Guild Wars 2

So this trailer was just announced.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqe7r5MQdiI

As we know it is in TA what do you think it is?
A complete dungeon revamp?
New paths?
Or just a new story dungeon?

Personally I think they are doing a complete dungeon revamp, as they have said many times they do not mind removing paths or dungeons completely. I also think in one way or another, be it story or explorable, we are going to get some interesting dungeon action with Scarlet! Finally ill be able to have fun many times while getting good rewards, with my guildies! Yay! Was a new dungeon, path or story, so hard?

Let just hope it stays forever! Perma content please!

Ugh, so Scarlet and all of that annoying magitech is going to invade the dungeons now.

I was content with dungeons being pseudo-medieval fantasy (well excluding COE), but now they’re going to be invaded by aetherblades and clockwork crap.

I don’t mind so much. Magitech and I get along. Though I’d be disappointed to see the fae-like qualities of TA replaced with magitech.

I could bearly stand Scarlett’s voice for the 10 minutes it took to do her playhouse thing. If she’s going to be a permanent addition to the TA explorable mode….. :/

I’m just glad that they are combining Dredge and TA.

Im not a fan of them removing the previous paths. It was ok for ac because they essentially stayed the same but revamped the mechanics. This looks like a complete redesign, so I hope its in the form of an extra path.

Adding new paths to each dungeons with the living story, along with a little bit of fixing to the old paths, would actually be a good idea.

Scarlet please go.

Not again. You could’ve brought back Faolain, and instead you bring back her? Come on.

Sad thing is, Scarlet is pretty much a Faolain clone except with magitech instead of mesmer powers, and minions whom are technology based instead of nightmare based.

In fact, they could’ve had Faolain be the mastermind behind all of this rather than Scarlet. She could’ve used her mesmer magic (or one of her courtiers) to play middleman for getting the Dredge and Flame Legion together, she could’ve been involved with the Aetherblades since the Nightmare Court and Inquest were working together already, and while going to Kryta would be quite a stretch, I could see Faolain just trying to mess up other peoples’ celebrations just because she could, since she also seemed to have the same “for the evulz” attitude that Scarlet has right now.

Well…as long as we can still play the old dungeon paths as well as the new ones, it won’t bother me so much.

I wouldn’t mind a dungeon revamp.If it is with TA great.And the trailer looks amazing

TheMaskedParadigm.3629:

I’m just glad that they are combining Dredge and TA.

Yes, we need Dredge in every single dungeon.

This assaults my dreams as nightmare.

But yeah, good they finally added dredges. NoNoNo sounds adorable compared to (scarlets?) laugh.

TA F/U will be fixed so that instead of spiders spawning on head shake, it’ll be dredge.

Actually the tree will be the clown car with dredges coming from the behind. The animated tell for that will be…

Jesus Christ, are they going to force even more insipid Aetherblade/Scarlet stuff down our throats?

Would be nice if they made that giant wurm at the start more of a Lupicus 2.0

Yeaaaaaaahhh. More technology. More robots. More holograms. More stupid lasers to jump on. More traps. More horribly made pseudo-futuristic kitten.
That kittening thaumanova reactor kitten wasn’t enough; you’re going to get some living story everywhere whether you want it or not, because it has to be forced down everyone’s throat, EVERYONE needs to know who that blasted Scarlet is, she’s such an interesting character!
Ahahahaha. Die. Die. Die. Die. Die.

I’m sick of these living story updates. Every single time I tried to be positive, and everytime I found them horrible and lacking, just a bunch of boring achievements.
I’ll wait for the next updates: buffed the underground fractal and added dredge, aetherblades, clockwork creatures and CoE lasers to every single dungeon.

Wait, what about a SPACE SHIP??? What about us jumping on the Enterprise at the end of the dungeon?!?!? I want to meet cpt. Kirk.
Ooooor we can jump on one of the aetherblades ship and meet captain Jack Sparrow. Wut about it? This game is so goofy and obnoxious already, might aswell meet an interesting character… for once.

Props to the art team, the only one doing a good job and that isn’t formed by a bunch of incompetent kittens. They made every update at least worth taking a screenshot.

… wow. Just realised I still have to forgive them for Canach’s lair. I think I felt insulted. Like, really insulted. And the following pieces of living story didn’t help… I didn’t expect such a laziness and such a low quality from them. <— that was just the biggest disappointment, not the only one.

My hat.

I want the battle of death star. Anet pls.

The only thing wrong with TA were the end bosses. the rest of the dungeon was well done and actually pretty fun. This is just puzzling.

TA p1-3 – Temporary content. In come aetherblades now.

Nilkemia.8507:

Not again. You could’ve brought back Faolain, and instead you bring back her? Come on.

Sad thing is, Scarlet is pretty much a Faolain clone except with magitech instead of mesmer powers, and minions whom are technology based instead of nightmare based.

In fact, they could’ve had Faolain be the mastermind behind all of this rather than Scarlet. She could’ve used her mesmer magic (or one of her courtiers) to play middleman for getting the Dredge and Flame Legion together, she could’ve been involved with the Aetherblades since the Nightmare Court and Inquest were working together already, and while going to Kryta would be quite a stretch, I could see Faolain just trying to mess up other peoples’ celebrations just because she could, since she also seemed to have the same “for the evulz” attitude that Scarlet has right now.

Well…as long as we can still play the old dungeon paths as well as the new ones, it won’t bother me so much.

Faolain >>> Scarlett. I like to believe there’s some evil mesmer shenanigans going on with Queen Jenna and Countess Anise, so tying that in with Faolain might not be such a stretch. Reading Scarlett’s backstory, she really has this mary-sue feel to her that puts me off a bit.

In terms of the dungeon, twilight arbor has some of the most unique and beautiful environmental design. So many of the other dungeons are dark and grim, but TA is quite bright and verdant. I would hate to see it become so much like SE.

We’ll have to wait and see if it really is a replacement. If it is…I guess its a step up from 2 week dungeons, but nuking old dungeons to simply replace them isn’t exactly what I was hoping for in terms of permanent content. I was nervous when the dev came in here and said TA was one of the first on the list for a “revamp”, because like Nike said above it’s just the final boss that needs help….but I’ll try not to worry until we get more info.

I feel like I’m one of the only people who wants the current TA explorable to be completely nuked and replaced. IMO the only thing it had going for it was the environmental design. It lacked good boss mechanics (except the 1st wurm boss to some extent), had a story which really didn’t add anything or matter (3 nightmare court leaders simply trying to take control after Faolin), and had those annoying poison flowers everywhere.

That isn’t to say there aren’t worse dungeons though (looking at you HotW and CM).

Now I want to see the Laurent, Vevina, and Fyonna return, except they’re trying to team up to fight Scarlet but they keep fighting amongst each other and—oh wait we killed them. Brambles.

GoldenTruth.2853:

I feel like I’m one of the only people who wants the current TA explorable to be completely nuked and replaced. IMO the only thing it had going for it was the environmental design. It lacked good boss mechanics (except the 1st wurm boss to some extent), had a story which really didn’t add anything or matter (3 nightmare court leaders simply trying to take control after Faolin), and had those annoying poison flowers everywhere.

That isn’t to say there aren’t worse dungeons though (looking at you HotW and CM).

I see you there, Captain Casual.

I really like TA, even the final bosses are fairly good imo. Just not being able to crit on them is a bit annoying. If they remove permanent content to be replaced with new stuff i will be very dissapointed. More perma content =/= replacing perma content.

TheMaskedParadigm.3629:

GoldenTruth.2853:

I feel like I’m one of the only people who wants the current TA explorable to be completely nuked and replaced. IMO the only thing it had going for it was the environmental design. It lacked good boss mechanics (except the 1st wurm boss to some extent), had a story which really didn’t add anything or matter (3 nightmare court leaders simply trying to take control after Faolin), and had those annoying poison flowers everywhere.

That isn’t to say there aren’t worse dungeons though (looking at you HotW and CM).

I see you there, Captain Casual.

Eh? Was TA supposed to be hardcore and I missed the memo? Tbh I’d rather it be more difficult. I’m simply stating that imo most of the mechanics placed in TA aren’t very good when compared to something like the Frizz or Molten Firestorm + Berserker encounters (though the MF bosses should of had a higher damage output).

I’m quite puzzled about the fact that they change TA now, too. I don’t have a big problem with the design of the enemies and enviromnents as I’m a huge fan of inquest anyway (and this looks kinda similar). The Aetherblades are fine, too.

MF, the Aetherblade dungeon and the gauntlet did show that Arenanet did learn at least something with regard to boss mechanics, so there is hope that there will be good bosses in there. The biggest thing for me would be the removal or a revamp of defiant.

But yeah, if the existing TA paths get removed entirely, I have to question their thinking again. TA isn’t that special, but – despite boring and / or stupid final bosses – very solid. The flowers make it even kinda unique in my opinion. The paths don’t have too many issues apart from all final bosses (and a WP missing here and there) in order to justify a revamp which might even remove old paths, because there are many other dungeon paths which need to be revamped from scratch.

Nevertheless, I do look forward to this patch. I wonder how it will affect the existing TA-path (+dungeon token rewards). I really hope it is a permanent dungeon, but considering the fact that it has something to do with Scarlet (thus their on-going soap opera), I highly doubt it.

@CM is bad: It’s relatively fun, TBH, though it does get cheesed since you can skip a good lot of the mobs in CM aaaand still completed dungeon and get and easier time since there’s a lot of projectile slinging mobs.

Do we STILL not know what the hell Atherblade motivations are? And not one of the prisoners told us ANYTHING?

Oh wait.. We do? “Because they don’t want Scarlet to kill them”? Wow, that’s kinda unrealistic in a world where everything else is trying to kill you anyways. It doesn’t really seem like a good way to raise an army.

Terrible, terrible villain…. I hope she’s not in the dungeon path.

Kain Francois.4328:

Do we STILL not know what the hell Atherblade motivations are? And not one of the prisoners told us ANYTHING?

Oh wait.. We do? “Because they don’t want Scarlet to kill them”? Wow, that’s kinda unrealistic in a world where everything else is trying to kill you anyways. It doesn’t really seem like a good way to raise an army.

Terrible, terrible villain…. I hope she’s not in the dungeon path.

We don’t know yet, though there are some theories out there. The one I like best takes into consideration the fact that the aetherblades are composed of charr, human, and norn – the same races as were displaced by the molten alliance. Scarlett may have orchestrated the molten alliance not only to build her weapons, but perhaps to raise an army from the desperate, displaced masses (who had no idea that Scarlett was the cause of their homelessness). Some have asked, why then were molten alliance fighting alongside the aetherblades in Scarlett’s invation? They actually never fight “side by side”, the aetherblades are teleported in only before or after a wave of molten alliance minions.

That’s all still speculation, but the point is, there is definitely reason to believe there are compelling motives, just not ones that have been relieved yet. It may be right to object, though, that they’ve been stringing it along too long, to the point where most people have lost interest in following the story.

rfdarko.4639:

We don’t know yet, though there are some theories out there. The one I like best takes into consideration the fact that the aetherblades are composed of charr, human, and norn – the same races as were displaced by the molten alliance. Scarlett may have orchestrated the molten alliance not only to build her weapons, but perhaps to raise an army from the desperate, displaced masses (who had no idea that Scarlett was the cause of their homelessness). Some have asked, why then were molten alliance fighting alongside the aetherblades in Scarlett’s invation? They actually never fight “side by side”, the aetherblades are teleported in only before or after a wave of molten alliance minions.

That’s all still speculation, but the point is, there is definitely reason to believe there are compelling motives, just not ones that have been relieved yet. It may be right to object, though, that they’ve been stringing it along too long, to the point where most people have lost interest in following the story.

In that case, the living world is a terrible format of story telling.

We’re able to love jRPG villains because we could play it through as a whole, whereas we have to wait sometimes months to see another chapter in the Guild Wars 2 story. This leaves a sour taste in our mouthes and gives us bad impressions about villains like Scarlet, which left the impression she was a Villain-sue in the eyes of many GW players.

I’m going to stress that I’m NOT blaming ArenaNet’s writers and designers for this. I do believe they have awesome ideas, and they’ve proven thow capable the team is by creating such a vast world full of lore. But their potential is suppressed by the limited delivery of content. The time gap makes the story feel too segmented and disjointed.

We’re able to love jRPG villains largely through nostalgia goggles and/or storytelling that was more limited by medium than today and thus less likely for us to completely screw up.

I can’t think of many JRPG villains that I really cared much for and I’ve played a long list of them. Most of them are either awful anime cliches or were just kinda generic bad dudes.

Not that he -isn’t- a terrible anime cliche, but Lezard Valeth IS my favorite JRPG villain.

As a sylvari fan, I heard “Twilight Arbor” and was psyched about this update … until I actually watched the trailer.

More Scarlet? More of her infantile, bratty giggling and braying? More Aetherblades? More insipid deus-ex-machina supertech? For goodness’ sake, please STOP IT already.

Twilight Arbor is one of the few sylvari-themed places in the game. While I’m not a fan of Faolain and her cohort, I do like content that explores a culture and its enemies more. Plus, the dungeon has a unique aethetic and is also one of the few more mythical-themed, actual high-fantasy bits of content compared to politics and technology. To rip that out and have Scarlet take over (let me guess, the Court too is sooooooooooooooooooooooooo scared of her imba powers that they lick her feet to survive?), even temporarily, is a kick in the teeth.

The one and only way I could see this turn out acceptable in my book is for Scarlet to be revealed as Faolain’s puppet, deceived and corrupted from the word go by masterful mesmer magic. And for us to FINALLY be able to kill Scarlet and destroy the Aetherblades once and for all. Done. Kaputt. Finito.

Please stop forcing this nonsense on every-bloody-thing in the game. Less tech, more high-fantasy … not the other way round.

As a sidenote, that would not make any sense at all. Vevina would kick Scarlets kitten out faster than she could start her kittened up laugh.

And i really don’t get why they try to revamp dungeons instead of adding new (permanent, non super time gated) ones. When i look at it, the AC revamp was a huge fail except lowering boss hp a bit. Scavengers are laughable, kholer is extremely annoying with 80% evade time, the troll is probably the worst designed enemy in the entire game, spider queen is just no fun, howling king is an afk fight, rumblus is afk when stacking in a corner and pure rng if you try it normal. And all that considering those bosses have been fun to fight. Especially the rumblus revamp…. urgh.

RIP in piece TA, I’m going to miss you old girl. I just hope it’s limited time only BS so I can just abandon her for a weeks and return once the taint of Living Story is gone (seriously am I the only one who regards anything ‘Living Story’ with immediate disdain?) I adore the entire theme TA has going for it, the only other dungeon that’s as surreal would perhaps be CoE. I just don’t understand why? Of all the dungeons that have gaping big holes in them they pick TA!? : /

I actually like the revamped AC though I have fond memories the original AC was truly faceroll.
Also Kholer does like one Ranger sword evade at the start of aggro and should be dead before getting off another. Though I will agree that Troll couldn’t possibly have been intended to be killed efficiently, dat perma fear and knockdown with a billion stacks of bleed NTY, you could do the whole path faster than him.

Dolan.3071:

(seriously am I the only one who regards anything ‘Living Story’ with immediate disdain?)

Far from it.

Poor TA… i like the theme so much i hope they dont kitten it up with so many atherblades and bs like that, if they do i would be so sad.

DOW Mageski.2097:

Let just hope it stays forever! Perma content please!

A hundred times YES. We need more permanent content, even if it is just a one new dungeon path. At least I hope this is what TAssault will end up being – a new path. If they wipe the old dungeon paths from existence, I’d be disappointed.

Kirschwasser.3972:

I don’t mind so much. Magitech and I get along. Though I’d be disappointed to see the fae-like qualities of TA replaced with magitech.

Same. There are themed dungeons for a reason. If new path/story is added, it should be on top of what exists now. They shouldn’t discard paths – adding a new one or revamping broken mechanics would be sufficient. Scarlet’s minions in only one path is fine, but if we lose the beauty and the nature-is-powerful-magic feel of TA, it would be really bad development. Haven’t got much faith left in Anet after LS so far, but I hope they’re better than that.
We do not need magitech in every single dungeon.

DigitalKirin.9714:

TA F/U will be fixed so that instead of spiders spawning on head shake, it’ll be dredge.

No more TA F/U, but truly TAfuuuu.

Colin said that TA was high on the list for dungeon revamps so I think they will be tweaking the existing paths and not adding a new path.

“Tweaking” = more dredges!

Add Dredge to every dungeon until people get the hint that anet hates Black Powder.

Did i miss something or why are there more and more people saying that the TA revamp will be a dredge filled dungeon?

Scarlet has molten alliance on her side. Molten alliance has dredge. You get the idea.

Walhalla.5473:

Did i miss something or why are there more and more people saying that the TA revamp will be a dredge filled dungeon?

Because dredges are the answer to everything, even how the universe was created.

spoj.9672:

Scarlet has molten alliance on her side. Molten alliance has dredge. You get the idea.

OK get it, shouldn’t take it too seriously

haviz.1340:

Because dredges are the answer to everything, even how the universe was created.

Ahh yes Dredge. The blind race of underground moles allegedly swarming our dungeons. We have dismissed that claim.

I hope they will give us a new dungeon instead of reworing an old one. I like TA I enjoy running TA paths.

spoj.9672:

Scarlet has molten alliance on her side. Molten alliance has dredge. You get the idea.

Please no.

In Dredge Moletariate, the dungeon runs you!

hedix.1986:

In Dredge Moletariate, the dungeon runs you!

+1

What is worse, ‘vanilla’ dredge or Molten Alliance dredge?