Guild Wars 2

Well, I’d like to +100 this.

Yes, I watched gameplay videos before I bought GW2. However, my first character was a thief and I don’t feel very… thiefy. I was expecting to sneak about on story missions and steal things from an unawares enemy. Or as a warrior to run in and fight mano-a-mano the Big Bad. On an elementalist, I hoped to use my skills to defeat the enemies with powers of nature. Perhaps on an engineer to manufacture items to fight for me.

Yet… there is NONE of this. Every single class is run, attack, run, attack. Enemies almost all act one of two ways – close distance and melee or stand back and shoot.

Basically, I do not feel that the decisions I made when I created each of my characters makes any difference at all to anything. Apart from the small details, I do not feel that ANY of the personal storyline really changes a thing.

If I choose to help Tonn blow up the Orrian towers, or I lead the artillery against the undead, or I try to retrieve the Krait orb… it makes zero difference. The krait orb is still there, Apatia is not, and Tonn still dies no matter WHAT I do. I feel the game ignores me/my character.

For me, the Personal storyline is quick XP and that is all.

I love the idea of incorporating class into the personal story, and hopefully it will be implicated later hopefully with expansions. But there are certain choices that you can choose. I know some branches you can either do a full frontal assault or attack from the rear. But yeah, I would love some stealth missions.

Because there are 8 professions and it would be a nightmare to program 8 possibilities into EVERYTHING just so people could feel like their profession was having more of an ‘impact’ on what is happening.

You are given choices on how to act throughout the game and you are left to play your profession however you want. Yes in the perfect MMO your profession would have an impact on everything. But do you have any idea how ridiculously implausible that is in todays gaming world. Companies don’t have the time, budget, personnel etc to implement this kind of system.
To you the end user it might seem as simple as ‘oh I’m an Engineer I should be able to blow this door up, whereas a thief should be able to sneak around to some other entrance’. But on the coding, art, designing, QA levels that tiny little possibility constitutes a LOT of work. It isn’t plausible.

The idea of having a class-based personal story aspect is very cool and I’ve never seen that one suggested before. Support for me on that one.

Flame, it does not have to be 8 path to each story part, it needs a LOT more
Not sure how many have played Dragon age (wont matter 1 or 2). Maybe even hell Mass Effect, or actually even Gw1.
Now, that is what i am talking abaut. When i talk with the vigil diplomat, i want more then the same “cutscenes” and conversations. Add a +1 mission, where you have to fight alongside with some xy hero, and you get additional lines in the “usual” conversation in the strory, where it mentions, how good your xy sword technic is.
(an example)
(I am not here to qq, i am here to show my opinion, and ideas. Besides, i think the devs had a LOT of time up till now, and the game feels like its still in beta, Atleast for some parts. Lets not even mention Guild Halls and so on. They must realyl have a small team, i am happy to hear they adding more and more ppl…they really need it)

Sure it needs a deal of programing, but i dont think, that moch more then a “stupid, holiday, event” story. Didnt they just state, they should be working on permanent content? (i think thats what it wanted to point out in the latest announcement)
I dont think its a big deal to use an alredy complete (part of a) map, and simply add story to it.
Conversations are extremely simple anyway. (just show up 2 models talking before a bacground.)
Sure it needs voice acting, that takes time and money.

I also think adding a “mini” story line, where your “mentor” or teacher (for example master elementalist, or high druid, or priest, masterspy ect…) teaches you in te ways of your “class” expertise.
I remember master togo and Kormir and the others. That was clearly awesome.

And thank you for the good feedback, i hope the devs keep on eye on this topic, and atleast mention something, sometime.

Nekroseth.5186:

Flame, it does not have to be 8 path to each story part, it needs a LOT more
Not sure how many have played Dragon age (wont matter 1 or 2). Maybe even hell Mass Effect, or actually even Gw1.
—

And thank you for the good feedback, i hope the devs keep on eye on this topic, and atleast mention something, sometime.

While I agree with you guys, I understand that expecting Guild Wars 2 to have a BioWare (I’ve played them all. ME1~3 and DA:O+DA 2) quality of story is TOTALLY DELUDED. This game has so much more to take care of, not just the single-player story. PvP, for one~

A complex branch like Dragon Age: Origins is impossible for Guild Wars 2, Dragon Age 2 would be something to look up to. It has a much clearer “2-sides” to it.

Or even Mass Effect 2 & 3, both of which had at least 2 very differentiated outcome at every turn (including the highly controversial ending of ME3, by the way~)

Currently, my choices in the story seem to have short-term effects at best, which make those choices unimportant. Endings are the same. Dead-or-Alive of major characters are the same. Not personal.

Originally, I really didn’t expect Guild Wars 2 to have branching storylines. I would be totally accepting if all races are given a linear storyline to follow, because this is a MMO, not a BioWare RPG.

But hey ANet, it was you who claimed this to be a personal story, in which my choices would shape the world around me. So, come on, keep your promises, and make it count

Whell…even if i exclude the most of the “personal story” part of the game, i still miss a LOT of detail abaut classes itself.
I mean…there is the trainer, that is good for giving you trait books……….feels sad thats all.

As for, more detail to personal story, i dont really mean a “bioware” like ting. (trough it would be amazing). But still….this is supposed to be an RPG, as the devs so hyped up the game. There are parts where i do feel like that….but mostly its undetailed.

For example : They sead, we can interact with the world a BIG TIME. Like taking up a rock and you can use it as a fiery builder with elementalist….that actually does exist…but clearly there is nothing more. (You cant blow up the fruitcart next to the centaur, so he gets blinded, or slips on the grease) You cant turn of the trap with a spell as elementalist, or disarm them as thief….if they promised rpg…they should have work a LOT more on it (if they had the time).
Classes really should impact the game itself a LOT more then they currently do. That is my opinionn.

Perhaps this is an idea for the future of personal story? Class bound. For the most part I liked the personal story regardless so I would want to go back to it. On my Charr I recruited a Warband, where are they again? I forgot whose in it to begin with..

I agree that professions should affect story missions but, to save on resources and to do it in a more realistic manner, not every class needs to have an alternative for every fork in the road. For instance, take the human story mission where you need to infiltrate a bandit lair to find out their plans. I feel a better way of doing that would be giving all professions two options. The first is to kick the door down and crack some heads together until you get answers. The second would be meeting one of them at a bar and getting them drunk enough to talk. After that, you get some alternatives based on your profession.

If you’re a thief, you get the option to use stealth skills to sneak in and using the shadows to stay undetected while your skills are on cooldown. Eventually you’ll have to steal the plans off of a high ranking member and get out without being caught.

As a mesmer, you have the option of disguising yourself and a clone as bandits to sneak in. Then you have to keep switching between yourself and the clone to gather up info and piece their plan together.

No other profession would have an alternative choice but, during the next fork, perhaps the warrior and ranger get alternatives while the rest have to choose between the two defaults. I also believe that gender, race and social standing should play factors in alternative choices. Granted these alternatives will come to the same conclusions but the personal story is more about the journey than the destination. Also, people will be more motivated to play through it a second time just to see how different things are with other options.

CLASS Story sounds like an epic idea! =)

I could see a sort of expansion doing this kind of thing that could also serve to introduce any new class skills they plan to bring into the game. Rather than buying with skill points, the new utilities are unlocked by some form of Hall of Monuments Scrying pool instances where the player is put in an instance with some Hero NPCs from GW1 of similar class or something. (And use Asurans or engineer-like people for Engi’s.)

That or an alternative approach to class specific instances is to have some kind of College or Institute that trains the new skills with missions or something. To make it fit the lore, “After the Pact defeated Zhaitan, they established the Training Academies to further train their troops to be the best they can be.” Big building with a big foyer, 8 chambers (1 per class) where the class specialists responsible for the missions reside. I think 4 or 5 missions for each profession with a final reward of unlocking new skills would be a fun option. They could make the story angles coincide with the skills, like "A Priory researcher uncovered tales of a Warrior who could do (insert skill related action). " and then the warriors would be sent off with a pack of Pact Warriors or something to make them feel that this was warrior business in a multi-instance mission that results in uncovering a tome or some method to acquire the technique. It’d be REALLY cool to explore some GW1 ruins and find ghosts of NPCs from the first game that provide guidance or the skill itself like the GW1 skill trainers. After that, maybe players go back to the academy and do a sort of ‘showcase’ instance that directs players through some practical uses of the new skill.

Maybe introduce a minigame in there “Class vs Class” where it’s 5 ele’s vs 5 rangers in team deathmatch or something with defined loadouts. (Just throwing random ideas out to reinforce the class specialization of the place)

Doing a story based around specific character classes I could see would take a lot of time, but maybe a few class specific missions would have been nice. Or throw in some unique options in missions – as was suggested earlier – but perhaps broadening the category into 3 like with armour to make it easier to program: warrior, a magic user and adventurer (ranger or thief etc), perhaps giving a chance to use brawn, magic, or wits respectively.

Most importantly some more choices in conversation would have been appreciated, as although its called personal story, it doesn’t feel like my own journey. Though I understand pulling off something Bioware level is really too much to ask.

Tabbris.5237:

I love the idea of incorporating class into the personal story, and hopefully it will be implicated later hopefully with expansions. But there are certain choices that you can choose. I know some branches you can either do a full frontal assault or attack from the rear. But yeah, I would love some stealth missions.

You don’t get it. When you choose from what side to attack, you literally choose from what side to attack. Fight would be the same. There is no “right choice”. Anet policy to make everything the same, so no one could have any advantage in anything.

While it would add a lot of burden on anet to add this kind of stuff, I really wish we could see some of it. Small voice acting tidbits for npcs and characters based on class would be great. I don’t think a more long-term mission chain would have to have too much content. Give me a class-based mission every 7-10 levels from, say, lvl 1-40 and I would be happy. They wouldn’t have to be race specific (being class specific) and they could even unlock some of our skills or special class features in a meaningful way, including our first elite, or maybe special gear like new class-based helms to replace our starting class helms (a new hood for a thief, for example).

I really wish they would just make a bigger expansion already… but thats a whole separate problem. sigh