Guild Wars 2

I wonder if I’m alone in this. I’m a long-time GW1 fan and, with one exception, I am loving GW2.

But Vistas are ruining the game for me. I don’t need long lectures about my motor control or my mouse or whatever. I fail miserably on the difficult ones and I worry that they will drive me to leave the game. I have friends who love them. But to complete a map you must do them … and this is my gripe.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to walk away from Guild Wars 2 upset about these things. It is so sad for me to love the game so much for everything except this.

Am I alone? How all of a sudden did exploring an RPG become about “mouse jumping puzzles?” (They are by definition a solo event.)

I beseech you, Arenanet, please … give people like me some kind of option which makes map completion possible for the vista-impaired. I’d even us gems to avoid these things.

Please. Seriously. I’m begging.

I disagree. No one is forcing you to do map completion. If you strongly dislike a part of it, don’t do it.
This is like asking to remove salvaging kill variety from the Daily Quest because you only like playing on one map.

I have to agree with Kuzzi, they, and map completion with them, are a completely optional part of the game. If they upset you, avoid them. Alternatively, grab a friend and figure it out together or have them show you if they’ve done it!

If you are willing to use gems, then …
Pay a Mesmer to Portal you up to a Vista.

I love the vistas, and am actually disappointed in the ones that are far too easy to reach. There’s a balance between easy and difficult ones, and achievements and map completion is a totally optional aspect of the game.

gotta love MLieBennett’s post

Valire.3761:

(They are by definition a solo event.)

Actually, funny you should say that. I was really struggling with a vista a couple of weeks ago in one of the zones — I simply couldn’t find a way to get where I knew I needed to be. So anyway, after much frustrating searching, I saw someone up there and I sent a whisper asking them how they got up there. Much to my surprise, the person came down and showed me -exactly- how she got up there. I was actually a little stunned. Anyway, the point is, the vistas are not necessarily solo. When my friends and I are playing, we also help eachother out (or laugh at eachothers missed jumps and deaths, more often).

Heh, funny little story Deria.

Have you ever taken the wrong and more difficult way to reach a Vista as well? I know I’ve done that, and met up with another player at the Vista where both of us were a touch confused at how the other got there. Followed by me feeling like an idiot taking the non-intended path.

I am one of these players who like to help other players reach the vistas.
Sometimes I gather a lot of people and then show them all how to get a very tricky one (like vizier’s tower).

As I am playing a mesmer I will try to use the portal skill. That should improve my ability to help.

:)

Deria.9158:

Valire.3761:

(They are by definition a solo event.)

Actually, funny you should say that. I was really struggling with a vista a couple of weeks ago in one of the zones — I simply couldn’t find a way to get where I knew I needed to be. So anyway, after much frustrating searching, I saw someone up there and I sent a whisper asking them how they got up there. Much to my surprise, the person came down and showed me -exactly- how she got up there. I was actually a little stunned. Anyway, the point is, the vistas are not necessarily solo. When my friends and I are playing, we also help eachother out (or laugh at eachothers missed jumps and deaths, more often).

One of my most memorable experiences with the game so far was with a jumping puzzle. On the Breached Wall vista in Diessa Plateau, I was practically banging my head against the wall trying to figure out the proper path and repeatedly falling — it was so frustrating. The thing is, there was this Norn female character right there with me the entire time. We’d make a little progress, fall, rinse and repeat. Sometimes it’d be me who figured out the next step and she (He? Who knows? Not the point, haha.) would follow me up, and sometimes the other way around. We both died fighting one of the veterans along the way and had to start over. Every so often, we’d say something in /say to vent a little frustration to the other total stranger we knew was going through the same thing. After more than a half hour, when we finally made it to the end, a simple /cheer and a mutual “grats” and we were both going our separate ways. Some may have found it insignificant, but to me it’s the kind of rare moment that I’ll probably remember fondly about this game long after I’ve moved on and forgotten the combat, certain encounters, etc. Those are the kind of experiences you only get in an MMO.

Well, for one, I guess I am in fact alone in feeling this way. While this is not comforting at all, it does mean there is no hope of it changing. It’s here to stay whether or not my hand/eye/kb/mouse coordination can ever deal with it or not. If I cannot find a work-around and I am unhappy with unfinished maps, then I am SOL and need to find another game. I get it.

The only real suggestion to date was from MLieBennet (thanks!) and it is a wonderful one. I had no idea that “vista runs” were even possible. If this turns out to be true, then after a time people will begin to offer such services and I will be able to partake of them. I do not consider using a “runner” to be some kind of breach of personal ethics. (Different topic: why is there no gw1-style player trading?)

“Showing the way” is not a solution to my issue. It’s not that I cannot sort the way, it’s that I cannot sort the mouse movements on the highly complex ones without hours and hours of trying over and over and over. (In other words, I fall.) I am challenged by certain mouse gestures / keyboard timing; if you like, call it a disability. Virtually all other game components are forgiving of this except for vistas.

C’est la vie. I shall hope that Vista Running Services become available soon at somewhat reasonable rates. (And if you offer such a service, please send me in-game mail!)

It’s not that much, there are like 2 vistas in the whole game that are hard…the rest is just finding the right path and if you can’t do it, youtube is a great place to find it out.

Well, if you’d like some concrete advice:

1) Turn off the double-tap to evade option in the menus when you are working on vistas. Accidentally doing a forward roll off a cliff is, while hilarious, not productive.

2) Learn the mechanics of jumping — sounds silly to say, but really there is a mechanic here. You can press the jump key and THEN the direction key and you’ll jump just as far/high as if you had pressed the keys in the opposite order. Realizing this will prevent you from annoyingly running off ledges when you meant to do a jump. Also, if you are on Asura or other small race, make a note of the fact that you can -appear- to be standing in thin air when in reality your characters hit-box is firmly grounded. Not realizing how far forward you can move leads to a lot of shortfalls when you jump.

3) Change your keys. I don’t use the standard wasdqe (or whatever it is) keyboard control layout. I hate it. I use w + mouselook for 99% of my needs, and occassionally a and d to strafe. In PvE that is fine. In PvP I’ll probably get owned by some circle-strafing teenager that can press 30-buttons at once but I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.

4) Use obstacles to help with your jumps. If there is a post sticking out of the wall and you want to land on the post, aim for the part of the post closest to the wall so that if your jump goes a little too far you stop and fall onto your target instead of jumping right past it.

5) Understand that it isn’t a race. You don’t get a prize for completing the vista faster than others — so if someone comes up behind you, let them pass.

Not sure if this helps you out or not, but hopefully it does.

Dude it’s like a minigame. I love it and maybe you need to learn to learn from your failures instead of getting mad at them.

Valire.3761:

I’d even us gems to avoid these things.

Pay a mesmer in silver to do the vistas for you. Done and done. No more jumping for vistas.

I’m also a bit inept at the jumps (especially on my Charr). Still, I’ve made it up some tricky ones, often with a guild mate showing me the path, sometimes just figuring it out on my own.

I’d say the biggest non-intuitive thing about the jump physics that was balking me until I figured it out is that you must keep holding the move button down after you jump, or you plummet in place. Useful in hopping to somewhere narrow because you can control your arc’s stop point, once you know about the effect. AND. Take heed here! You can steer in midair! You can jump around corners! In fact you -have- to on some of them, like in the WvW puzzle.

I hope that helps you and others. Steering mid-air is just not obvious until you are either told or do it by accident as I did.

Not to brag but i figured that out when i went for my first vista. Then again I love to jump so it’s no surprise I found that out. TOMARROW I WILL MAKE MY ASURA AND HE WILL HOP HOP LIKE A BUNNY. GOOD NIGHT SLEEPY TIEM HAVE TO TYPE INTENSLY OR WILL PASS OUT.

I have to agree with most people here. Unless you are asking to get rid of them completely (which I don’t think you are, and in would disagree with that to if you were), it is weird to want map completion to, you know, not include completing the map. If a vista is there, it fits in map completion.

Jumping puzzles now are different IMO, cause they are sorta “off” the map…since they are hidden and don’t show up on the map. Those make sense to not be included in map completion.

lets just say whenever i intend to complete a map i go for the vistas first to get the hard stuff over with. worst memory? falling to my death like a dozen times on that one vista in the shattered coast and having to run all the way back. some of the jumping puzzles in this game are really #$%@. i agree with others, get a friend and do it together, or ask in map chat for help. if not, just avoid it, 100% completion is not an essential part of the game anyway.

Snarky Snarf.8463:

maybe you need to learn to learn from your failures instead of getting mad at them.

Comments like this are not helpful when the problem lies primarily with someones motor skills . I can Sympathize with the OP as i have some motor issues as well and have fallen more times than i can count because of it .

My advice is to remap your keyboard and take them slowly .

Do them on a normal sized character such as a Human or Sylvari as you will get a better idea of where your character is in relation to objects .I would also suggest only doing the difficult ones once and say screw it on the other characters (that’s what I’m doing anyway ).

If a friend of yours has a Mesmer ask if they are willing to help you via portal .

Its not the end of the world if you cant get a vista in 2 or 3 tries you can always move on to another objective and come back later .

I agree with the double tap to dodge. This was killing me often. But I like to use it in fights. Only disabling it during jumping puzzles. I wished there was a button to toggle this instead of having to go to the menu every time.

Jumping puzzles are much harder than vistas.

Vistas are easy to reach. Most of them. The ones a bit harder are usually the ones where a jumping puzzle is nearby – usually the easiest of the jumping puzzles in the game.

For example one in the ice area(Shiverpeaks somewhere). And one in Orr… that tower. Was surprised to get a jumping puzzle achievemen there when I had not even been up completely(a little bit lower and a few jumps still to do). Harder than other vistas. But easier than other jumping puzzles because “only” jumping. No things throwing you down like wind blowing or monsters killing you or a labyrinth with a hard to find way.

The only vistas hard to reach are the ones where you can’t find the way. Sometimes very easy and nearby. Often a bit more far away – I got used to this and walked far away very early.

But a few start very far away. For example in the 2nd Orr zone is one I think west of the mid cathedral… that was hard. Even with asking not easy. Video needed. But there are a lot of videos at YouTube. Easy then.

Don’t worry, the ones that require any actual precise jumping are extremely rare. Most of that is saved for the exploration achievements. Most of the vistas are just about finding the path and walking or jumping up to it with no real danger of failure. Some don’t even have a path, they’re just on the ground and you walk up to them. 90% of the time, if a vista seems like its too much reliant on jumping, that just means you’re taking the wrong path.

You must hate the jumping puzzles in a few of the zones, then.

Vistas are amazing, and most of the fun is figuring out the path. What "mouse movements" are you talking about? It’s all about running and jumping in the right direction or taking it slow when appropriate to see where the best place to stand and jump from is. Being close to a vista but trying to force your way to it using a path that’s not really a path can definitely be frustrating, too.

Would you be comfortable with giving an example of one that is making you angry/frustrated and how you’ve approached it so far?

edit: As someone who is so very happy that jumping around terrain was made into an actual game feature, I don’t want these to go away at all. But I also would love to see a person who doesn’t like them get a better hang of them and start to like them. I think that would be great if we can help in any way.

No one is telling you to try another game.

It might be your motor skills but I think it’s your lack of patience. I am playing on a P.O.S. computer, my graphics are beyond crappy and so is my lag. But every map I have done I have completed 100%. My computer works against me and yeah, it can surely be frustrating, but they are not impossible. Not everything is gonna be one-shotted and would you really be interested in a game if everything came so easily?

Well, some vistas almost ruin the game for me too. They are the vistas that have some step in which my character has to stand on empty space to jump to the next place. Two examples are a vista in Metrica Province the one in that for the first step it is needed to jump over a canopy and then from the canopy to a roof, … I do not remember the name of the place. Another example is the second step of the vista near the Tomb of Morlog in one the paths. What ruins the game in these cases -in my view- is the lacking of security about the physical, that is, that what you see is not what you have, that is, that you have to go guessing whether there is some invisible extension in the void of the physical objects.

There is also much physical uncertainy about whether a given rock or a given slope will be possible to be climbed or not, and the fear that if you miss it you may get lost runing around for you don’t know how long. I suggest to Arena.net to make it actually possible to climb, as there is not -and there will be not- fliyng in GW2, in my view, climbing may be an actualy needed option of freedom in the Z axis. Climbing can be implemented as a slow movement that allows climbing over rocks and up on slopes of 60% degree.

The fact that other players are so nice to help me is a good memory for me too, nevertheless, this does not change the fact that these issues almost ruin the game experience and that I may go too fast to YouTube looking for a video about a vista just because of fear of those complications about the physics.

I find vistas a challenging and fun part of the game. They require a bit of effort to get and reward you with scenic views of the developers’ hard work. Most of the time they aren’t -that- hard to get to, the only one I’ve ever found truly taxing was the one in Morlog, Dredgehaunt.

Because I’m terrible at jumping puzzles. I flung myself off the scaffolding twice and accidentally dodged off once instead of jumping.

Bonzoso.7014:

One of my most memorable experiences with the game so far was with a jumping puzzle. On the Breached Wall vista in Diessa Plateau, I was practically banging my head against the wall trying to figure out the proper path and repeatedly falling — it was so frustrating. The thing is, there was this Norn female character right there with me the entire time. We’d make a little progress, fall, rinse and repeat. Sometimes it’d be me who figured out the next step and she (He? Who knows? Not the point, haha.) would follow me up, and sometimes the other way around. We both died fighting one of the veterans along the way and had to start over. Every so often, we’d say something in /say to vent a little frustration to the other total stranger we knew was going through the same thing. After more than a half hour, when we finally made it to the end, a simple /cheer and a mutual “grats” and we were both going our separate ways. Some may have found it insignificant, but to me it’s the kind of rare moment that I’ll probably remember fondly about this game long after I’ve moved on and forgotten the combat, certain encounters, etc. Those are the kind of experiences you only get in an MMO.

Bonzoso! I had the same experience, except I was a Norn female – do you play a charr on Ruins of Surmia? I’m guessing not as afterwards I went to do some more jumping puzzles with my new Breached Wall companion. It was epic, and one of my favourite things ever in all of gaming. I’m really glad someone else had the same experience in the same place

Hyung.6140:

Bonzoso.7014:

One of my most memorable experiences with the game so far was with a jumping puzzle. On the Breached Wall vista in Diessa Plateau, I was practically banging my head against the wall trying to figure out the proper path and repeatedly falling — it was so frustrating. The thing is, there was this Norn female character right there with me the entire time. We’d make a little progress, fall, rinse and repeat. Sometimes it’d be me who figured out the next step and she (He? Who knows? Not the point, haha.) would follow me up, and sometimes the other way around. We both died fighting one of the veterans along the way and had to start over. Every so often, we’d say something in /say to vent a little frustration to the other total stranger we knew was going through the same thing. After more than a half hour, when we finally made it to the end, a simple /cheer and a mutual “grats” and we were both going our separate ways. Some may have found it insignificant, but to me it’s the kind of rare moment that I’ll probably remember fondly about this game long after I’ve moved on and forgotten the combat, certain encounters, etc. Those are the kind of experiences you only get in an MMO.

Bonzoso! I had the same experience, except I was a Norn female – do you play a charr on Ruins of Surmia? I’m guessing not as afterwards I went to do some more jumping puzzles with my new Breached Wall companion. It was epic, and one of my favourite things ever in all of gaming. I’m really glad someone else had the same experience in the same place

Very cool! I was playing a Charr, but I’m on a different server. Yeah, it’s neat to know that other people are out there doing the same things and making the same connections. I’m glad someone else took away something good from that frustrating place, hehe! It goes to show that some of the most fun you can have in this game (and others like it) can come out of nowhere when you aren’t even looking, if you’re only open to it and not so quick to give up.

I only find vistas slightly annoying when it’s up a huge hill and I’m running around for 5/6 minutes trying to find the base of the hill, only to realize it’s a tunnel or something in a cave.

But for the most part I love vistas, judging from everybody else it seems like nobody really has an issue with them

Thanks, Deria, for your suggestions. And thanks, Adine, for your understanding. And to the others also who shared constructively. I appreciate it.

It’s very clear to me that I am in the minority. Perhaps I am impatient or perhaps I am so motor-skill challenged I will never master the jump mechanics required. Maybe I can amend my suggestion some, as it is clear that Vistas are here to stay as a part of map completion, that Arenanet provide a “jump training ground.” Beyond my challenged motor skills, it is possible I simply do not understand the mechanics well enough.

I guess, as I sit back and think about why this bothers me so much, it is that in GW1 there was never any pressure on Anet’s part to complete any portion of the game. You embraced what you loved and ignored what you hated. With map completion staring at me on my sign-on screen and in every full map-view, it reminds me constantly that I am failing. This may be a personal issue, but it’s a real one that makes me question if I can play GW2 for the five-plus years I played GW1.

I appreciate the constructive comments. I by no means was suggesting the elimination of the Vistas; maybe what I really want is way to turn off the UI components that nag me to do something I may never complete. I don’t want GW2 … which I play for relaxation and as a bit of an escape, not as some important competitive exercise … to generate frustration or anger.

It’s my current frustration and anger with Vistas, which admittedly is very personal, that made me write my original post.