Guild Wars 2

BobbyStein.2315:

Narrative Designer Scott McGough and I talked about this very topic some time ago. In short, Trahearne was intended to fill a very specific role that, in terms of both gameplay and story, the PC could not fill—an order-neutral character with extensive knowledge about Orr and the magic of undeath who could coordinate a global war effort and make the necessary plans, thus leaving the actual gameplay up to the player. Further, Trahearne’s character design was intentional in that he would be a reluctant hero who, through interacting with the player, evolved into someone who could step up to lead the Pact.

That’s exactly his problem – he is the perfect piece, designed to exactly fit in the missing part of the puzzle (ie story). He’s overdesigned, in some sense, and being the perfect fit, is just completely bland. I think a lot of this comes from design by committee (even if just 2 people).

Most of the NPCs that have more than token dialog have the same personality – slightly snarky, slighty laid back, slighty overconfident, slightly this and slightly that. They’re about as interesting as the typical later afternoon cartoons for 8-12 year olds. They fit in exactly were they go and its all fairly boring. Add on top mediocre voice acting for many, and the personal story is just a painful slog.

Someone like Tybalt stands out because he’s a two-dimensional character in a world of one dimensional characters (or whatever low N and N-1 you happen to parse things out to). He’s actually not all that deep, just is well voiced for his role and has a few good lines.

An individual (good) author makes good characters because they’re pretty much in charge and can develop the plot, characters and setting fairly tightly. When it becomes a group exercise, things (usually) go bad. You can even see this in author collaborations – unless one of the two (or more) is the main driver/writer and the others just throwing in high level ideas, most author collaborations don’t go well, imo at least.

Also, I think it was alluded to in one of these threads that, in order to appeal to the broadest group, any significant NPC has to be more vaguely characterized. I think the real way around this is not to have deeply interwoven NPCs. Trahearne and the iconics just get in the way of the story. I can’t stand Logan, beyond just weak characterization, what characterization there is I really can’t stand. My vote for future plot developments with him involve me being able to repeatedly punch him in the face.

Here’s a list of names:

Dodonna
Willard
Rieekan
Madine
Mothma
Ackbar

Only one is generally well known I’d say (Akbar, of course). These are all the Rebel commanders you meet in the original trilogy. None of them get in the way of the story of the main characters. But the rebellion is clearly staffed with leaders and has plans – thus the heroes can go on their way in their roles within the struggle against the Empire.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

I’d hazard a wager that no matter who wound up in that position, if it wasn’t the player character (which couldn’t happen for very good reasons) people were going to complain.

Some people feel like the point of the personal story should be to make their character feel like the hero, where others are annoyed when the PC is given too much importance in the overall storyline. I fall into the latter group, myself. I don’t consider the PC as they appear in the personal story to be my character; I chose their appearance and which branch of a story I wanted to see, but I have little to no influence on their personality, mindset, or history, so I’m already basically watching someone else’s character become the hero, regardless. And I enjoy when the personal story fits as seamlessly as possible into the open world, because knowing that the entire plot couldn’t have taken place without me present makes the world feel lonely. Too few MMO stories embrace the fact that the world is full of real people, and GW2 does a pretty good job with that overall.

So it’s impossible to entirely please either group, I think, but almost everyone likes the mentors even though they have exactly as much influence on the story as Trahearne in their own arcs. I think if the story had gone on to be about each mentor taking charge of their Order’s branch of the Pact, with Trahearne in charge and the player character commanding, so that all five end up working together in the last stages as a hero-based “party,” that would have been more satisfying. The ending left poor Trahearne scrambling alone for the player’s interest. Appearances in the sylvari plots notwithstanding, the writers essentially introduced a whole new story right at the point where everything else was wrapping up.

BobbyStein.2315:

. . . since we have plans for Trahearne and other existing characters in future live updates and expansion content.

Please. No.

BobbyStein.2315:

BuddhaKeks.4857:

What do you guys think about the incredible negative feedback you got for Trahearne?

Narrative Designer Scott McGough and I talked about this very topic some time ago. In short, Trahearne was intended to fill a very specific role that, in terms of both gameplay and story, the PC could not fill—an order-neutral character with extensive knowledge about Orr and the magic of undeath who could coordinate a global war effort and make the necessary plans, thus leaving the actual gameplay up to the player. Further, Trahearne’s character design was intentional in that he would be a reluctant hero who, through interacting with the player, evolved into someone who could step up to lead the Pact.

This didn’t resonate well with some players for a variety of reasons. We’re comparing external feedback with our own, since we have plans for Trahearne and other existing characters in future live updates and expansion content. We won’t spoil what we’re discussing, other than to say we’re looking at many different options for his current implementation and beyond.

BuddhaKeks.4857:

Do you use the feedback you got to try improving the writing for future storylines and their characters?

Of course. We want to improve our storytelling and characterization so that it complements the great gameplay that our designers work hard to create.

I’m actually more annoyed by the fact that you guys killed off every single interesting character. And for the sake of what? Some silly emotional surprise? I can stand seeing trehearne as long you bring my Sieran back.

BobbyStein.2315:

We’re comparing external feedback with our own, since we have plans for Trahearne and other existing characters in future live updates and expansion content. We won’t spoil what we’re discussing, other than to say we’re looking at many different options for his current implementation and beyond.

As long as all the options involve him dieing horribly as soon as possible, all will be well…

I have played an Asuran, Order of Whispers character to completion. Loved all the Asura stuff, the Order stuff was okay, then it just got very dull indeed.

Human Noble not too bad.

Enjoying Charr Iron Legion very much.

You introduce all these nice mentors early on, who actually have some character, then relegate them to the dungeons…

BobbyStein.2315:

Narrative Designer Scott McGough and I talked about this very topic some time ago. In short, Trahearne was intended to fill a very specific role that, in terms of both gameplay and story, the PC could not fill—an order-neutral character with extensive knowledge about Orr and the magic of undeath who could coordinate a global war effort and make the necessary plans, thus leaving the actual gameplay up to the player. Further, Trahearne’s character design was intentional in that he would be a reluctant hero who, through interacting with the player, evolved into someone who could step up to lead the Pact.

This didn’t resonate well with some players for a variety of reasons. We’re comparing external feedback with our own, since we have plans for Trahearne and other existing characters in future live updates and expansion content. We won’t spoil what we’re discussing, other than to say we’re looking at many different options for his current implementation and beyond.

Of course. We want to improve our storytelling and characterization so that it complements the great gameplay that our designers work hard to create.

First off, thanks for the answer. I see what you were trying to do with Trahearne, but it doesn’t work for many reasons.
1. He just shows up out of nowhere, only Sylvari players recognize him, which I am not (since honestly I don’t like them very much, they are too stiff and “lawful good” for my taste). For the rest of the players he is just the dude who replaces your mentor. Unfortunately Tybalt and Forgal set the bar very high (and I guess Sieran for some people, but again not me). Going from those excellently written characters to Trahearne is quite a “culture shock”.
2. I listened to his voice on youtube (because ingame I had the german dubb running, which is actually a bit better) and his voice actor seems pretty bored. There is almost no emotion in the role.
3. He doesn’t really have flaws. He makes no mistakes. I know he is supposed to be that shy scholar who doesn’t know anything about leading an army, yet he seems to be good at it right form the start, which make his complaining about not being a good leader, just look weird and out of place. A good example would be Kormir, she actually did make mistakes (awaking the Apocrypha, the failed invasion of Kourna) and she tries to make up for that. This makes her a stronger character.
4. Unfortunate choice of words. For example in the Dishonored by Allies storyline he talks about how that undead mesmer is actually after him, even though all her confrontation to that point were with the PC only. In fact the player seems to do much more anyway (it’s very clear what Trahearne even does in the Pact, despite giving options on how to move on, but not actually deciding himself), so it would make more sense if the Risen were after him/her. Anyway, some of the things he says, make him look very self-centered, at times even arrogant.

Another question: As you probably noticed I’m a GW1 player. However I feel like the narrative of GW2 pretty much ignores the stuff I did in GW1. There is no mention of a group of heroes that stopped the Flameseeker prophecy, freed Kryta from the White Mantle tyranny and even went toe to toe with a dragon champion. All we got is the HoM, which is cool, but it seems really odd to me that no NPC ever remembers the greatest heroes of Tyria’s past. I know it is hard to address the PC, since you don’t know, was he male or female, which profession and so on.
However I think some vague references to the “Ascended”, “Master Togo’s pupil” or “Sunspears” should be possible. I think it would be a nice way to thank GW1 fans for their ongoing support.

BobbyStein.2315:

This didn’t resonate well with some players for a variety of reasons. We’re comparing external feedback with our own, since we have plans for Trahearne and other existing characters in future live updates and expansion content. We won’t spoil what we’re discussing, other than to say we’re looking at many different options for his current implementation and beyond.

Are you going to give that Mary Sue a quick death? Slow death? Fiery death? At the very least make that tree lose his/her vocal cords… or vocal twigs. His voice is so bland and monotonous that the very instance Trahearne makes his appearance I skip to the end immediately.

Of course then he just wouldn’t shut up as he follows you around like a useless puppy carrying some fancy sword, with paragraphs of exposition and regret filling up your screen. He actually makes joining Zhaitan appealing. (The dragon helped recover a long lost island, turned Quaggans from whimpering butterballs to slightly threatening toads, offers a long term retirement plan and is an accomplished, if misunderstood, landscape artist.)

And I’m amused at how you say some. How about next event involves the community choosing whether or not our ridiculous tree general lives or dies and we’ll see how abundant “some” really is.

Bearzu Smash.5962:

BobbyStein.2315:

. . . since we have plans for Trahearne and other existing characters in future live updates and expansion content.

Please. No.

We don’t even know what the plans are yet. It could be simply letting him retire in Orr tending the land there and trying to get it to stop looking so dingy. I’d be all for that

I’d like to see a secret mission, like the cow level in Diablo, where we get the option to kill Trahearne in a number of horrible manners. That’s the only scenario in which I think I could stomach interacting with him again.

At the very least in the future, refrain from making us the sidekicks to a character not fit to lick our boots.

Random sidenote: the coolest mentor, and the only one I really missed “leaving”, is Forgal. I laughed out loud several times through his dialogue lines. The Whispers Charr guy was OK, and I hated every second with my Priory Sylvari mentor, because she acts like she’s on drugs.
IMO Trahearne is disliked mostly because he is a very shallow character. There are no surprises when he talks. He also keeps on saying the same lines over and over, which makes him annoying. What would have made the story with Trahearne a lot more interesting would have been if he had led the pact into a preliminary disaster. The resulting tension and confrontations between him and the pact, the player character and the pact, the player character and Trahearne, maybe even Trahearne and Mother Tree, would have given plenty of opportunities for interesting story telling and decision making for players.

P.S: Whatever you do in following episodes of Personal Story, don’t make Trahearne a Risen…

Bearzu Smash.5962:

BobbyStein.2315:

. . . since we have plans for Trahearne and other existing characters in future live updates and expansion content.

Please. No.

Please yes.

What frustrates me about Trahearne isn’t him barging into my story, stealing spotlight, or having a bland personality (or voice, although I’d say what he really suffers from is a rigid character model that can’t make up for his tone with actual body language). What frustrates me is that there are hints and suggestions of his deeper character scattered all in the first half of the story that are just sweeped under the rug as short dialogue options (with other people) or throwaway lines at the end of a mission that you can’t engage in, can’t talk about, can’t delve deeper into and see. He just gets treated as a plot device with superficial relationships (including with you) once you get to Claw Island.

And this isn’t limited to Trahearne—a lot of characters suffer from existing for their roles and not as characters, and there’s just so little attention given to their quirks and being (like their past) that they feel empty. And they don’t have to be that way—they were clearly ideas there, they just weren’t followed through on. I’d like to see these characters get fleshed out like they deserve, I’d like to see those that were done well and then put on a bus (see: almost everyone in the early personal story) given more screentime. I’d like the current characters to be salvaged rather than just tossed away as a failure and moving on to the next thing, because I don’t think they’re so far gone that that’s necessary. The story is young, we have plenty of room to refine it.

I’d also like to actually be able to maintain a relationship with them that doesn’t turn cold after the mission storyline is done.

Those are exactly the things I hate about him. Well that and his mono-toned voice giving me orders.

“On me commander.”

“Shut it, Trahearne or I’ll crush you into this bridge.”

pixieish.9627:

He actually makes joining Zhaitan appealing. (The dragon helped recover a long lost island, turned Quaggans from whimpering butterballs to slightly threatening toads, offers a long term retirement plan and is an accomplished, if misunderstood, landscape artist.)

This is the best thing I read in a long time! Please know, that you made my day!

pixieish.9627:

And I’m amused at how you say some. How about next event involves the community choosing whether or not our ridiculous tree general lives or dies and we’ll see how abundant “some” really is.

It’s more like, they most probably are aware that close to 100% of players loathe Trahearne, but they can’t really admit that. if the first part stands true and they’re going to kill his character off (I don’t know, make him rot or something), we should be fine.

BobbyStein.2315:

BuddhaKeks.4857:

What do you guys think about the incredible negative feedback you got for Trahearne?

Narrative Designer Scott McGough and I talked about this very topic some time ago. In short, Trahearne was intended to fill a very specific role that, in terms of both gameplay and story, the PC could not fill—an order-neutral character with extensive knowledge about Orr and the magic of undeath who could coordinate a global war effort and make the necessary plans, thus leaving the actual gameplay up to the player. Further, Trahearne’s character design was intentional in that he would be a reluctant hero who, through interacting with the player, evolved into someone who could step up to lead the Pact.

Trahearne was not so much a character as a glorified maguffin – that we didn’t need!

I think our characters should have led the Pact – not Trahearne. Forget the whole ‘order-neutral’ business. That makes no sense. Why would the Orders respect someone who has not and would not join any of them? What I would have done is have our characters join each Order on a temporary/honorary basis, have them work with each Order, learn something valuable about/from each Order, and then when the time came for the big showdown with Zhaitan, have our characters lead the Pact because of their unique understanding of how each Order operates – and because each Order, through direct interaction and experience with our characters, would have come to know and trust and respect our characters just as our characters would have come to know and trust and respect them.

This would have required many more missions, of course, which in turn might also have made the Personal Story less ‘scattered’ across levels. I hated having to go do something else to level up just so I could come back and tackle the next story mission. Here’s my example of how it felt, all too often:

Story-giving NPC: Timmy’s fallen in the level 50 well! Only you can rescue him!
Level 42 PC: Tell Timmy to tread water, I’ll come rescue him when I hit level 50!

Anyway, that’s my take on it.

Geikamir.6329:

Those are exactly the things I hate about him. Well that and his mono-toned voice giving me orders.

“On me commander.”

“Shut it, Trahearne or I’ll crush you into this bridge.”

Those things, to me (sans voice-acting), I think are more the fault of how they handled our character than how they handled Trahearne’s (abrupt intro aside)—that is, slowly removing all of our connections and identity until we’re left with a stand-in husk for the story, whereas Trahearne has only one stable identity that can be addressed. If our race, order, choices, history had ever actually been acknowledged (consistently, and not “I happen to pick the same storyline with a character I met earlier and if I talk to them they might recognize me”), if it had continued to play a part in our story I don’t think Trahearne’s side of things would have been so egregious—it would have felt more like a side plot to our own story, but it’s hard to be our story when it’s not our character. I Our story didn’t have substance and Trahearne’s did, and that’s why it stands out above us and makes it and him look more important than we do.

The stories that range from level 1 to level 20 are all pretty good, easily my favorite part of the entire personal story. Once my characters have been introduced to the Orders, though, I feel like things slowly step downhill from there and jump off a cliff completely once we hit Claw Island. Everything past that is a chore to trudge through. It doesn’t help that every character – regardless of race – ends up saying the exact same lines as anyone else after you join an Order.

BobbyStein.2315:

BuddhaKeks.4857:

What do you guys think about the incredible negative feedback you got for Trahearne?

Narrative Designer Scott McGough and I talked about this very topic some time ago. In short, Trahearne was intended to fill a very specific role that, in terms of both gameplay and story, the PC could not fill—an order-neutral character with extensive knowledge about Orr and the magic of undeath who could coordinate a global war effort and make the necessary plans, thus leaving the actual gameplay up to the player. Further, Trahearne’s character design was intentional in that he would be a reluctant hero who, through interacting with the player, evolved into someone who could step up to lead the Pact.

This didn’t resonate well with some players for a variety of reasons. We’re comparing external feedback with our own, since we have plans for Trahearne and other existing characters in future live updates and expansion content. We won’t spoil what we’re discussing, other than to say we’re looking at many different options for his current implementation and beyond.

BuddhaKeks.4857:

Do you use the feedback you got to try improving the writing for future storylines and their characters?

Of course. We want to improve our storytelling and characterization so that it complements the great gameplay that our designers work hard to create.

It’s possible for those plans to Trahearne to include some gasoline? Napalm maybe?

Man, you did to me again!!

I’m a veteran from original GW, in were you made me babysit Menhlo and Togo and then… Kormir!

I hate Kormir!

She made us enter in the mess with Abaddon, we had to rescue her, she only can guide us (and with the collision of characters, she bothers more than helps) and in the only cooperative mission she do a thing, she actually can screw your perfect completition killing ghosts… And in the end, when is your character the one that solve everything… She become a goddess!!! That’s fair reward A-net version!! >_<

No, our character couldn’t become a god, maybe naming it ‘Faceless One’ or ‘New Abaddon’… No, had to be Kormir, she screws up, she get the good part.

And with Trehearne you play a Kormir over us. Sure he doesn’t screw up but the character is complete unappealing and the only way I really like with him is the end quest before Arah Story mode… and wasn’t for him!! Was for ‘Fear not this night’ song in the background!!

This is some crazy idea: Let our characters be the heroes!!! Yes… No some second class henchman for an npc that nobody cares about or want to assassinate him/her for his/her behaviour.

I don’t have a problem with the rest of the stories. I have nine characters, six of them lvl 80 with all the varieties about race and choices possible. I don’t have a problem with the story, isn’t amazing but is good. My only problem is how my character develop from hero to his/her people to henchman for a schoolar plant >_<

I loved characters like Tybalt and Forgal (I hated that crazy plant, Sieran… All the Durmand Priory is very boring) and I hated when Trehearne didn’t die in the end.

I think the only way you can fix Trehearne is to let us kill him!! Make him a dragon minion and let us put him out of his misery >_<

BobbyStein.2315:

Raindash.2794:

I am playing Sylvari, and I’m getting sick whenever I see those conversation loading and those british accents and stiff dialogues. I usually press Skip to End and do the quest.
I don’t even know what the story is about and making choices is completly random for me.
Should I care? Did I fail and ruin everything?

The personal stories vary by playable race. If you’re not enjoying the one you’re currently playing you may want to roll a new character. Try asura or charr. You may find their tone more to your liking.

but only for the first ~20-30 levels

Once you join an order, it’s all the same, minus the voice actor for your race/gender combination. Yes, there are some forking paths that we can explore separately on different characters, but it’s more or less the same exact thing with little variation and tons of boring Trahearne pal-ing around. And virtually no ties to previous choices made.

The intro portion of the personal story, the parts associated with your race selection and character creation choices, are terrific for every race. I have enjoyed them all immensely.

Many of the missions with teams like Tegwen and Carys and the Gear Warband and those two asura (with the one who was a fight announcer or whatever) and others like them who are parts of the Orders have great writing and lines, but they don’t overshadow the larger aspects of the personal story at this point. Dealing with petty inter-Order bickering, tagging along with a guy who’s miles short of inspiring, and having no meaningful connection to earlier story (e.g. your surviving warband member as a charr never appears again, your efforts as a hero among your people or a genius/mad scientist among your college or as a great hunter, etc.), leave the GW2 personal story wanting, in my opinion. Perhaps that’s more a side-effect of it implying a lot of potential to me but failing to deliver on it than of it truly being "worse" than GW1 or whatever, but it’s fair to say that when leveling characters I resign myself to knowing that heading to LA to watch Destiny’s Edge argue before I meet my mentor is the beginning of the decline in the story.

edit: But the mentors are amazing. Each of them. Truly a pleasure. Which makes it all the more sad when you are forced to leave them and buddy up with Trahearne.

edit2: Man I never disliked Kormir. The gods gave us a choice, and she sussed it out and took a chance. Worked for me; at least the NPCs still proclaimed my characters as the hero at the end of everything. Gameplay-wise, it would also be dull if we all were gods after playing through Nightfall!

I skipped many of the posts due to potential spoilers. Which is odd because what I am about to say… I hate the personal story too! I am so far into it I don’t want to give up, just want to get it over.

I despise anything that pulls me from the game world. Frankly, I think it’s lazy. It takes innovative thinking to have narrative story within the game world. I have no interest in scripted cut scenes.

I wish the cut scenes and non-interactive story arc development time/money went into the actual game world… Because this is truly where MY personal story is, how I interact with the game world.

I didn’t dislike Kormir. I didn’t like her either. She was just bland to me as a personality and I found her blinding a meaningless plot device, given that she seemed just as able to run around in unknown terrain afterwards as she could before.

I understand why some others would dislike her, though. I think feedback from both Nightfall and GW2 suggests that players generally enjoy the feeling of turning into heroes as they progress through the game. They don’t have to feel that way at the beginning – you could have certainly toned down the fulsome praise after Shaemoor/Issormir – but they need to feel they have achieved something at the end. And somehow that feeling wasn’t there. Trahearne did not really help in that regard.

I’ve got to admit that I was hoping Trahearne would fade away and go off somewhere else to study, having achieved his wild hunt. So I’m not feeling optimistic about his role in future content. However I don’t support the idea of him turning evil and us having to kill him simply because fanservice usually doesn’t work in games and can come over as cheap.

Bobby – sincere thanks for engaging on the themes raised. I can’t tell you how much warmer it makes me feel towards a game and its developers when we get this kind of interaction.

For me personally, there are various issues with the mechanics of GW2, but I know that I can get past that in almost any game when the story has me hooked. The idea of playing through a rollicking good fantasy yarn with memorable, well-rounded characters alongside either some friends or some strangers, playing my own part as a character I’ve created, is the core appeal in GW2 for me.

I agree with many of the points about voice acting and disposable characters, and with the problems with Trahearne. I would suggest the main over-arcing issue at the moment is disjointedness – the feeling that the elements just don’t come together and that there were a lot of brains involved, not all aware of what each other was doing, voice actors unsure of the context of their lines et cetera.

I guess I’d like to see a new arc of the story spring up that characters at all stages of their personal story can join in, which takes a more cohesive and streamlined approach. I also don’t think we need such reliance on voice acting – I would like a lot more of the story to play out between cut scenes, through actions and spontaneous exchanges, rather than through somewhat stilted meetings.

Writing a good story is hard, writing an interactive one double so. Best of luck in succeeding against the odds.

CalvinHobbes.3541:

Wait a minute. The writing team wasn’t in charge of the story during development? That could actually explain quite a bit. Is this a new concept to have people other than the writing team develop the story? Or is this the norm within the gaming world? It just seems bizarre to me to have someone other than the writing team developing the story. Sort of like having the janitor doing the coding.

It wasn’t that non-writers did the Personal Story. There were writers dedicated to the Personal Story, just not Bobby’s writing team.

ArenaNet mentioned their writers were broken into two writing teams.

One team consisted of two people, the “Loremasters”. They were responsible for the Personal Story, Dungeons, and Cutscenes. I think they were Jeff Grubb and Ree Soesbee.

The second team (Bobby’s) seemed to have pretty much everyone else. This second team wrote for the remaining elements, e.g. the dialogues in Dynamic Events, dialogues we had with NPC’s, and the background conversations we heard NPC’s have with each other across Tyria.

BobbyStein.2315:

Kingfisher.7213:

CalvinHobbes.3541:

Wait a minute. The writing team wasn’t in charge of the story during development? That could actually explain quite a bit. Is this a new concept to have people other than the writing team develop the story? Or is this the norm within the gaming world? It just seems bizarre to me to have someone other than the writing team developing the story. Sort of like having the janitor doing the coding.

It wasn’t that non-writers did the Personal Story. There were writers dedicated to the Personal Story, just not Bobby’s writing team.

ArenaNet mentioned their writers were broken into two writing teams.

One team consisted of two people, the “Loremasters”. They were responsible for the Personal Story, Dungeons, and Cutscenes. I think they were Jeff Grubb and Ree Soesbee.

The second team (Bobby’s) seemed to have pretty much everyone else. This second team wrote for the remaining elements, e.g. the dialogues in Dynamic Events, dialogues we had with NPC’s, and the background conversations we heard NPC’s have with each other across Tyria.

This is mostly true, though I should clarify. I did have two writers assisting with the dialogue generation/revision on those feature teams. One was assigned to help with dungeons (explorable mode) and the other was embedded on the personal story team. In both cases, they were there to execute on a plan that was already in motion and under the direction of people on those respective teams.

I’d also like to say that the teams that handled those other content types worked really hard and were under some intense deadlines. They did the best they could under the circumstances, so I hope that people keep that in mind when formulating their feedback.

Bobby,

I truly understand that each group that worked on the three phases of the personal story worked hard. So I hope my criticism doesn’t land in a way that takes away from their work. I just have a very hard time understanding how a company of your size and a project of this magnitude didn’t have better communication between teams.

I have to ask, did anyone at the company simply take the story from start to finish and simply watch it to see if it even made sense and was enjoyable? If they hadn’t, have you done so post release? Can you see how utterly fragmented and underdeveloped the entire storyline is? It’s three separate arcs with nothing that really ties them together continuity wise.

I am truly worried about keeping trahearne in the story. He in my opinion was an utter failure of a character. I won’t speak for the community because I know there are people that enjoyed him as a character, but I hope you can see within this Personal Story section a vast amount of derision leveled at that character.

I believe that the first story arc was the strongest written part of the storyline but ended abruptly and many of the motivations in the storyline just drop off a cliff. Are there any thoughts on continuing that story through your personal area which was supposed to be “personal”?

I truly hope so. I also hope we can have some story choice where we choose a path away from Traeherne.

I guess if I can’t. I will continue to do what I usually do. Forward past anything he is involved in. Let him run in and get killed and then finish the mission with him on the ground.

Thank you for listening to my thoughts. I am just truly truly shocked that anyone let that story out as a functioning storyline. I would have left it at a point where you felt confident in the story and then released sections as you developed it to a place you felt proud to release. I mean we were waiting for other parts of the game that have been promised, but haven’t made it into the game “until they are ready.” Why not the personal story?

Well overall though there were some interesting moments, id say the personal story was not well executed. Time constraints and other problems, were probably real. Also maybe some authors are used to writing different types of stories.

Still for most of the story it fell pretty flat.

the dialougue was often poor, even for the NPCs, also, i think the static style cutscenes were handled pretty poorly, im not saying you cant use something like that, but it totally ignores most of the keys of storytelling even within itself.

Even using a standard backdrop and basic story telling techniques you can achieve more with less. Look at most standard rpgs from the 90s, many which use just face shots and straight up text, with like a few face expressions did a better job of conveying the scene and whats going on.

I know they said they dont have any cutscene guys of note, but as a storyboard artist, and a sequential artist, theres lots of ways to handle these things even with a lot less resources.

that said, if you want to do it the same way you are doing it now, look to swtor, they really handled their VA, and choices and writing excellently, of course it probably cost them a lot, but thats what is out there.

quickthorn.4918:

I didn’t dislike Kormir. I didn’t like her either. She was just bland to me as a personality and I found her blinding a meaningless plot device, given that she seemed just as able to run around in unknown terrain afterwards as she could before.

My personal dislike for her came from a very full glass.

I mean, I loved GW like nobody can know. I still do… and even when I enjoyed the stories, sometimes I get very frustrated with them.

In Prophecies the story is… not appealing to me at all. I mean, first I rescue my people from Ascalon, went to Lion’s Arch…. in the first moment the White Mantle showed up, the story went down the hill for me. Too much predictable and I didn’t like the Lich as a villain.

Factions I liked it a lot… Shiro Tagachi was a character I liked so much, very interesting and complex (and I loved try to break my own record to finish him in the final coop, with 4:20 minutes under my belt :P) but, I guess like every other soul, I hated to be a simple babysitter for Togo and Menhlo and the two parts coops depending of the success of the other group too.

I liked Nightfall story more. The only thing I disliked was Kormir herself.

She is annoying, she is blank, she screwed up things and she ended up being rewarded for that. In the gameplay, having her around, with her model in the way the majority of the time and, in the only coop she can helps, she can really screw the perfect completition…

It’s a thing that I think A-net should change in their way of creating story for characters: They use too much the resource of a npc to mix things, or be the motor, in the place of being the character of the player itself.

Bioware did that right (did, not now…. You only have to see The Old Republic to see how much down the toilet went Bioware in story crafting >_< ) in Kotor or Baldur’s Gate: your character is the hero or the center of the story, it’s the important part and the glue of all.

In the story in GW2, even when I like it, I have to admit that in some points you ask yourself ‘Why I’m doing this?’

You start being a new born sylvari or a norn champion or saving Shaemoor to ending up being the delivery boy (girl in my case) of, first your order, and then Trehearne. Doing all the job to others take the credit.

I know life isn’t fair and yadda, yadda… and in games like Secret World I swallow that ‘cause the characters themselves tell you ’You aren’t special, you aren’t unique and you aren’t a freaking choosen one’. But here A-net sold me ‘this is your story’, that my character is a hero with her own story… And A-net still needs to deliver to me that, ’cause the thing I have until now, from the beginning to the dead of Zhaitan, is the story of Trehearne from my point of view.

So… if they let us kill and put six feet under the freaking schoolar plant, I’ll be gladly to be a big kitten hero at last :P

BobbyStein.2315:

I’d also like to say that the teams that handled those other content types worked really hard and were under some intense deadlines.

Ha. Say no more.

It was the bean counters again, wasn´t it?

So it seems not only the writing could´ve used another month or two in beta, but definitely the rest of the game too.

HawkMeister.4758:

BobbyStein.2315:

I’d also like to say that the teams that handled those other content types worked really hard and were under some intense deadlines.

Ha. Say no more.

It was the bean counters again, wasn´t it?

So it seems not only the writing could´ve used another month or two in beta, but definitely the rest of the game too.

Bean counters? No, probably people further up the company food chain. And probably not any single person, either. Still, I don’t think speculating on the corporate politics here is any good. It’s sufficient to say: “they had a deadline to meet”. As an amateur writer, I can appreciate the pressures that can form there.

Vengerin.6013:

She is annoying, she is blank, she screwed up things and she ended up being rewarded for that. In the gameplay, having her around, with her model in the way the majority of the time and, in the only coop she can helps, she can really screw the perfect completition…

It’s a thing that I think A-net should change in their way of creating story for characters: They use too much the resource of a npc to mix things, or be the motor, in the place of being the character of the player itself.

Bioware did that right in Kotor or Baldur’s Gate: your character is the hero or the center of the story, it’s the important part and the glue of all.

Baldur’s Gate? Oooh, that game. Where you’re subjected to way more of Bioware’s “you are either a saint or a puppy-murdering madman” decisions of good vs evil. And where the story winds up missing a couple steps in the last few chapters . . . we find out what’s going on but the path of finding that out doesn’t make any sense at all when you look at it. In a way, I think it progressed worse than GW2’s because it survived entirely on “trust what we tell you without wondering how we know”.

KoTR (Knights of the Old Republic) I looked up once, and saw it was almost the same plot as Neverwinter Nights overlaid on a Star Wars backdrop. And NWN was . . . weak. It was very weak.

I could go deeper into how the protagonist of Baldur’s Gate is very much a character who doesn’t matter (hint, it’s his daddy that matters the most, and what he did) or the same in Neverwinter Nights (it’s Aribeth who drives the plot there). But the problem is much the same as with Guild Wars 1 & 2 – the games are full of interesting side characters but the main story characters we’re supposed to care more for don’t have as much . . . impact.

I will admit, I rather liked what happened with Kormir, and sort of like Trahearne (I’m about to actually meet him in my sylvari’s plot, so maybe I’ll get a better feel for him there) and while I can see the point of some arguments . . . any time I hear that either of those two “stole” what was “rightfully” the player characters’ spoils? I wonder how in the heck I played a game entirely different from that.

I dont think the problem was the story or even the characters themselves. I found the core problems to be consistant appearance by characters so you got to know them and presentation/dialog quality.

For example. Snarl and Galina are two characters who, if you pick the right options, can turn up alot. I was pretty fortunate to get them quite a bit in my first play through. I got to know and like both these characters and enjoy their style.

My brother however in his playthough had them only turn up once and get to know them at all. They were just a couple of random NPCS. The same issue applys to other NPCs such as the querky charr and asura priory researchers whos name I cant remember.

Presentation is the other issue. Ive had a lot of discussions over Trehearne with others. While I didnt hate him, he wasnt a particularly appealing character to me. However he gets alot of hate from others. Interestingly hes also accused of things that if you look closely at the plot didnt actually happen. Something about how he is introduced or presented puts him in the bad books of alot of people.

I think it has two key issues though since I dont share this hate I could be wrong.

Firstly, people perceive Trehearne’s role as more important and exciting than it actually is. Perhaps I didnt have a problem with Trehearne because being the Marshal seemed like a thankless task to me. He got all the paperwork while I got to do all the action stuff. I dont think alot of people thought that about Trehearne. Instead they saw him as the center stage character stealing the PCs limelight.

Secondly, Trehearne’s character was quite a subtle one and as a result required careful presenting to insure it had both a feeling of depth but enough charisma to interest the player. In the end he tended to come off either as rather boring or overbearing depending on the occation.

I think very few people managed to empathise with him and as a result failed to value him as a character and a friend/partner of the PC. Compare him to the mentors who were almost universally liked by players. It wasnt just that they were querky or funny. They were our character’s pal and friend.

Vengerin.6013:

She is annoying, she is blank, she screwed up things and she ended up being rewarded for that. In the gameplay, having her around, with her model in the way the majority of the time and, in the only coop she can helps, she can really screw the perfect completition…

It’s a thing that I think A-net should change in their way of creating story for characters: They use too much the resource of a npc to mix things, or be the motor, in the place of being the character of the player itself.

Bioware did that right in Kotor or Baldur’s Gate: your character is the hero or the center of the story, it’s the important part and the glue of all.

Baldur’s Gate? Oooh, that game. Where you’re subjected to way more of Bioware’s “you are either a saint or a puppy-murdering madman” decisions of good vs evil. And where the story winds up missing a couple steps in the last few chapters . . . we find out what’s going on but the path of finding that out doesn’t make any sense at all when you look at it. In a way, I think it progressed worse than GW2’s because it survived entirely on “trust what we tell you without wondering how we know”.

KoTR (Knights of the Old Republic) I looked up once, and saw it was almost the same plot as Neverwinter Nights overlaid on a Star Wars backdrop. And NWN was . . . weak. It was very weak.

I could go deeper into how the protagonist of Baldur’s Gate is very much a character who doesn’t matter (hint, it’s his daddy that matters the most, and what he did) or the same in Neverwinter Nights (it’s Aribeth who drives the plot there). But the problem is much the same as with Guild Wars 1 & 2 – the games are full of interesting side characters but the main story characters we’re supposed to care more for don’t have as much . . . impact.

I will admit, I rather liked what happened with Kormir, and sort of like Trahearne (I’m about to actually meet him in my sylvari’s plot, so maybe I’ll get a better feel for him there) and while I can see the point of some arguments . . . any time I hear that either of those two “stole” what was “rightfully” the player characters’ spoils? I wonder how in the heck I played a game entirely different from that.

Opinion aside from Baldur’s Gate (game that I find one of my favorites and an ideal of what a rpg should be) and its plot, I find myself more protagonist in that game that I felt in any other title that I played (and I played a lot).

Yeah, you are your father’s son… So what? Still your decisions are yours and you aren’t a follower. Sorry, I love A-net guys, but if they had develop that game, our character’s role have been Imoen’s or Jaheira’s.

Aside from that….

Stop the ones that didn’t played NWN or KotoR ’cause is spoiler time.

Yeah, NWN plot is weakest at its best and Aribeth is that kind of Kormir character that I hate, but its plot is so similar to Kotor like an orange to a rock.

In NWN you have to deal with a plague and looking how Aribeth turns evil for the most stupid motive… And in Kotor you have to deal with a memory lost, the way to recover it and finding that Revan, the ultimate bad guy of the galaxy, are you!!

Yeah, pretty much the same!!

Sorry, but even when I love A-net and I think they can create the most appealing npcs, they also are very capable to create the most annoying ones. And the way they try to balance things out in the story line and shorta… I prefer something that give me the sensation of epicness and that my character IS really important.

Really, isn’t so difficult let us having a moment of glory >_<

Vengerin.6013:

Oh don’t get me wrong, Baldur’s Gate is a favorite of mine and I enjoyed beating the tar out of it. (Except for how there were items hidden in really . . . impossible to find places unless you knew they were there.) But the dialogue choices and the way I was drifting one way or another fits into the standard video game morality scale of "faultless saint’ vs “puppy-kicking maniac”. I hate that system. I also hated that I was automatically docked for bringing along Viconia for no real reason. And I don’t mean that NPCs reacted badly and that is it; I mean I was unable to be as good as I wanted to be because she was within ten feet of me.

Oh, about Imoen . . . did you play the sequel? She winds up almost as much of importance as the Protagonist due to a few things.

Aside from that…. Stop the ones that didn’t played NWN or KotoR ’cause is spoiler time.
(Snip)
Yeah, pretty much the same!!

Oh you also had your mentor go Dark Side for apparently no reason. Like Aribeth. You were supposed to find parts of something to lead you to the weapon Malak was after. (Was it Malak? I forget.) Like in NWN finding the Words of Power . . . yes, there is enough going on similar in plot.

As for that twist in the story? That alone would make me rate it better than NWN, because the twist in that story towards the final act was not worth discussing at all. It barely counted as a twist. At least the final encounter was interesting.

Sorry, but even when I love A-net and I think they can create the most appealing npcs, they also are very capable to create the most annoying ones. And the way they try to balance things out in the story line and shorta… I prefer something that give me the sensation of epicness and that my character IS really important.

Really, isn’t so difficult let us having a moment of glory >_<

It’s why I say that most great videogames suffer from the same problem lately: either the main plot isn’t interesting and the characters are, or the main plot is a wonderful idea and the characters drag it down. I haven’t seen many games in the last ten years balance it well.

(MANY games, I said. I know they exist and probably played more than a few, please don’t take time to cite them to me :P And the first one to bring up Planescape gets a cookie.)

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Vengerin.6013:

Oh don’t get me wrong, Baldur’s Gate is a favorite of mine and I enjoyed beating the tar out of it. (Except for how there were items hidden in really . . . impossible to find places unless you knew they were there.) But the dialogue choices and the way I was drifting one way or another fits into the standard video game morality scale of "faultless saint’ vs “puppy-kicking maniac”. I hate that system. I also hated that I was automatically docked for bringing along Viconia for no real reason. And I don’t mean that NPCs reacted badly and that is it; I mean I was unable to be as good as I wanted to be because she was within ten feet of me.

Oh, about Imoen . . . did you play the sequel? She winds up almost as much of importance as the Protagonist due to a few things.

Aside from that…. Stop the ones that didn’t played NWN or KotoR ’cause is spoiler time.
(Snip)
Yeah, pretty much the same!!

Oh you also had your mentor go Dark Side for apparently no reason. Like Aribeth. You were supposed to find parts of something to lead you to the weapon Malak was after. (Was it Malak? I forget.) Like in NWN finding the Words of Power . . . yes, there is enough going on similar in plot.

As for that twist in the story? That alone would make me rate it better than NWN, because the twist in that story towards the final act was not worth discussing at all. It barely counted as a twist. At least the final encounter was interesting.

Sorry, but even when I love A-net and I think they can create the most appealing npcs, they also are very capable to create the most annoying ones. And the way they try to balance things out in the story line and shorta… I prefer something that give me the sensation of epicness and that my character IS really important.

Really, isn’t so difficult let us having a moment of glory >_<

It’s why I say that most great videogames suffer from the same problem lately: either the main plot isn’t interesting and the characters are, or the main plot is a wonderful idea and the characters drag it down. I haven’t seen many games in the last ten years balance it well.

(MANY games, I said. I know they exist and probably played more than a few, please don’t take time to cite them to me :P And the first one to bring up Planescape gets a cookie.)

BG, BGII, Throne of Bhaal… Different characters, different choices… I’m a very altoholic girl, even in single player games and I loved so much BG that I even enjoyed playing Icewind Dale, even when the story was worst for far.

And well, as a point in favor of Bastilla over Aribeth, she was tortured :P

And the find this or that isn’t so important than the story, which is YOUR story as Revan and the choice of redeem yourself or not. I see the other parts as complementary.

And yes, I agree with you that is a problem most games these days have.

I was sure I was about to play GW2 no matter what and I was very into the hype but I played other mmos in the waiting and tested some in BETAs or so…

The Old Republic is… crap. How something created by Bioware and based in Star Wars can be so bad?? Npcs that doesn’t recognice your gender or race, a story that doesn’t care about that too, that doesn’t change a little (yeah, little things… very little), a story with an end (in a mmo >< ) and very, very, very unappealing enemies or friends… And the thing they made in the lore with Revan made me wanna punch them in their faces ><

In Tera I don’t see even a story and in Secret world, in Beta was awful but it changes and grow up better…. I like it, not so much as GW2 but it’s ok.

I really, really think that GW2 story can be turn to be great if they start from this point… Let us call the story ‘till this point the beginning. Bring up the rest of the Elder Dragons, let us get our glory, let us use our choices in the character creation for something more…. And stop trying to make us into companions, we aren’t >_<

Ps: Planetscape Torment, ohhh, the memories :P

Vengerin.6013:

I was sure I was about to play GW2 no matter what and I was very into the hype but I played other mmos in the waiting and tested some in BETAs or so…

The Old Republic is… crap. How something created by Bioware and based in Star Wars can be so bad?? Npcs that doesn’t recognice your gender or race, a story that doesn’t care about that too, that doesn’t change a little (yeah, little things… very little), a story with an end (in a mmo >< ) and very, very, very unappealing enemies or friends… And the thing they made in the lore with Revan made me wanna punch them in their faces ><

In Tera I don’t see even a story and in Secret world, in Beta was awful but it changes and grow up better…. I like it, not so much as GW2 but it’s ok.

I really, really think that GW2 story can be turn to be great if they start from this point… Let us call the story ‘till this point the beginning. Bring up the rest of the Elder Dragons, let us get our glory, let us use our choices in the character creation for something more…. And stop trying to make us into companions, we aren’t >_<

Ps: Planescape Torment, ohhh, the memories :P

You may be lucky, I could never find a copy of Planescape. Legitimately.

I think the biggest problem with any MMO is that they want the story both ways. They want the player to feel good and the center of the world (maybe), but on the other hand, EVERY player can’t have that or you wind up with some interesting things. I mean, look around the game at other players. See all the humans? They’re all the Hero of Shaemoor. The norn are all The Slayer of Issormir. All the charr lost everyone in their warband except one person, while taking out the ghost of Duke Barradin.

Yes, it’s epic and it makes you feel good as you play those first few chapters of the personal story. But once you stop to think it gets ludicrous . . . and it starts to unravel. Unfortunately, you went and peeked at the man behind the curtain. You pulled Santa’s beard.

This is a problem I don’t know IF it can be solved. Everyone wants to be the hero of the story, but the limitations prevent it from working out where everyone has a definitely unique story to be the hero of. That’s just not possible (yet) in an MMO as written by the developers.

I almost want to go back to some of the older, ancient MMOs where you were just some idiot who wandered around doing things of minor interest except for one-off events.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Vengerin.6013:

I was sure I was about to play GW2 no matter what and I was very into the hype but I played other mmos in the waiting and tested some in BETAs or so…

The Old Republic is… crap. How something created by Bioware and based in Star Wars can be so bad?? Npcs that doesn’t recognice your gender or race, a story that doesn’t care about that too, that doesn’t change a little (yeah, little things… very little), a story with an end (in a mmo >< ) and very, very, very unappealing enemies or friends… And the thing they made in the lore with Revan made me wanna punch them in their faces ><

In Tera I don’t see even a story and in Secret world, in Beta was awful but it changes and grow up better…. I like it, not so much as GW2 but it’s ok.

I really, really think that GW2 story can be turn to be great if they start from this point… Let us call the story ‘till this point the beginning. Bring up the rest of the Elder Dragons, let us get our glory, let us use our choices in the character creation for something more…. And stop trying to make us into companions, we aren’t >_<

Ps: Planescape Torment, ohhh, the memories :P

You may be lucky, I could never find a copy of Planescape. Legitimately.

I think the biggest problem with any MMO is that they want the story both ways. They want the player to feel good and the center of the world (maybe), but on the other hand, EVERY player can’t have that or you wind up with some interesting things. I mean, look around the game at other players. See all the humans? They’re all the Hero of Shaemoor. The norn are all The Slayer of Issormir. All the charr lost everyone in their warband except one person, while taking out the ghost of Duke Barradin.

Yes, it’s epic and it makes you feel good as you play those first few chapters of the personal story. But once you stop to think it gets ludicrous . . . and it starts to unravel. Unfortunately, you went and peeked at the man behind the curtain. You pulled Santa’s beard.

This is a problem I don’t know IF it can be solved. Everyone wants to be the hero of the story, but the limitations prevent it from working out where everyone has a definitely unique story to be the hero of. That’s just not possible (yet) in an MMO as written by the developers.

I almost want to go back to some of the older, ancient MMOs where you were just some idiot who wandered around doing things of minor interest except for one-off events.

It’s a limitation because it eventually conflicts with player expectations. They can give us plenty of glory—but they can’t give us the glory a lot of people seem to want. Because everyone is the hero, and because everyone is approaching it from different angles, anything the player handles is effectively a void in history because nothing specific can ever be made of it. We get to do all sorts of cool things and be praised for it, let’s be honest—but these are all impermanent things that won’t be remembered because they can’t be remembered. It’s why we can’t be a god, or Marshal of the Pact, or have our Prophecies characters properly remembered, or have actually been the driving force of EotN.

It’s a little bit of a recursive issue because players want to feel strong and special and not just be a face among the crowd, but they can only be allowed to go so far because the reality of it is that we’re always just a face among the crowd—among other players.

I think it would have been interesting too if the personal story had all been minor racial you-are-not-a-special-person stuff, but Anet likes to tell large tales and so you have to accept the storytelling limitations that come with that (or I guess just not enjoy the story).

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

You may be lucky, I could never find a copy of Planescape. Legitimately.

I think the biggest problem with any MMO is that they want the story both ways. They want the player to feel good and the center of the world (maybe), but on the other hand, EVERY player can’t have that or you wind up with some interesting things. I mean, look around the game at other players. See all the humans? They’re all the Hero of Shaemoor. The norn are all The Slayer of Issormir. All the charr lost everyone in their warband except one person, while taking out the ghost of Duke Barradin.

Yes, it’s epic and it makes you feel good as you play those first few chapters of the personal story. But once you stop to think it gets ludicrous . . . and it starts to unravel. Unfortunately, you went and peeked at the man behind the curtain. You pulled Santa’s beard.

This is a problem I don’t know IF it can be solved. Everyone wants to be the hero of the story, but the limitations prevent it from working out where everyone has a definitely unique story to be the hero of. That’s just not possible (yet) in an MMO as written by the developers.

I almost want to go back to some of the older, ancient MMOs where you were just some idiot who wandered around doing things of minor interest except for one-off events.

I had a copy of Planescape thanks to a friend :P

And about the story…

Not so much, not so little. Of course could be amazing if a group of devs could give every single person a story, different from one to another. But isn’t possible and we have to deal with that.

But that doesn’t mean we can’t have our epic story.

Similitudes with other players aside, we could have a personal appealing story with more in our hands and less in npcs’ hands. I mean, you don’t need to over analyze a story to enjoy it… I like thinking in my main like the Slayer of Issomir, the only one… but I hate think in her like Trehearne’s second in command.

I don’t know the rest of the players, I’m only speaking for myself but when I was a little girl I wanted to be Skeletor, not Evil-lyn, if you know what I mean.

And there are a lot of things that bug me about Trehearne.

Unless you are sylvari, the first time to meet him is in Claw Island and you trust him right away enough to suggest him like Marshal of the Pact. And not only that, the guy accept right away.

I know he saw the dream from the Mama Tree like you and saw his future but… That creeps me out.

The same with Caladbolg… As a sylvari you save the sword and you have the task to kill Zhaitan. And Mama Tree gives the sword to the guy with the Wyld Hunt of being an exalted gardener for Orr?? Really??

Yeah, yeah, I know, the Pale Tree sees the future, yadda, yadda… But seems wrong from the very beginning.

And those lines ‘With him we have an oportunity’, ’Trahearne’s right hand’…

It’s like salt in the wound.

I know the devs should love their own creation, I can get that, it’s the typical Ed Greenwood complex (that guy really loves Elminster), but we players only want what we want. I said it before: I’ll wait for my real personal story to begin.

Not Trahearne’s, not Almorra’s, not Logan’s (please…)… My character, full in glory, being the hero and being calling that.

But also I won’t mind more from Destiny’s Edge, specially Rytlock and Felici… I mean, Zojja :P

Even something about Logan (I hated the guy until Arah, story mode).

Vengerin.6013:

And there are a lot of things that bug me about Trehearne.

Unless you are sylvari, the first time to meet him is in Claw Island and you trust him right away enough to suggest him like Marshal of the Pact. And not only that, the guy accept right away.

I know he saw the dream from the Mama Tree like you and saw his future but… That creeps me out.

The same with Caladbolg… As a sylvari you save the sword and you have the task to kill Zhaitan. And Mama Tree gives the sword to the guy with the Wyld Hunt of being an exalted gardener for Orr?? Really??

Yeah, yeah, I know, the Pale Tree sees the future, yadda, yadda… But seems wrong from the very beginning.

And those lines ‘With him we have an oportunity’, ’Trahearne’s right hand’…

It’s like salt in the wound.

I know the devs should love their own creation, I can get that, it’s the typical Ed Greenwood complex (that guy really loves Elminster), but we players only want what we want. I said it before: I’ll wait for my real personal story to begin.

Not Trahearne’s, not Almorra’s, not Logan’s (please…)… My character, full in glory, being the hero and being calling that.

But also I won’t mind more from Destiny’s Edge, specially Rytlock and Felici… I mean, Zojja :P

Even something about Logan (I hated the guy until Arah, story mode).

Yeah, look . . . I’m just waiting on my Arah Story to finish my personal story but I did run it before. Let me address this please?

You’re correct in that he basically just appears if you’re not a sylvari. At least Tybalt was kind enough to explain who this Firstborn was and why I should respect him. (Actual thought: “So you spent your time around Risen and in Orr . . . which is almost literally crawling with Risen, and you’re alive to tell the tale? Can I shake your hand? Can you teach me how you didn’t draw all their attention so I can go there?”)

As for that super-awesome greatsword? It’s clear as you reach the end that Caladbolg was never meant to be solely a weapon. It was a “seed” to facilitate the rebirth of Orr. The fact you could tap its power offensively didn’t mean it was only a weapon.

As for “Trahearne’s right hand”, bear in mind that while he leads, you act. You act, and everyone knows by the final chapter that if you show up their chances of coming home alive just doubled. (Unless you tell them to “hold this entrance” in which case . . . run. Just run.) And you do need Trahearne, his knowledge about the Risen is important . . . as is his talent for rituals. But as far as missions go . . . without you, this wouldn’t work. He can’t stand up to a fight (he’s never had to) and people are expecting him to be this Risen-stomping leader when his talents are more in line with the Priory’s “knowledge is power” approach.

Odd note, Elminster isn’t who Ed Greenwood considers himself to be. He considers himself to be Mirt, an innkeeper in Waterdeep. Strange, as it’s said Ed Greenwood resembles Elminster.

Oh, and Destiny’s Edge? I really appreciated what they tried but we really needed them in the personal storyline, not the dungeons where their story unfolds. That odd choice never sat well with me – we spend the first three chapters learning from these mentors, but then they’re not there until the end when these five people show up and go “yeah we’re a team again, point us at Zhaitan”. I always thought the reconciliation should have happened during the last chapter.

It doesn’t even need to be the focus of the mission, or take up real-estate within it. Have it happen between the missions that slowly the members show up in the instances before the briefings and throw around lines, about how they’re getting over their failure and loss getting back in the saddle.

BobbyStein.2315:

The personal stories vary by playable race. If you’re not enjoying the one you’re currently playing you may want to roll a new character. Try asura or charr. You may find their tone more to your liking.

You are missing the point of many players. The problem is that the stories are NOT personal.

Definition of PERSONAL
1 : of, relating to, or affecting a particular person : private, individual <personal ambition> <personal financial gain>
2 a : done in person without the intervention of another; also : proceeding from a single person… from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/personal.

A story that requires a group of five people to complete is not personal; period.

A story that is predominately about Trahearn is not personal.

Guild Wars, EON, Nightfall and Factions all had an excellent storyline. Some may not have like some of the NPC’s but the story was well thought and came to a conclusion.

Prior to the release of the game I had read both books. However, the Destiny’s Edge group was but a side item. Going through the (un)personal story I did not try the dungeons because I did not have nor did I want to find a group of five. (Sorry, my idea of a PUG is the other players involved in a world event. We help each other; accomplish a goal, then go our separate ways.)

The point is, the GW2 personal story is a major bust. It cannot be completed personally (solo) and is not enjoyable. Overall, the GW 2 storyline is very, very poor and I am extremely disappointed.

BobbyStein.2315:

They did the best they could under the circumstances, so I hope that people keep that in mind when formulating their feedback.

Nah, these are the interwebs, we yell and insult and demand without thinking thatthere are other human beings at the other side!

Serious, I can only imagine how hard the story lines must have been to write. Clearly, not everyone likes them, but they are okay-quality in my opinion.

They are not as deep as in some other games, but that’s fine, games are all about priorities. I think they are good enough to satisfy the needs & wants of most people, myself included.

I really think that the major problem with the personal story (and the degree to which this is a problem is a personal opinion), is that there were a ton of story branches, and if you knew all of them then I think it hangs together very well, but if you only follow a single path through from start to finish, then a ton of NPCs show up out of nowhere and are never seen again in a very unsatisfying way. The reason for this is because they will appear from an earlier storyline that you did not participate in, and then vanish into a later storyline that you missed because you took a different path.

It would have been much better if the stories had contained more redundancies, so that if you encountered characters you’d never seen before, but that was from a different storyline, you would get more backstroy on them, and when characters from your on storyline left, and you bypassed a storyline in which they would have reappeared, you’d get mail from them telling of their adventures in a different part of the world afterwards.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

…

Lets put aside Ed Greenwood. I didn’t say he thinks he’s Elminster… I said he LOVES his character so much that the character is annoying and unbeareble. It’s so awesome and can do pretty much everything that I wanted to throw out rainbows reading the books or the D&D Forgotten Realms manuals in where he shows up.

I know it’s his baby but I like characters that can bleed, that overcome difficulties… Elminster is so freaking awesome, even in the beginning that I can’t relate with him at all.

That comes for Trahearne too.

The guy can freaking cast SIX flesh golems at once!! Not even a party full necro can do that because the party size is five!! It’s like saying: Hey, this guy is so awesome, look at this.

Sorry, but I don’t enter for the: They told you how awesome he is. I don’t care if he’s so awesome.

First for the point of view of a norn (my main ele is a norn girl) the character doesn’t care… I need hard rock solid proof. The Issomir body is there, you can see how good my character is but my character only have words. And she trusted him right away like a forever pal.

About you acts, he leads… Amazing, but should be my story, not his. I could be cool with him leading if my merits as character were recognize but the only freaking thing I heard about playing one of my characters in the story is: How freaking awesome Trahearne is.

Was your character’s idea to create the pact, you secured Fort Trinity… The freaking plant even can’t make a decision of his own, you choose everything… And he’s leading the pact? I could pretty much do the same with my character in command, for that I don’t see the necesity of Trahearne around. He could be your second in command and pretty much do the same.

And don’t come with ‘Balance in the pact, being from an order’… In the story your character could or drop the order to maintein balance or make trials for the other orders (access to armors and weapons from other orders… I’m really all for that) to earn their respect.

Placing Trahearne is just cheap and easy… and I could buy it if my character have had prominence but I end up, even in the end, being Trahearne’s girl.

And I’m sorry, but I read the books before playing (and taking A-net didn’t sell them in Spain, I had an ordeal to access them) and also I loved the characters in the game and for me Destiny’s Edge is more interesting and huge than a plant, that like a bad seed, poped up nowhere claiming to be amazing and your boss.

And about the sylvari sword… It’s a seed and yadda, yadda… but he gets the sword to clean Orr… What is what you have from your Mom with the task of killing Zhaitan up front? A pad in the back and a smile. You have to face it with your guts and your jewels, nothing more. And they celebrate Trahearne’s leadership, even when you fixed Destiny’s Edge, who, like it or not, are critical to defeat Zhaitan.

And the thing with the sword for me goes deeper… Look to those stories where the hero gets a magical freaking weapon to face evil. Excalibur is just an easy example.

Look who gets the magical weapon and try to guess, from A-net point of view, who they think is the hero of their story. The seed matter to clean Orr is just a literary resource to justify the weapon. They could make our sylvari character have it and only can use it to kill Zhaitan, giving a similar object to every race… And letting Trahearne seeking for a cool, preserved, amazing seed of power kept in a part of Orr for that matter.

I said it before, I enjoy leveling up characters and going across the story, but I take the story like a beginning explaining Trahearne’s story and I’m waiting for the devs to deliver my own… That story about me where I’m the hero and the center. Not a npc.

They could have done anything else, but they didn’t. Trahearne existed, and his duty was to cleanse Orr. He was given the only tool for the job, and that tool is no more now that the task is done.

The whole “magic sword” aspect is an interesting conversation, though it will wander pretty far afield if we go ahead and discuss it. The magic sword making the hero is an old trope, but it’s been subverted recently many times to the point where authors and legends pretty much have come to an agreement that the tool is not what makes the hero . . . it is an inherent quality they possess which drives them to action in cases where ordinary people would choose not to act.

In this case, Trahearne is a hero not because of Caladbolg, but because he chose to do something. Before our characters came along, he wasn’t doing anything other than waiting. Being honest, he was mostly coasting by going “yes I know it’s my destiny, but I’m not ready yet”. Then we come along, and the time is right to act. He acts, he moves on his destiny rather than not acting, and for that he is a hero.

So too are our characters. Taking my human ranger into account, rather than run and hide when centaurs attacked Shaemoor he grabbed a weapon and went out to help evacuate civilians to safety and then unbidden charged into a battle alongside trained soldiers without regard for his own safety. That’s the prelude to the rest of the story, and that is what sets him to be a hero regardless of what happens after. It can’t be taken away, it can’t be blunted, it is what happened.

I am taking from your posts you are approaching this from the sylvari aspect, and I’ll be the first to line up and say: I haven’t done much with the sylvari characters. They were the second-to-last race I picked because I was more in tune with norn and charr after Eye of the North. Stupid reasons, perhaps, but they had more to them than the sylvari and I . . . plain . . . do not like the asura.

From what I gather, your wyld hunt, your destiny, is stated to be fighting the dragons. Starting with Zhaitan, since it is the most pressing matter to the Grove and the one which threatens your race the most at that time. Trahearne’s destiny is to cleanse Orr – one way or another, you were going to wind up with fates entwined. I understand he takes more part after the first chapter of the personal story, and I’m anxious now to start seeing how that works out.

(more coming)

Now, taking what decisions were made about Trahearne’s destiny putting yours aside for a time. It’s clear in the final chapter of the story that you cannot defeat Zhaitan until its power has been weakened, and until Trahearne succeeds. The steps to invading Orr one step at a time and pushing back the minions is an instrumental piece of groundwork to weakening the dragon enough to take on directly. The Eyes, the Mouths, and the cleansing of the Artesian Waters all are necessary first steps.

For that, you take out the Mouths, an Eye, and are instrumental in destroying more support without Trahearne’s aid than with it. The Pact’s three-pronged assault by land, air, and sea towards the end is where the orders shine instead of Trahearne. The followup mission I did in the Cathedral of Silence had Trahearne along but he didn’t do anything other than come to listen to the information.

If you want to widen it just to “NPCs” then we come back to something else which is of import. As I said before, if we accept that being a hero is acting when others would choose not to, then it’s your heroics which prompt things to be in motion. It’s your involvement which pushes things to get done, even if it’s not your hand doing it directly. You motivate and inspire people to action, and to put aside differences for the sake of the one goal which matters: defeating Zhaitan and the other dragons. Even Destiny’s Edge gets over their grudges and pulls together, because you convinced them through your assistance and prompting that it was not as important as getting the job done.

I would also submit that Trahearne’s “motivational speech” we see in the Dream, the one which you are present for, only succeeded because the Commander is such a strong figure that the Pact has seen they can win. After all, one person is running into battle against impossible odds and coming out the other side. What could a hundred . . . a thousand . . . do with that level of conviction?

I will note this: If and when you guys get around to initiating the final battle storyline against Jormag, the lore apparently indicates that this series of events will begin when “someone” is capable of breaking Jormag’s tooth in Hoelbrak. I’m giving you a friendly warning right now, if, in some strange fever dream, you guys have even considered making this “someone” be a random NPC, rather than the player character, I would strongly advise against it. If you think the Trehearn hate is bad, you can’t even begin to imagine the deluge of hatemail that “Mary Sue Toothbreaker” would have showered upon her for “tooth-blocking” the player character like that.

Ohoni.6057:

I will note this: If and when you guys get around to initiating the final battle storyline against Jormag, the lore apparently indicates that this series of events will begin when “someone” is capable of breaking Jormag’s tooth in Hoelbrak. I’m giving you a friendly warning right now, if, in some strange fever dream, you guys have even considered making this “someone” be a random NPC, rather than the player character, I would strongly advise against it. If you think the Trehearn hate is bad, you can’t even begin to imagine the deluge of hatemail that “Mary Sue Toothbreaker” would have showered upon her for “tooth-blocking” the player character like that.

It won’t be a random NPC. It will be someone who hasn’t already tried it, I’m wagering, and probably someone from among the kodan or norn. I’m putting my money on a kodan, I think, because the norn have been trying for ages and the kodan have seen no need to try yet.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Ohoni.6057:

I will note this: If and when you guys get around to initiating the final battle storyline against Jormag, the lore apparently indicates that this series of events will begin when “someone” is capable of breaking Jormag’s tooth in Hoelbrak. I’m giving you a friendly warning right now, if, in some strange fever dream, you guys have even considered making this “someone” be a random NPC, rather than the player character, I would strongly advise against it. If you think the Trehearn hate is bad, you can’t even begin to imagine the deluge of hatemail that “Mary Sue Toothbreaker” would have showered upon her for “tooth-blocking” the player character like that.

It won’t be a random NPC. It will be someone who hasn’t already tried it, I’m wagering, and probably someone from among the kodan or norn. I’m putting my money on a kodan, I think, because the norn have been trying for ages and the kodan have seen no need to try yet.

Will be a random npc from the very start that isn’t our character the one who makes it.

Why can’t be our characters? And from the point of view of a Norn fan with a norn main, I will be really really kitten off to the devs if they make another ‘Kormir’ to do the job.

Seeing your message posts, I guess you are a fan of the character story and don’t mind/like Trahearne and that’s cool, but for another kind of player like me, the ones that took to the letter the ’you’ll be the hero of your story’ promotion, the ’What’s your story?’ selling line from A-net, the thing with Trahearne is that we don’t feel so heroic or epicness being a delivery boy.

Sure, you said Trahearne wasn’t doing a thing until our character moved things and that only adds weight to the thing saying he’s big enough for his post and characters in game, npcs and lore side, are giving him much more credit of what he really deserves.

The Caledborg thing and the rest is a mere point of view. But for me, the actions of A-net with him are just saying who they think the hero is… and the problem is that what they think is the thing forced on us.

A-net did what they did and nobody can change that (for more that I saying mentally every time I have a cinematic with him: Gasoline, fire… please…) but as I said, they can fix that up don’t doing the same mistake again with another dragon.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Ohoni.6057:

I will note this: If and when you guys get around to initiating the final battle storyline against Jormag, the lore apparently indicates that this series of events will begin when “someone” is capable of breaking Jormag’s tooth in Hoelbrak. I’m giving you a friendly warning right now, if, in some strange fever dream, you guys have even considered making this “someone” be a random NPC, rather than the player character, I would strongly advise against it. If you think the Trehearn hate is bad, you can’t even begin to imagine the deluge of hatemail that “Mary Sue Toothbreaker” would have showered upon her for “tooth-blocking” the player character like that.

It won’t be a random NPC. It will be someone who hasn’t already tried it, I’m wagering, and probably someone from among the kodan or norn. I’m putting my money on a kodan, I think, because the norn have been trying for ages and the kodan have seen no need to try yet.

There’s only one NPC I will accept in this role: Rainbow Dash. If they bring her in, fine. Otherwise, yes, it should be our characters.

Vengerin.6013:

Seeing your message posts, I guess you are a fan of the character story and don’t mind/like Trahearne and that’s cool, but for another kind of player like me, the ones that took to the letter the ’you’ll be the hero of your story’ promotion, the ’What’s your story?’ selling line from A-net, the thing with Trahearne is that we don’t feel so heroic or epicness being a delivery boy.

Sure, you said Trahearne wasn’t doing a thing until our character moved things and that only adds weight to the thing saying he’s big enough for his post and characters in game, npcs and lore side, are giving him much more credit of what he really deserves.

The Caledborg thing and the rest is a mere point of view. But for me, the actions of A-net with him are just saying who they think the hero is… and the problem is that what they think is the thing forced on us.

A-net did what they did and nobody can change that (for more that I saying mentally every time I have a cinematic with him: Gasoline, fire… please…) but as I said, they can fix that up don’t doing the same mistake again with another dragon.

It’s less that I’m a fan of the story, and more that I’m an amateur writer who has spent a fair bit of time understanding why stories are done certain ways. Trying to understand why things happen both internally (within the fictional universe) and externally (things in real life).

You’re correct in that I don’t mind Trahearne, as I like the character concept but I’m not going to go so far as to say I like the execution. I can see what they were shooting for, and from there work backwards to understanding for myself just how this got built.

From that perspective, and from the past works of Guild Wars 1, I already get the strong feeling that yes, there will be another NPC “point man/woman” the next time we have to go up against a dragon. If it’s Jormag, you may see it being a norn or kodan. If it’s Kralkatorrik you may see it be a human or charr. If it’s Primordius you’ll probably be seeing an asura or stone dwarf.

“Why can’t it be us?” There’s no real reason it can’t be, but if you decide to put the player character that close into the story you run into another set of issues writing this. Specifically, not all player characters are created equal. Especially now that you have a rather spectacular amount of options in the personal story of what path to take. (I won’t say “each one is unique” because by the nature of it being a programmed set of options, it’s more than possible that someone else you never met has made all the same choices.) And from a writer’s standpoint, it is tremendously hard work to write with a large amount of unknowns or options. It’s possible to make it work, but it would take a lot of time, a lot of effort . . . and that translates into a lot of money and a long time between concept and release.

As noted, since this game is voiced in places (in many places) you’re looking at lines for a voice actor to say. Allowing more variation and more options means more lines and more work for them . . . and more to pay them. You can very very easily reach a place where you simply cannot afford to make something more complex based entirely on cost. Similarly, you can reach a point where it would take far too much time to put it into practice. And that’s assuming you don’t find plot holes or bugs . . . both of which are highly likely to spring up.

Those are the real-world answers as to “why not my character?”. The lore based reasons are much fewer and weaker, but it boils down to trying to reconcile exactly what it is that makes them special as opposed to any other person besides the fact it’s the player character.

Sadly, understanding these things also led me to understand . . . yes, there are players/readers who simply do not care and will always stop to ask “why did Frank get to be the one to do this when Larry could have done it?” and won’t accept the perfectly valid answer from the writer:

“Because those are the choices I made.”

Tachenon.5270:

There’s only one NPC I will accept in this role: Rainbow Dash. If they bring her in, fine. Otherwise, yes, it should be our characters.

I don’t want it to be Rainbow Dash, she gets enough awesome stuff to do without killing a dragon too.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

…

The problem maybe is that you relate to them in terms of professional view and not a player/dev relationship like the rest of us.

Sure a writer should write first for himself and then to sell… unless you really want to sell, then you have to let aside your personal taste and write what people really want to read.

In the case of a videogame, that’s more true than ever.

If you create a story people don’t like, you risk yourself to don’t sell your product. And rpg videogames, doesn’t matter if it’s mmo or single player, I see them more like ‘Follow your own adventure’ stories, not like novels.

In a videogame you have to make sure your player is the protagonist. And if you introduce an element, naming a right hand, npc that dies, best friend, girlfriend/boyfriend, you have to make the sensation real, you have to make the player care for that character or like/love it. In the case of villains the two best possible choices are absolute hate and ‘I kinda like him/her but I want him/her dead’.

They did a marvelous job with Tybalt and Forgal (I don’t like that crazy plant of Seiran but I get why some people like her) and some other characters… Logan, for starters… I hated him badly. I hate him with all my guts… In fact I made my human characters last ‘cause I couldn’t stomach the guy. In Citadel of Flame I started to like him, a little, but I loved him in Arah… A guy that can break a rope with a fist have my respects :P

But Trahearne… Unless you are sylvari, the guy pops up from nowhere. And I noticed the writers tried hard to make him look cooler, with the flesh golems thingy, how he changes from being insecure to a bossy son-of-a-tree… But I can’t stomach this kind of characters, those that the writers love so much they push aside protagonists to try to make us swallow them.

And characters that doesn’t make sacrifices… Elminster and Trahearne are in the same category for me. Not ‘cause they are equally good or something, but because in my mind I’m always saying ‘Die, please’.

Guys that doesn’t bleed. I hate that kind of character, characters that are always cool, hair in the wind, smile to the camera and like an eau de toilette commercial.

If Trahearne had died in the end, man, I could forgive and accept everything. He poped up, he took command, he finished his ordeal, he died… That’s perfect.

But the guy lived, like a freaking threat from A-net to include him, again like a protagonist, in another part of the story. And sorry, unless the guy turns evil and I get the possibility to kill him badly, I really want him to take the retirement.

It’s like the thing with Jormag and the fang or tooth or whatever… If pops up some Random son of Randomness, son of Plot no Jutsu the 3rd, rightfull owner to the throne of the Eye of the North, Hand of the King and master of the mytical sword Greyskull, I swear the only way A-net is gonna see my credit card again is by looking to a photo of me that I will send to them in that case: with my credit card in a hand and my finger in the other.

Sorry, but still I have the voice of the lovely Felicia Day in my head from the trailer of the races with Destiny’s Edge when she ask: What’s your story?

I don’t want, with that question in my head, to point to Trahearne or another random guy.

I know they (A-net writers) have limitations and so on… but are things that even lore wise they can easily do. They don’t need to turn our characters into spectators to create a good story. On the contrarie, they NEED to bring up our characters in the front and let us experience the feeling of being a legend.

Some of this is out of order because my thoughts bled all over the place answering this. Sorry.

Vengerin.6013:

The problem maybe is that you relate to them in terms of professional view and not a player/dev relationship like the rest of us.

. . .

They did a marvelous job with Tybalt and Forgal (I don’t like that crazy plant of Seiran but I get why some people like her) and some other characters… Logan, for starters… I hated him badly. I hate him with all my guts… In fact I made my human characters last ‘cause I couldn’t stomach the guy. In Citadel of Flame I started to like him, a little, but I loved him in Arah… A guy that can break a rope with a fist have my respects :P

I’d argue that’s probably the developers’ perspective too, but you’re right. Part of this is because it’s the only way to point out where this character is rooted in (pun not intended). As a player, I didn’t have much distaste for Trahearne, I diliked Logan’s whining and aggressive crap towards Rytlock but not the character himself. I had an intense love/hate of the same manner towards Tybalt; some of the things were downright fun (pirate drinking contest and the bit with him disguised as Demmi) but other aspects of it . . . look, I wanted the Agent who recruited me to be the mentor in the Order. And handing me off to a Lightbringer who never had been in the field? A raw recruit, in the hands of someone who isn’t a field operative, doing things in the field?

Yes, I’m sorry to say, there are things to complain about even though Tybalt’s personality was fun to hang around. When I found out he was not a field operative I wanted (for an intense brief moment) to belt him upside the head and walk from the Order to go join the Vigil.

Sure a writer should write first for himself and then to sell… unless you really want to sell, then you have to let aside your personal taste and write what people really want to read. In the case of a videogame, that’s more true than ever.

If you create a story people don’t like, you risk yourself to don’t sell your product. And rpg videogames, doesn’t matter if it’s mmo or single player, I see them more like ‘Follow your own adventure’ stories, not like novels.

I’d argue less true in the sake of video game RPGs. Tell the story you want to tell, not the one people want to hear. That’s where lots of recent games have fallen down with people I know – the story isn’t strong because it’s too compromised with other things ‘people want’.

Also if the “choose your own adventure” novels I had growing up were any indication, those are rarely anything to brag about. The choices were never always good and even if they were the writer would cheat all too often to bring the story where they wanted it to go. This also applies to “you build your own story” RPGs especially. Very rarely do any choices have significant impact on the gameplay in a lasting form, despite some alterations to dialogue or maybe who’s left standing where. And the few which allowed significant impact fall victim to “and what’s the point?” more often than not.

(More)

In a videogame you have to make sure your player is the protagonist. And if you introduce an element, naming a right hand, npc that dies, best friend, girlfriend/boyfriend, you have to make the sensation real, you have to make the player care for that character or like/love it. In the case of villains the two best possible choices are absolute hate and ‘I kinda like him/her but I want him/her dead’.

I disagree a bit, because . . . and again, from the professional view, there are umpteen amounts of cheap narrative tricks to compel emotional reactions. And they all come off as cheap if people are familiar with the tricks and have seen them before. The doomed hometown. The mentor’s death. The childhood friend dying or turning against you. The sadistic choice. The theft from the player. The party betrayer.

All of these I can take off the top of my head which can easily be calibrated into making an emotional reaction drive one way or another. Anyone who is savvy with plots will see them coming, and call it ahead of time, and it fails to have the proper reaction.

For the people who see it coming, the gut-punch of having your mentor die is more an eye-rolling “of course…”. Having someone from your party turn out to be a mole for the enemy can elicit a “but that makes no sense!” reaction. Forcing a decision between two bad options leaves people who can think of a third option going “but why can’t I do this?” and . . .

And then you’ve broken the spell, the player’s no longer invested in your game on an emotional level. Now they’re looking behind the curtain. This is an inevitable thing, that you’ll have players doing this, and the best you can do is really just go with what you wanted to do in the first place and be aware that someone . . . somewhere . . . might possibly not like it or react the way you wanted.

(Take how many people don’t react to “Dark Side” stuff in Star Wars works as evil but as “really freaking cool”, or the ones who really will be the baby-punting destroyer of villages with gusto given the chance.)

But Trahearne… Unless you are sylvari, the guy pops up from nowhere. And I noticed the writers tried hard to make him look cooler, with the flesh golems thingy, how he changes from being insecure to a bossy son-of-a-tree… But I can’t stomach this kind of characters, those that the writers love so much they push aside protagonists to try to make us swallow them.

And characters that doesn’t make sacrifices… Elminster and Trahearne are in the same category for me. Not ‘cause they are equally good or something, but because in my mind I’m always saying ‘Die, please’. Guys that doesn’t bleed. I hate that kind of character, characters that are always cool, hair in the wind, smile to the camera and like an eau de toilette commercial.

The problem is, I don’t feel I was pushed aside from the story. I can see how people think that, but the Commander is an integral part of the process and as I point out a lot even in this thread: if he shows up, the Pact members know their chance of coming back improved. They openly thank and admire your efforts, as much if not more than Trahearne’s.

Sure, Trahearne doesn’t suffer . . . but then we already HAVE a sylvari who is suffering and gripped with doubt: Caithe. And there’s Malomedes who was tortured by the Inquest. If more were wrestling with these issues then the sylvari come off as punching bags rather than their own people.

But the guy lived, like a freaking threat from A-net to include him, again like a protagonist, in another part of the story. And sorry, unless the guy turns evil and I get the possibility to kill him badly, I really want him to take the retirement.

He’s not going to turn evil unless all sylvari do. And don’t think people haven’t been waiting to find out they’re a sinister threat which had been hidden all this time. There are a lot of odd details people have put together to try to support the Pale Tree is a dragon-related thing.