
Well, that and the poor writing. I haven’t seen writing this bad since the Star Wars prequels.
That’s harsh, I was going to say Lost season 3 was a better example . . .
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