Guild Wars 2

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r all over the place (making sure the spoiler-alert gets read)
So yes. A pretty bold statement I threw up there…and I certainly don’t think they don’t matter at all…but only so very little that they feel obsolete. I only played through the story once and here’s why I am NOT happy with it (besides the worst end-boss in history of gaming).

TL;DR since lots of you guys get this wrong:
This wasn’t about wether or not I like the story. I actually DO like the story and everything. I also don’t mind Trahearne being pictured as the hero of it all.
I was talking about major flaws in the logic behind how the story puts the different branches together (Which is in my opinion part of game-design as well as story-writing.). Nobody can tell me that it makes sense that a I see something happen because of my choice in the past, and then, later on, they tell me something else happened back then.
This just doesn’t make any sense. Same as people randomly treating you like best friends when you see them the first time, just because in another storyline you would’ve met them already.

When the game started I felt like the choices you made were impactful on the world. I mean, I knew that the persistent world wouldn’t change one bit because of what I would do. But I felt that at least the personal story would change according to my race, my background and my early decisions.

Nope, they don’t. And the dilemma started at the defense of claw island. You’re supposed to meet Trahearne for the first time there, talking to that weird Charr-commander who is completely ignorant, I think you know who I mean. So you meet him for the first time there…wrong I am Sylvari, I met him already in my personal story way earlier.
They did an okay job there, put a dialog where Trahearne recognizes me and asks me how I’ve been; only because I am Sylvari, pretty nice you’d think.
It isn’t.
So after him and I made clear that we already know eachother quite well another dialog starts where he gets introduced to me. Really?
That was so unneeded but it doesn’t interrupt the flow of the story.

The next issue I had when I met this Largos-woman (Sayeh al’ Rehjid or something like that). Trahearne acts like I never met her before. And in fact I DID never meet her before. But she/or even my character insists that we already know eachother. WTF I have no idea who that butterfly is. What is going on? So after using the internet I figured out that she’s featured in some missions I didn’t play because I made choices that did not move me into that branch of the story. Also that weird orb they suddenly started to talk about at some point comes from there.
So I am there and I have NO idea what is going on and everything is weird (people tell me I know her). Just because I didn’t pick the right path. I’m pretty sure that’s not what AN wanted to do.

But wait. The biggest screw-up lies ahead.

So in my early days in the Sylvari-starting zone had to save an Orrian relic-mirror from the Krait. One of the characters got sucked into it and this apparently transported her to Orr. I got to chose how we try to save her. Either I go to Trahearne because he has all knowledge about Orr…or we follow the Asura who has a special device.
I followed the Asura, we saved the Sylvari, everything is cool. So far.
In Orr I have to chose between attacking Zhaitan head-on or trapping him. I chose to trap him and they bring the mirror back into the game to bait him. That’s actually a pretty good idea I thought so I loved the mission…until:
It starts with the two Sylvari from back then getting introduced to me again. Unlike when we had the same issue with Trahearne, this time I didn’t even have another “hey, I know them” scene. They were treated as strangers.
Then they start telling me that one of them got sucked into the mirror once (like in my story) AND THAT TRAHEARNE SAVED HER.
Are you kidding me?
I saw with my VERY OWN EYES that the cool Asura-lady saved her butt back then. Not Trahearne. I played a major role in her saving back then. Not Trahearne.

So ya. I’m pretty sure there are many other places where the story starts to not make any sense anymore or tells you weird stuff. These mess-ups were all from my very own (and first) play-through in the order they happened. And I wonder two things.
The story in the first 20 levels was awesome. Did AN finish the rest under time-pressure or are they unable to do better? Or did they do the ending first and then got better over time?
Did they even play through their story? Somebody MUST have realized that he has never met that weird Largos-Lady before because I’m sure not everybody who playtested went through the same path.

Since a lot of people responding here don’t seem to get this; this is not about the fact that Trahearne steals your story and makes it his own. We already have thousands of threads about that and I’d not make another one

Just wanted to add my opinion to this as an Asura. Again, SPOILERS ahead.

So as part of your Asura questline you get to save a professor Gort(?) who has discovered dragons consume magic. You save him from the Arcane Eye (why were they keeping him? who knows). You help him create and test an awesome dragon minion anti-gun. And then you get to Orr, and he behaves like he has no idea who you are as he gets presented to you. However, after the end of the storyline when you got to Fort Trinity he has a dialog option where you tell him something of the form “Who knew when I rescued you so long ago, bla bla”.

And that issues is prevalent throughout all of the Orr storyline, I keep meeting people I met before and there is nothing in the conversation to imply that.

And to make it absolutely crappy, at one point you go search for something in Orr (grenth temple choice to find the source of orr) and your crewe appears with the VOED (something important in the 1 -10 storyline for Asura) and there is no recognition of you, theirkittencrewe member for so long. And they explain what the VOED is.

I don’t get the personal story line either. My choices don’t matter because the end result is the same, and what the heck is your “home instance” for anyway? The only think that has ever compelled me to return to it, is if I didn’t get the POI. It never changes, so why bother? At lease in EotN, I felt like Jora and I had become best friends by the time I had finished the GW1 expansion and I was proud to make a Norn Warrior in this game, in her honor. What happened ANet? If Jora would have died, I would have been sad. The “companions” you kill off in this game? Whatever, cause I really couldn’t tell you anything about them anyway.

The story doesn’t make sense because your choices (when given the choice) does NOT matter and is not ‘recorded’.

It is as if the developers decided that Path A was the preferred path and wrote the subsequent storyline for it then decided to throw in another choice, Path B, to give a little variety, linked it with the subsequent lines of A, but forgot to make adjustments accordingly. In the end your story culminates all the same regardless of the choices made along the way.

While it would not make sense in this game, I do miss the alignment-altering choices in the D&D style games. If you made a choice in those, there was a consequence (most of the time), and the story would be affected accordingly. Depending on your choices and actions, you might (for example) not be able to use certain armors or weapons any more or your storyline would veer into a new direction. In the end, you might still end up killing the Bad Guy, but then again you might just end up joining forces.

FalconDance.1637:

The story doesn’t make sense because your choices (when given the choice) does NOT matter and is not ‘recorded’.

They actually have the ability to record your choices. They even did it at two points (at least I realized it at two points). Once at the said point where Trahearne asked me how my journey was so far (my race-choice) and once at the point in Orr where you get separated from the people you’ve been with and the race that you chose to help in your vigil/priory/order storyline comes to help you.

This makes it even more sad to me that AN didn’t keep up with this and threw old friends in our friend, acting like we never met them…and people we’ve never seen before who act as if we were their brothers.

Cirah Ravenheart.9618:

I don’t get the personal story line either. My choices don’t matter because the end result is the same, and what the heck is your “home instance” for anyway? The only think that has ever compelled me to return to it, is if I didn’t get the POI. It never changes, so why bother? At lease in EotN, I felt like Jora and I had become best friends by the time I had finished the GW1 expansion and I was proud to make a Norn Warrior in this game, in her honor. What happened ANet? If Jora would have died, I would have been sad. The “companions” you kill off in this game? Whatever, cause I really couldn’t tell you anything about them anyway.

I am a norn and lvl 80 and do not know where my home instance is, I was never told to go there and I probably did to get the POI I guess? Or I did go there but thought it was just an instance? but my hubby and I were talking the other day.. he’s also a norn.. and he was like ‘Maybe I am really dumb but I don’t know where my home instance is.." and I was like you know you’re right.. I hadn’t even thought about it.

I only figured out that we have something like a home-instance yesterday, right before creating this thread.
Honestly. I’ve never been in there (Sylvari) and I don’t even know where it is. I suppose it is somewhere in the grove. But I’d rather have my choices to have an impact on the story rather than some weird instance I’m rarely gonna be in. If I think of this game in a month I won’t be thinking “Oh, those changes to my home-instance I picked a month ago are really awesome.” Instead I’ll think: “This story was really kitten up because the choices I’ve made weren’t the ones that AN wanted me to pick/created the rest of the story for, so I had a pretty messed up story at a few points.”

Edit: Why does the f-word change to “kitten” instead of “kitted” when I write “****ed”?

Mirodir.1672:

I only figured out that we have something like a home-instance yesterday, right before creating this thread.
Honestly. I’ve never been in there (Sylvari) and I don’t even know where it is.

Remember way back at the beginning of the story when you go to the grove to meet Caithe, and you go into a separate instance from the rest of the world? That is the sylvari home instance.

The norn home instance I found quite by accident when wandering around, the entrance is a stairwell that doesn’t really look like a stairwell near the entrance to the main lodge.

Followed a very similar line as the OP it seems, with pretty much the same ‘wtf?’-moments

Actually, some choice is good:

Making this choice mattered because I got to help the fish people (OMG I was in the suggestions forum and forgot why I was there now I remember I wanna suggests the fish people race as playable!) Tybalt is a very memorable character for lines like this to be fair though.

Also he seems to take being in water unusually well for a cat person ^_^

(picture contains potential spoilers but not too much I don’t think)

He’s like that cartoonish goofy best friend who winds up being the breakthrough character in a series ^_^ If you pick the wrong secret society you won’t team up with him =(

Mirodir.1672:

Edit: Why does the f-word change to “kitten” instead of “kitted” when I write “****ed”?

It’s even worse than that, some acronyms are even “kittened”, which I think is ludicrous. That’s just so your parents (who likely aren’t even watching over your shoulder as you type these things) won’t get (you know the word) off over other people’s communication methods, most of which is appropriate (from what I read) given the context in which it’s used but people are forced to express themselved in a watered down manner that doesn’t accurately reflect the situations and/or their true feelings. They don’t want your parents to pull the GW2 plug from you and if they see swears they might, you know how some parents are.

I know. All I complained about there was the fact that *****ed up turns to “kitten up” instead of “kittened up” and *****ing would turn to “kitten” instead of “kittening”. Keeping the form of the replaced word would help it being read more fluently.

Too kittening right, Jeffrey!

So instead of giving us a reponse about how fail the personal story is you just posted about that stupid thing of the kittens. GJ ArenaNet, keep up with that..

I am so jealous of you guys. I played as a Charr and no one from my story shows up. I was expecting my warband to show up for the the battle of Claw Island and no one did. If I know if I was actually my character I would go to the Black Citdeal and ask for my best friend Clawspur to fight alongside my side instead I never hear from my best friend that I known since my childhood again. Arenanet decided that no one wants their choices from early on to reflect on the latter game. As far Trahearne getting credit, the kitten gets credit for everything we do. He tells us to do something, tags along, does kitten all and then gets the credit.

Edit: I use the ba word and it is changed to kitten. Arenanet all the kids are swearing in cod, there is no need to block these words.

Killul.9685:

I am so jealous of you guys. I played as a Charr and no one from my story shows up. I was expecting my warband to show up for the the battle of Claw Island and no one did. If I know if I was actually my character I would go to the Black Citdeal and ask for my best friend Clawspur to fight alongside my side instead I never hear from my best friend that I known since my childhood again. Arenanet decided that no one wants their choices from early on to reflect on the latter game. As far Trahearne getting credit, the kitten gets credit for everything we do. He tells us to do something, tags along, does kitten all and then gets the credit.

Edit: I use the ba word and it is changed to kitten. Arenanet all the kids are swearing in cod, there is no need to block these words.

They even block out the non-euphemism version of darn for “frig” sake and that’s not even a real swear. Most swearing isn’t even done within the context of insulting others anyway.

Like I said, there are moments when no other words will do for a given situation, but rules are rules so we are forced to use dork speak =(

I love it.. gives me a giggle every time I see someone going on about kittens!

At any rate, agree with the OP. The storyline could use some retouching.

Zabrios.6079:

So instead of giving us a reponse about how fail the personal story is you just posted about that stupid thing of the kittens. GJ ArenaNet, keep up with that..

About half of the threads on the Personal Story forum first page have comments from ANet but no replies so far on the 3 ongoing threads (not counting the ones in the Sylvarri forums) with regards to how the personal story is not really your personal story because of Failhearne, considering that these threads are the most discussed. It seems like this is an issue ANet is actively avoiding answering at the moment. I don’t think they expected people to react so negatively to Failhearne or how the personal story develops later in the game.

It is sad, but I experienced nearly the same as the thred starter. Playing a Sylvari, making decisions and later in the game it’s all gone as if it had never happened.

For me RPGs have been fantastic and immersive tools of storytelling for years, but what I got so far in GW2 is “You are the hero, you saved the day, but please don’t mind if we can’t remember your name tomorow. If you want to do something meaningfull, please do the epic legendary weapon grind…”

For me this simply looks like the game was released much to early or AN ran out of money during development. The personal story starts very well, but it “evolves” to one of the worst storytelling experiences I ever had in a RPG.

IMO there is nothing subjective over this thread.
People’s opinion about the story may be subjective, but player’s choices not affecting the game is not subjective, it’s just a fact, and that’s the subject in discussion.

ArenaNet says:
“What we want is for the player to feel like a hero, and to feel like they’ve really changed the world around him.”
https://www.guildwars2.com/media/videos#vlb/Tv7j73VWVWs

If we make choices that are just ignored later on, we are not changing the world at all.

Hi guys, I was at first as dissappointed as you, but apparently it’s just a bug. Check this thread, Sarah Witter replied there and said it’s a bug. https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/story/Sylvari-Storyline-bug-or-intended-issue/first#post156741

I’ve been playing the personal story with a friend (we both are human) and our stories are mostly the same, even though we made completely different choices and our personalities are different.

It would really be cool if even the dialogues changed a bit accordingly to our personality, even if the results are the same in the end.

The only decision that really affects the game from what I’ve seen so far is choosing the order you’ll follow.

About the Home District I could see that a few minor things change, like the race you decided to help appear there (hylek, quaggan or skritt). However, some major things, like your sister that was rescued are nowhere to be found.

Fredacp.6389:

IMO there is nothing subjective over this thread.
People’s opinion about the story may be subjective, but player’s choices not affecting the game is not subjective, it’s just a fact, and that’s the subject in discussion.

ArenaNet says:
“What we want is for the player to feel like a hero, and to feel like they’ve really changed the world around him.”
https://www.guildwars2.com/media/videos#vlb/Tv7j73VWVWs

If we make choices that are just ignored later on, we are not changing the world at all.

…and just to add, you cannot feel like a hero if Failhearne steals all the glory for the work you’ve done. It actually defeats the purpose of the Personal Story feature. Accept or not and as sad as it may sound, a lot of people play MMO’s because of the sense of virtual achievement and recognition they get – taking this away and giving this to an NPC that most people feel do not deserve it limits this enjoyment.

No disrepect to you Jeff, but this is a multi-faceted issue. It’s not just Trahearne, or how people find his character that’s the problem here. As the OP stated, choices are not mattering at all, which is counter to the expectation set for this game. While I do understand that there are limitations to how “personal” you can make the story, especially at end game when things have to wrap up together, it would not hurt to incorporate slight variations that will acknowledge the decisions you made. It was really not a good decision to make Failhearne the focus of the story. The people who like Trahearne now would not have minded if their characters became the focus of the story instead. The people who don’t like Trahearne now would be much happier if their characters became the focus of the story instead. It’s a win-win and it makes perfect business sense.

I don’t think that one needs to be a writer to be able to discuss a story. And there is value(!) in discussing things, even if the matter at hand is highly subjective. Especially for the writers themselves: It is feedback about the effect something has to a lot of different users. It can show, if something is working as intendet from a story perspective.

Did the readers connect the dots? Is the motivation believable? What characters are well liked and what are rejected – and why? —- There are lots of things for a writer to read between the lines when his audience has a discussion like this.

Also apart from the subjective there is another layer to the discussion where factual things are discussed, in particular the lack of choice and the lack of acknowledgement of those choices actually present in the game.

[Spoiler]
Honestly, it felt to me that the introduction of Trahearne (and the death of the tutors from all the 3 orders as a sacrifice so we can stay alive) was a way to tie the personal stories together and save some money with voice acting. [/Spoiler]

I really love the game, but I’ve lost faith in MMOs providing a consistent narrative for story.

There are a lot of really cool and fun scenes, and as long as I look at it in the context of me not really mattering, it’s all fun and games…but as soon as I start to think that I matter and notice that things I did before aren’t being properly referenced or just plain ignored, it falls apart.

I had a similar problem with SWTOR, but since the enjoyment for that came strictly from the story more than the game mechanics or systems itself, I eventually stopped playing. I really hoped that GW2 would be my fix for a persistent world with a coherent narrative and I’ve been disappointed.

I’m not saying that the writing is bad, each individual scene is really good…but the way it was tied together wasn’t nearly as tight as I was expecting.

Maybe someday this will be fixed…or at the very least, maybe future expansions will do a better job of tightening things up.

Jeffrey Vaughn.1793:

I’m not a writer, so I don’t feel comfortable discussing the story and characters. In particular, there’s little value in trying to get into a debate over the story. Honestly, it’s highly subjective, and some folks like it, and some don’t.

This wasn’t about wether or not I like the story. I actually DO like the story and everything. I also don’t mind Trahearne being pictured as the hero of it all.
I was talking about major flaws in the logic behind how the story puts the different branches together (Which is in my opinion part of game-design as well as story-writing.). Nobody can tell me that it makes sense that I see something happen because of my choice in the past, and then, later on, they tell me something else happened back then.
This just doesn’t make any sense. Same as people randomly treating you like best friends when you see them the first time, just because in another storyline you would’ve met them already.

It’s good to read that the Trahearne-meeting as Sylvari is considered as a bug though. Makes me feel a bit better already.

I posted a topic on the suggestion forum with an idea that could minimize the problem discussed here.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/suggestions/How-to-make-decisions-matter-and-easier-to-keep-track-at-the-same-time/first#post256777

Jeffrey Vaughn.1793:

I’m not a writer, so I don’t feel comfortable discussing the story and characters. In particular, there’s little value in trying to get into a debate over the story. Honestly, it’s highly subjective, and some folks like it, and some don’t.

wait what

How can "some folks like it and others not", i.e. a comment on opinion, apply when the OP is about the story failing to follow its own sequence of events correctly, i.e. a failure to align facts?

synk.6907:

Jeffrey Vaughn.1793:

I’m not a writer, so I don’t feel comfortable discussing the story and characters. In particular, there’s little value in trying to get into a debate over the story. Honestly, it’s highly subjective, and some folks like it, and some don’t.

wait what

How can “some folks like it and others not”, i.e. a comment on opinion, apply when the OP is about the story failing to follow its own sequence of events correctly, i.e. a failure to align facts?

My words exactly. As I said before I totally like the story despite those flaws (which aren’t only connected to story-writing)

my major issue with the story is how it’s structured. the emphasis on “choices that change your story” meant that the story itself meant little, as each choice represented an isolated story arc that would never be touched again. this, ironically, meant that the choices didn’t matter at all, because once you were done with that arc, it would cease to exist. the story, despite what the script desperately tries to say (zhaitan is really weaker now, promise!), never leaves the status quo. nothing ever impacts.

in fact, this isolation of story arcs often leads to contradictions.

so what i would like ANet to worry about next time they write something, is to focus on telling a concise, coherent story.

Yes, this isolation of story-arcs is likely to lead to contradictions if you don’t pay attention 100% of the time.
I know I can talk easily because I didn’t have the job to put this all together. But honestly I have the right to criticize even though I probably couldn’t do it better on my own. If you could only criticize when you could do it better yourself then this world would have barely improved. Specialization started with the cavemen and if the gatherer would’ve been fine if the hunters came back with barely any flesh every time, just because they couldn’t do it better themselves, then we would be extinct now.
I just really wonder if NOBODY ever realized those logical flaws while playtesting what they created.

I think it would have done better with less branching and more cohesion. And no Trahearne ¬_¬

Yes I have to agree with Mirodir, the storyline in the game is likely to lead to contradiction. I played as a Sylvira ranger but in the light and darkness quest trahearne talk as if am not a Sylvira and I have never meant the mother tree. When I got the to the mother tree she spoke as if am not are sylvari and I was like what this really. After the a sad duty quest I stop playing all my personal quests.

The story is fine, I can live with Trahearne being cast the Great Leader and all while I go out and do the dirty work.

But like the OP, I’m sylvari. I know Trahearne already. I helped save the ditzy young sylvari from the mirror. I did lots of things, that frankly don’t seem to matter, because the people I did them with don’t remember them.

It’s hard to feel heroic when the person that I saved from being devoured by Risen Spiders doesn’t remember me.

Xfraze.1704:

I really love the game, but I’ve lost faith in MMOs providing a consistent narrative for story.

There are a lot of really cool and fun scenes, and as long as I look at it in the context of me not really mattering, it’s all fun and games…but as soon as I start to think that I matter and notice that things I did before aren’t being properly referenced or just plain ignored, it falls apart.

I had a similar problem with SWTOR, but since the enjoyment for that came strictly from the story more than the game mechanics or systems itself, I eventually stopped playing. I really hoped that GW2 would be my fix for a persistent world with a coherent narrative and I’ve been disappointed.

Are you reading my mind? This is me, word for word. It’s a huge letdown, and one major reason why I’m already losing interest in this game — just as it was with TOR. It’s mind-boggling, really, because many of the problems are so obvious that I can’t imagine how they could ever have been greenlit, unless the vaunted “personal story” played distant tenth fiddle to everything else during development and had no coordination or QA at all.

Completely disjointed story arcs, choices that don’t matter because they never come up again, the few recurring NPCs that exist not remembering me, others getting credit for my actions, NPCs being introduced and forgotten just as quickly … seriously, avoiding that is not rocket science, it’s Storytelling 101.

There’s so much potential in this setting, it’s just a bleeding shame that the game drops it all after the engaging early cultural story arcs.