Guild Wars 2

Can’t say I really approve of the idea of gating access to paid for content with a log in window, but at least its a larger window than in the past.

Ok so…

’Living World Season 3 episodes will release every 2–3 months. We’ll bundle Living World episodes with the kind of content and updates we’ve been adding through our seasonal quarterly releases, but the frequency of releases may increase. Our goal is to deliver quality content on a sustainable cadence, so we can drive the story of Guild Wars 2 and open world gameplay forward while also supporting our other game modes. ’

We will be getting 4 Chapter updates a year (3months is a quarter), and since there are 6-8 chapters in a LS release this can run 1.5-2.5 years before we get to the end of it?

No thanks.

That just introduces more of the same content drought we have been facing since the announcement of HoT back in Jan-2015.

They must change this stance, there is no way I’m waiting 3 months for a patch release after the bullkitten they pulled with the HoT release.

Where does it say there will be 6-8 chapters?

There were 8 in Season 2, but Season 1 had at least 16 (29 if you count every release before the first break, I can think of numerous ways to count it that produce other totals).

That’s all that we’ve got to go on so far.

And at some point we’re going to have a second expansion.

Also these new episodes are suposed to be way more full of content than the old ones.

Ardid.7203:

Also these new episodes are suposed to be way more full of content than the old ones.

I hope that this is the case, but is there any official statement?

Ashen.2907:

Can’t say I really approve of the idea of gating access to paid for content with a log in window, but at least its a larger window than in the past.

It’s not paid for content. The content you paid for was everything you got when HoT launched plus raids. They never said you’d automatically get access to LS3 if you bought HoT only that you would need HoT to play LS3. If you misunderstood it’s on you. This announcement should have been the least surprising thing they have ever done.

Arlee.7038:

Ashen.2907:

Can’t say I really approve of the idea of gating access to paid for content with a log in window, but at least its a larger window than in the past.

It’s not paid for content. The content you paid for was everything you got when HoT launched plus raids. They never said you’d automatically get access to LS3 if you bought HoT only that you would need HoT to play LS3. If you misunderstood it’s on you. This announcement should have been the least surprising thing they have ever done.

LIVING WORLD

Of course, the story of Tyria will continue beyond the launch of Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns.

If you own the expansion, you’ll be able to simply log in to the game to gain free access to upcoming Living World releases!

How do I unlock the episodes?
Just as in Season 2, you can unlock each episode for free by logging in to Guild Wars 2 any time between the episode’s initial release and the release of the next episode. If you don’t own Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns, you can still log in to unlock the episode for free—it’ll be there waiting for you once you purchase the expansion!

Taken from the latest blog post, bolding my own.

edit: point still stands that you only paid for access to content, not the content itself. Otherwise players that dont own HoT wouldnt even be able to unlock it.

Danikat.8537:

Where does it say there will be 6-8 chapters?

There were 8 in Season 2, but Season 1 had at least 16 (29 if you count every release before the first break, I can think of numerous ways to count it that produce other totals).

That’s all that we’ve got to go on so far.

And at some point we’re going to have a second expansion.

I am going on past based releases. But the fact remains they are stating LS3 chapter Updates every 2-3 months, if there are 8 (Like in LS2) then we can expect LS3 to take 2 years~ before we get the entire release rather then 6-8 months.

I get they want to stagger releases, but common. The last 2 years of release for this game has been a complete Joke. All that HoT Hype, and nothing from jan-2015 until HoT was released, and then only 2 new Content drops with the 3rd being the HoT fixes (IMHO what hot needed to be at release so I do NOT count that as a content release, just a Bug/Balance Fix) since HoT.

And it seems that is going to be what we need to expect for this game moving forward with comments like ‘Every 2-3 Months’ from the Blog Post.

But I cannot accept it like this. When the game first shipped the content updates being on a 2 week in cycle and a 4 week out cycle was nice. They need to go back to that model but sparse it out more to a 4-6 week in cycle and possible a 8-12 week out cycle. That would be FAR better then this 2-3month LS3 chapter plan they currently have.

And I am sorry, but I will NEVER buy a 2nd Expansion for this game. HoT was a lesson to be learned. Anet does NOT have the resources to drop a quality Expansion for this game. Period.

sirsquishy.2619:

Danikat.8537:

Where does it say there will be 6-8 chapters?

There were 8 in Season 2, but Season 1 had at least 16 (29 if you count every release before the first break, I can think of numerous ways to count it that produce other totals).

That’s all that we’ve got to go on so far.

And at some point we’re going to have a second expansion.

I am going on past based releases. But the fact remains they are stating LS3 chapter Updates every 2-3 months, if there are 8 (Like in LS2) then we can expect LS3 to take 2 years~ before we get the entire release rather then 6-8 months.

I get they want to stagger releases, but common. The last 2 years of release for this game has been a complete Joke. All that HoT Hype, and nothing from jan-2015 until HoT was released, and then only 2 new Content drops with the 3rd being the HoT fixes (IMHO what hot needed to be at release so I do NOT count that as a content release, just a Bug/Balance Fix) since HoT.

And it seems that is going to be what we need to expect for this game moving forward with comments like ‘Every 2-3 Months’ from the Blog Post.

But I cannot accept it like this. When the game first shipped the content updates being on a 2 week in cycle and a 4 week out cycle was nice. They need to go back to that model but sparse it out more to a 4-6 week in cycle and possible a 8-12 week out cycle. That would be FAR better then this 2-3month LS3 chapter plan they currently have.

And I am sorry, but I will NEVER buy a 2nd Expansion for this game. HoT was a lesson to be learned. Anet does NOT have the resources to drop a quality Expansion for this game. Period.

However MO indicated that these episodes will be larger. Whether you believe him or not is totally your issue.

Mike O Brien.4613:

Some of you may look back nostalgically at 2013 when we shipped updates every two weeks. That year we shipped a wide variety of things: nine or ten releases that we’d today call a Living World episode, plus updates to systems and content for other parts of the game, plus festivals. So it was the extreme unbundled version of this. It was nice that there was always something new, but I’m personally not wistful of that cadence, because we sacrificed so much to be able to ship that frequently. With Season 3 our goal is to deliver content sustainably, at quality, establishing a pattern we don’t have to take breaks from.

^Right there it says these Living World/Story releases are comparable to 9 or 10 of the previous LW/S releases. If so, that would indicate the 8-episode arcs would be completed in just one release, not 2 years.

I’d guess it’s better to wait and see, than predict the ‘sky is falling’ prematurely.

Behellagh.1468:

However MO indicated that these episodes will be larger. Whether you believe him or not is totally your issue.

History speaks for itself, and we have 2 years of release history to work with. The fact you WANT to trust MO is more drinking the coolaid then living in reality.

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

^Right there it says these Living World/Story releases are comparable to 9 or 10 of the previous LW/S releases. If so, that would indicate the 8-episode arcs would be completed in just one release, not 2 years.

I’d guess it’s better to wait and see, than predict the ‘sky is falling’ prematurely.

“Living World Season 3 episodes will release every 2–3 months. "

unless each Episode is 3+ chapters, no it will take 2 years or so for the complete LS3 to finish. Normally an Episode is a chapter. Unless Anet is changing the tradition of that here.

and no, its not the sky is falling its more like a lot of are tired of the past and current release schedules they have been doing. And from the LOOKS of what they are saying about how LS3 is going to drop, its just more of the same. But now they are going to package Recycled content + LS3 chapters + QoL changes + sPVP seasons + Polish/Bug-Fixes/Tuning all in one or 2 patches every 2-3 months now. Just to make the patches seem larger, when in reality nothing is going to change.

I mean, and dont get me wrong here, I hope I am not correct on this. But if you look at all the previous patch history with the current statements they are making, this is exactly what can be predicted.

Arlee.7038:

Ashen.2907:

Can’t say I really approve of the idea of gating access to paid for content with a log in window, but at least its a larger window than in the past.

It’s not paid for content. The content you paid for was everything you got when HoT launched plus raids. They never said you’d automatically get access to LS3 if you bought HoT only that you would need HoT to play LS3. If you misunderstood it’s on you. This announcement should have been the least surprising thing they have ever done.

Interesting take.

If a company says that I have to buy X in order to have access to Y, then I am being asked to pay for Y. If the only way to get something is via payment then it is, by definition of the word, NOT free.

And this is no different than LS 2. You had to own the game because there wasn’t a F2P option at that point. And if you missed the window that’s 200 gems. Times 8 and that’s $20€ for LS content because you weren’t paying attention. At least they’ve been offering a bundle deal for all the episodes you missed for 20% off, now 40% for the next two weeks.

But now we get an 8 to 12 week window for each episode (let’s say we are getting 3 episodes minimum). If we can keep getting updates at this rate while they are also prepping the next paid expansion, I’ll be happy.

When I played City of Heroes, our free content/technical updates ranged from roughly 8 weeks for the shortest to 32 weeks for the longest. Time between HoT and LS3, 39 weeks, but for me the April Update made HoT finally accessible to me.

Behellagh.1468:

And this is no different than LS 2.

Very different than prior seasons in that neither season 1 nor 2 were used as part of the marketing to induce me to buy the base game.

I bought HoT for access to LS3.

But, as I mentioned above, I disapprove of the gate, but its not much of an inconvenience.

Behellagh.1468:

And this is no different than LS 2. You had to own the game because there wasn’t a F2P option at that point. And if you missed the window that’s 200 gems. Times 8 and that’s $20€ for LS content because you weren’t paying attention. At least they’ve been offering a bundle deal for all the episodes you missed for 20% off, now 40% for the next two weeks.

But now we get an 8 to 12 week window for each episode (let’s say we are getting 3 episodes minimum). If we can keep getting updates at this rate while they are also prepping the next paid expansion, I’ll be happy.

When I played City of Heroes, our free content/technical updates ranged from roughly 8 weeks for the shortest to 32 weeks for the longest. Time between HoT and LS3, 39 weeks, but for me the April Update made HoT finally accessible to me.

So from Oct when hoT was released until April you were unable to really dive into HoT? And you find that a good deal?

But we knew well before HoT was released the further LS were tied to the requirement of owning HoT. We are talking well over a year that we knew this to be a requirement. A bit late to be upset by that.

Behellagh.1468:

But we knew well before HoT was released the further LS were tied to the requirement of owning HoT. We are talking well over a year that we knew this to be a requirement. A bit late to be upset by that.

I think you are missing the point here. The entire purpose of this thread is that LS3 is only included with HoT if you login while the Chapters/releases are available.

Sure they are making it retained on F2P accounts so that if they buy HoT they can jump in. But they should just activate LS3 on all HoT level accounts regardless if they login or not. As the idea has been that LS3 was going to be apart of HOT. And there should be no ‘If’ with it.

sirsquishy.2619:

So from Oct when hoT was released until April you were unable to really dive into HoT? And you find that a good deal?

I could play HoT, it’s just I didn’t want too. The long metas, unstable client, increased GPU requirements for similar frame rate, the time of day locks of adventures, etc really put me off. But money paid, couldn’t get it back, oh well. But I did unlock gliding one so that kept me happy in core Tyria and I was one of the few players who seem to like the dessert borderlands. Of course it’s last version of DB before being swapped was better and if the poll results are any indication, we will see them again.

I got 4400 hours in this game and I still haven’t done my PS to completion on any character. Same with LS2. I don’t have enough mastery points in central Tyria to unlock and get autoloot. I’m not into fractals and dungeons were more toxic than PvP and ANet decided to lock up a LOT of central Tyria mastery points in those areas. In HoT all I need to do is visit a local to get a mastery point or get gold in an adventure. In central Tyria I need to buy a full set of race armor for a ungodly amount or get all the diving goggles including one that’s at the end of one of the more difficult JPs and it’s a blind jump into a bucket. Bringing a mesmer and revive orbs is a kitten requirement otherwise it’s another 10+ minutes to get back to that location to try again. Order of difficulty difference in getting MPs is still outrageous, but it gave me something to strive for.

And that’s the key to GW2, setting your own goals rather than expecting to be spoon fed content while being shuttled around from zone to zone.

Behellagh.1468:

sirsquishy.2619:

So from Oct when hoT was released until April you were unable to really dive into HoT? And you find that a good deal?

I could play HoT, it’s just I didn’t want too. The long metas, unstable client, increased GPU requirements for similar frame rate, the time of day locks of adventures, etc really put me off. But money paid, couldn’t get it back, oh well. But I did unlock gliding one so that kept me happy in core Tyria and I was one of the few players who seem to like the dessert borderlands. Of course it’s last version of DB before being swapped was better and if the poll results are any indication, we will see them again.

I got 4400 hours in this game and I still haven’t done my PS to completion on any character. Same with LS2. I don’t have enough mastery points in central Tyria to unlock and get autoloot. I’m not into fractals and dungeons were more toxic than PvP and ANet decided to lock up a LOT of central Tyria mastery points in those areas. In HoT all I need to do is visit a local to get a mastery point or get gold in an adventure. In central Tyria I need to buy a full set of race armor for a ungodly amount or get all the diving goggles including one that’s at the end of one of the more difficult JPs and it’s a blind jump into a bucket. Bringing a mesmer and revive orbs is a kitten requirement otherwise it’s another 10+ minutes to get back to that location to try again. Order of difficulty difference in getting MPs is still outrageous, but it gave me something to strive for.

And that’s the key to GW2, setting your own goals rather than expecting to be spoon fed content while being shuttled around from zone to zone.

my entire comment was based on the fact you weren’t really able to enjoy the HoT paid content for almost 7 months after buying it. And IMHO that is worth something. Even if you do not feel that way, a large portion of the player base does.

And that is why Anet is not equipped to deliver an expansion. It took them 7 months to make it playable for a player such as yourself.

With how they are going to pack LS3 behind the Login screen, roll down updates to 2-3 months for Gaps, it just feels like more of the same over the last 2 years.

This year, they have polished and fixed the game more then anything else. Then we got some recycled content drops mixed in with 2 new Raid wings and some other polishes.

The same can be said before HoT was released. But nothing really new as they were working on HoT at the time. So Just bug fixes/Polish/Balance for the last 2 years.

and you are ok with that?

HoT was/is a complete disaster for an expansion. They released it incomplete and let the players figure out tricks to get through most of it. Then 7 months later they actually FIX their mistakes and finish/Polish off what HoT should have been delivered as.

Personally I think Anet owes its entire player base compensation for the mess-up of the expansion. And one way they can start is by going good on their word and unlock LS3 for every HoT enabled account with out requiring anyone to login.

sirsquishy.2619:

Behellagh.1468:

But we knew well before HoT was released the further LS were tied to the requirement of owning HoT. We are talking well over a year that we knew this to be a requirement. A bit late to be upset by that.

I think you are missing the point here. The entire purpose of this thread is that LS3 is only included with HoT if you login while the Chapters/releases are available.

Sure they are making it retained on F2P accounts so that if they buy HoT they can jump in. But they should just activate LS3 on all HoT level accounts regardless if they login or not. As the idea has been that LS3 was going to be apart of HOT. And there should be no ‘If’ with it.

But that’s just like LS2 unless you think that they won’t offer a buy option in the Gem Shop. That model seemed to have work them so it gets repeated but with a much longer free window. A window that you don’t even need HoT to get credit for. So I don’t see the issue.

Every MMO wants to retain population, keep players playing, more so with F2P/B2P MMOs. That’s the reason for login rewards and older dailies. That’s a reason for time gated materials. It’s the reason for sales and removed items returning without prior notice of sometimes very limited time. Here are stuff that you can only do if you visit the game often and NOT wait and do it all when you return. And while you are here, did you see the new skins and conveniences in the store? How about the current sale? See how much gold you can get for your $10€ of gems?

And that’s the real reason. The game’s monthly cash flow is heavily dependent on players buying gems with cash. “For a fraction of your weekly Starbucks or artisanal cheese or micro brews budget, look what you can get in game?” And that’s not going to happen if you can’t get your players to log in regularly.

It’s like if you buy a season pass for a game and then you are told you must log in between x and y date or you won’t get the content you already paid for.

I may be wrong, but I’m pretty sure that HoT included LS3, raids, legendary weapons and other things that were meant to be added post launch.

sirsquishy.2619:

my entire comment was based on the fact you weren’t really able to enjoy the HoT paid content for almost 7 months after buying it. And IMHO that is worth something. Even if you do not feel that way, a large portion of the player base does.

And that is why Anet is not equipped to deliver an expansion. It took them 7 months to make it playable for a player such as yourself.

With how they are going to pack LS3 behind the Login screen, roll down updates to 2-3 months for Gaps, it just feels like more of the same over the last 2 years.

This year, they have polished and fixed the game more then anything else. Then we got some recycled content drops mixed in with 2 new Raid wings and some other polishes.

The same can be said before HoT was released. But nothing really new as they were working on HoT at the time. So Just bug fixes/Polish/Balance for the last 2 years.

and you are ok with that?

HoT was/is a complete disaster for an expansion. They released it incomplete and let the players figure out tricks to get through most of it. Then 7 months later they actually FIX their mistakes and finish/Polish off what HoT should have been delivered as.

Personally I think Anet owes its entire player base compensation for the mess-up of the expansion. And one way they can start is by going good on their word and unlock LS3 for every HoT enabled account with out requiring anyone to login.

As I’ve stated, I played City of Heroes before this, a subscription game. A game I paid over $1000 and keep playing and paying even when it had only two updates in a span of 13 months and several 6+ month long gaps. I’ve spent considerably less to play this game and while I enjoyed the flexibility and genre of CoH more than a fantasy game, I feel I got more than my money’s worth out of this game with many, many more hours of play ahead of me.

So yes, I bought HoT, felt that I couldn’t play it in that state but I still had things I could do in the rest of the game that I hadn’t yet. I was sure that ANet would do good and fix the issues so it wasn’t a big deal to me. It’s no different than buying book 6 of a series than I’m currently on book two buy have up to book 5. My purchase was a way to acknowledge that I enjoy their work and wish them to continue creating more of it.

Now if they didn’t do right with HoT, sure, I would get upset and hesitate buying the next expansion. But this isn’t about buying another expansion. This is about “free” content for those who did buy the last one and suddenly being upset that in the name of delivering quality, unlike HoT, that they shifted their content update size and rates.

So if you feel you didn’t get your money’s worth between the original game and the expansion, the door is over there but don’t simply hang around and tear the game down that others don’t have the degree of issues you have in hopes that the game fails and the company goes out of business. I don’t want players like you succeeding by creating doubt in new players who show up to give the game a try. Not out of any loyalty to ANet but because I’m selfish and it’s those players that will let me keep playing the game with the occasional gem purchase. So if you are going to rage, rage constructively and sub making mountains out of ant hills.

Athena.3579:

It’s like if you buy a season pass for a game and then you are told you must log in between x and y date or you won’t get the content you already paid for.

I may be wrong, but I’m pretty sure that HoT included LS3, raids, legendary weapons and other things that were meant to be added post launch.

Then show me where they said that? It’s easy to claim that they did. Just as some claim they said crafting your precursor was going to be cheaper than buying one. Or that they said you could play a fully unlocked elite spec on day one of HoT. Lots of claims with little or no backup. Always couched with “I heard that” or “I was told that”.

IIRC they only said you needed HoT to play future LS content. The fact it’s being offered like LS2 was offered is a non-issue except for drive by players.

Behellagh.1468:

Athena.3579:

It’s like if you buy a season pass for a game and then you are told you must log in between x and y date or you won’t get the content you already paid for.

I may be wrong, but I’m pretty sure that HoT included LS3, raids, legendary weapons and other things that were meant to be added post launch.

Then show me where they said that? It’s easy to claim that they did. Just as some claim they said crafting your precursor was going to be cheaper than buying one. Or that they said you could play a fully unlocked elite spec on day one of HoT. Lots of claims with little or no backup. Always couched with “I heard that” or “I was told that”.

IIRC they only said you needed HoT to play future LS content. The fact it’s being offered like LS2 was offered is a non-issue except for drive by players.

Show you what? Why are you accusing me of stating things as fact when I ended my post by stating that I may be wrong? Your IIRC has just as much merit, or lack thereof, as my recollection. In addition, I really don’t have the time to do a deep dive for where this information may have been presented. There are just too many articles, videos and posts to search through.

A few of my friends and I are under the impression (whether that impression be right or wrong) that LS3 would be “bundled” out post-launch of HoT the same way raids and legendaries were meant to.

People just love to be hostile to others on an internet forum. If you have information to prove those of us in this thread with concerns about this subject are misinformed, please bring forth that information. If you’re not going to give us decisive information to address our concerns and seek only to instigate hostility, please leave.

“I may be wrong but I think my neighbors lure children to their house with Pokemon, eat them and use their ground bones to make patio pavers.”

Sorry, stating damaging accusations of wrong doing with the phrase “I may be wrong” doesn’t excuse you from trying to stir up trouble.

I find it simply ABSURD that you feel the bar of logging in while an episode is first live as a personal affront or insurmountable barrier especially since it is the same as LS2.

And to make it easy for you, this is the one mention of living world on the HoT web site, near the bottom of the Heart of Maguma “journey deeper” section.

https://heartofthorns.guildwars2.com/game/maguuma

Of course the wording is open to many interpretations. We often see what we want to see.

Behellagh.1468:

“I may be wrong but I think my neighbors lure children to their house with Pokemon, eat them and use their ground bones to make patio pavers.”

Sorry, stating damaging accusations of wrong doing with the phrase “I may be wrong” doesn’t excuse you from trying to stir up trouble.

I did not state a damaging accusation anywhere. Even if I had stated a “damaging” accusation, I think you grossly exaggerate the impact that a post from a single user would have on the game. Comparing an accusation on an internet forum to an accusation of murder is very different in levels of severity.

Behellagh.1468:

I find it simply ABSURD that you feel the bar of logging in while an episode is first live as a personal affront or insurmountable barrier especially since it is the same as LS2.

You are once again exaggerating and putting words into my mouth; I am mainly inquiring on behalf of a friend that is currently deployed. Are there other courses of action besides posting a question on a forum? Of course. I could simply buy him LS3. He could buy it himself. I could potentially log in for him. However, this is the reason we have forums — for discussion. Are there more important things to worry about while a friend is deployed? Of course; but sometimes it’s the little things in life that matter. Regardless of what the verdict is, it’s not the end all if he cannot get LS3 for “free” since he purchased HoT.

Behellagh.1468:

And to make it easy for you, this is the one mention of living world on the HoT web site, near the bottom of the Heart of Maguma “journey deeper” section.

https://heartofthorns.guildwars2.com/game/maguuma

Yes, I did already see that page, but thank you. (It’s also linked by a developer on the first page of this thread).
“If you own the expansion, you’ll be able to simply log in to the game to gain free access to upcoming Living World releases!”
Even if you don’t own the expansion, you’ll be able to log in and claim LS3 for free to play in the future when you do own HoT. If you read through that page, you’ll also notice that it doesn’t say a single thing about “raids”. My point being, somewhere along the way (if not multiple times) there was information distributed that discussed post-launch content for HoT. That information isn’t really on this page and what little there is is fairly subjective — although it could be assumed that LS3’s distribution would work similar to LS2’s distribution; however, 1) This is the first time we’ve dealt with an expansion and the living story working together and 2) In discussions, and even that very information page you linked, the Living Story Season 3 is tied directly to Heart of Thorns. It isn’t really its own entity. It hasn’t ever been tied to Expansion 2. It’s never really been talked about as its own thing (also it generally hasn’t been talked about).

Behellagh.1468:

Of course the wording is open to many interpretations. We often see what we want to see.

Yes! Absolutely. Now please apply that introspectively and ask yourself why it was necessary to go for my throat, put very aggressive words in my mouth and accuse me of trying to “stir up trouble”. If you do reply, please do not reply to this part as it is not what the thread is about. Pointless bickering on a forum is pointless and non-constructive. I know you are intelligent enough to realize that. As for myself, I am sorry that you felt that I was trying to do whatever negative thing it is that you thought I was doing.

Ashen.2907:

Can’t say I really approve of the idea of gating access to paid for content with a log in window, but at least its a larger window than in the past.

Were did they say that ls3 were a hot feature?
They did say you had to have hot to be able to play it and that it would bridge the gap story vise towards the next expansion.

Linken.6345:

Were did they say that ls3 were a hot feature?

Where did I claim that they did?

What I do believe is that if Anet says that I have to pay X dollars to have access to LS3, then they are saying that LS3 is paid content. I don’t care for the idea of gating paid content in this manner…

…but again, it isn’t really a big deal because a 2-3 month window of opportunity is pretty forgiving.

Ashen.2907:

Linken.6345:

Were did they say that ls3 were a hot feature?

Where did I claim that they did?

What I do believe is that if Anet says that I have to pay X dollars to have access to LS3, then they are saying that LS3 is paid content. I don’t care for the idea of gating paid content in this manner…

…but again, it isn’t really a big deal because a 2-3 month window of opportunity is pretty forgiving.

Wouldn’t Season 2 be considered paid content since you needed to have purchased the game to access it?

Ayrilana.1396:

Ashen.2907:

Linken.6345:

Were did they say that ls3 were a hot feature?

Where did I claim that they did?

What I do believe is that if Anet says that I have to pay X dollars to have access to LS3, then they are saying that LS3 is paid content. I don’t care for the idea of gating paid content in this manner…

…but again, it isn’t really a big deal because a 2-3 month window of opportunity is pretty forgiving.

Wouldn’t Season 2 be considered paid content since you needed to have purchased the game to access it?

Technically, it’s inclusion in the game came looooooooooooong after release, so it’s not paid content per se. It’s paid content in the context that people who didnt play then need to pay in order to make it available. On the other side of the coin, it’s not paid content for the opposite context.

Aidan Savage.2078:

Ayrilana.1396:

Ashen.2907:

Linken.6345:

Were did they say that ls3 were a hot feature?

Where did I claim that they did?

What I do believe is that if Anet says that I have to pay X dollars to have access to LS3, then they are saying that LS3 is paid content. I don’t care for the idea of gating paid content in this manner…

…but again, it isn’t really a big deal because a 2-3 month window of opportunity is pretty forgiving.

Wouldn’t Season 2 be considered paid content since you needed to have purchased the game to access it?

Technically, it’s inclusion in the game came looooooooooooong after release, so it’s not paid content per se. It’s paid content in the context that people who didnt play then need to pay in order to make it available. On the other side of the coin, it’s not paid content for the opposite context.

But how does one define what is long enough for it not to count? I just don’t really see the difference as you still have to purchase the core game to play S2 just as you have to purchase HoT to play S3. Not likely it really matters one way or the other.

Athena.3579:

… clip …

My saltiness toward you was due to the proverbial straw. Your post seemed to come down of those in this thread and other threads who after getting their argument about lack of new content shut down with an announced date are now focusing on the weakest of arguments to continue bashing ANet. The notion that requiring players to log in while the episode is current to get it for free, as it was in LS2, is just another example of ANet deceiving the customer with HoT. I’m sorry you took the blunt of that but I had enough.

Not sure what you are trying to say about raids but they had their own page on the HoT site – https://heartofthorns.guildwars2.com/game/raids

The OP’s question, just noticed that this is a necro thread, got answered but it then this got turned into yet another “ANet deceived us” thread. And while you listed a legitimate issue for a minority of players who are routinely separated from their gaming machine for long stretches, that’s not why most are complaining. They are looking to salt the forums with negativity in the hopes of driving away new players. If it’s not one thing, it’ll be another. It’s whatever they can get others riled up about. They got a bone to pick with ANet and that’s it.

Again, sorry you took both barrels of my rage.

Danikat.8537:

It is official: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/guild-wars-2s-living-world-returns-on-july-26/

“How do I unlock the episodes?

Just as in Season 2, you can unlock each episode for free by logging in to Guild Wars 2 any time between the episode’s initial release and the release of the next episode. If you don’t own Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns, you can still log in to unlock the episode for free —it’ll be there waiting for you once you purchase the expansion!"

nice

It’s just occurred to me that I’m going to be away from home for the entire first week of this release.

It’s times like this I’m really glad they dropped the idea of temporary content. If this was back in Season 1 I’d be resigning myself to only doing the most essential and/or quickest parts of the release and forgetting about anything else involved. As it is I’ll be able to do all of it and I won’t even have to start as soon as I get home. (I probably will, but I won’t have to.)

I know I shouldn’t be this happy that they scrapped an impractical system (especially over a year after it happened) but there were so many releases where I did have to try and pick out the few bits I really wanted to do before it was gone forever that not having to do that still seems exciting.

I am not a F2P GW2 player, but I don’t have many HoT masteries completed, just enough to finish the last LS, but can LS 3 be completed without needing HoT masteries? For instance, if a F2P player buys LS3 off the gemstore can they get through it without needing HoT masteries at all?

slashlizardy.9167:

I am not a F2P GW2 player, but I don’t have many HoT masteries completed, just enough to finish the last LS, but can LS 3 be completed without needing HoT masteries? For instance, if a F2P player buys LS3 off the gemstore can they get through it without needing HoT masteries at all?

F2P player cannot play LW3. He has to buy HoT, thus buying the game, thus he is no more F2P.

Ok so a F2P or a base GW2 player couldnt even run it — gotcha! -- thanks Mort.

I think it’s fairly clear that F2P cannot do that, slashlizardy. The story will happen at least partially in the HoT maps. Also the FAQ in the blog says that you must own HoT to play it. But the F2P can log in during the release and then if they ever buy the game they can play LS3 without paying extra for it.

LS2 takes place in Pact Tyria, is part of the core game that we had before HoT, thus allowing F2P to get at it as they get the core game (with restrictions).

Thanks for the clarification Donari, much appreciated

To be honest. LW story 3 should not even be tied into if you have HoT. We already killed the evil dragon in HoT, the land is saved. LW story 3 like all other LW stories should be core based. You can add in fun choices for it to try to get players to buy HoT but it should not be a requirement.

As for mike saying they want a pattern they don’t break from, they have broke from every pattern they ever set going back to gw1. Remember the every 6 months we’ll have a new campaign? It was longer then 6 months lol The closest one was Nightfalls lol. Then when they created Eye of the North went from being a campaign to an expansion. Then they stopped on that and took 3 years to make gw2 and shipped it rushed and unfinished. And during that time, they added in Winds of change and the other one to keep us interested to buy time til gw2 came out.

In all honesty Odin, I agree with you. In my opinion, if you have HoT or the base game, then by virtue of logging in on during the window of opportunity, then yes you should have LS3 unlocked and all you need to play it. If your only F2P or you missed the window, then you should be able to buy the episodes off the gemstore and play, but that is not the route anet chose.

slashlizardy.9167:

In all honesty Odin, I agree with you. In my opinion, if you have HoT or the base game, then by virtue of logging in on during the window of opportunity, then yes you should have LS3 unlocked and all you need to play it. If your only F2P or you missed the window, then you should be able to buy the episodes off the gemstore and play, but that is not the route anet chose.

If they only have the base game and new Living Story episodes are in a new map, then how can they play it?

The thing is, Odin, the HoT story hasn’t ended. We broke off with no resolution, no aftermath, and stuff about to happen with the egg. That’s all in the HoT maps. The GW2 story is far from narratively perfect but they really can’t just abandon the HoT area situation to bring everything back to core lands at this point.

Almost certainly they didn’t mean to leave the story hanging this long, and knew what story beats they’d be giving us after Hearts and Minds. Heck, they had more story beats they meant to include but the pressure of the launch deadline made them send far too much to the cutting room floor (Malyck being the prime example).

Also LS3 continues the story from the HoT episodes, even as those episodes picked up minutes after LS2 ended. The gap in delivery has been far too long, but can be likened to waiting a year or two for the last book in a trilogy if you read it as it is written and published, where eventually you could binge all three books straight through for a cohesive experience of the tale. Storytelling in an ongoing game has different parameters, true, so perhaps in writing they should have taken into account that there would be delivery gaps, but overall the story is written as if delivered all at once.

LS3 pretty much has to be tied to HoT, and possibly always had to be even in early concept design. I think it’s pretty nice of them to only require a log in during live release regardless of HoT ownership for a player to permanently unlock free LS3 access for his/her account. Well, also fairly canny in a marketing sense, in that it will nudge fence sitters over to buying HoT … but if they were just mindlessly cash grabbing, they’d be requiring purchase of HoT before unlocks became possible at all.

Ayrilana.1396:

Ashen.2907:

Linken.6345:

Were did they say that ls3 were a hot feature?

Where did I claim that they did?

What I do believe is that if Anet says that I have to pay X dollars to have access to LS3, then they are saying that LS3 is paid content. I don’t care for the idea of gating paid content in this manner…

…but again, it isn’t really a big deal because a 2-3 month window of opportunity is pretty forgiving.

Wouldn’t Season 2 be considered paid content since you needed to have purchased the game to access it?

The base game, for me at least, was sold based on what it was. I bought HoT because Anet said that I would not be able to access LS3 without it. I dont recall maketing for the base game referencing LS1 or 2. Then again, as I mentioned, I bought the base game to get the content of the base game. That was the point of the marketing and the purchase. I bought HoT in spite of the content of HoT because I was told, essentially, “even if you dont like or want what HoT has to offer you will need to buy it in order to access the next chapter of the ongoing story.”

So I bought LS3, paying for that content…paid content as the developers intended.

Donari.5237:

The thing is, Odin, the HoT story hasn’t ended. We broke off with no resolution, no aftermath, and stuff about to happen with the egg. That’s all in the HoT maps. The GW2 story is far from narratively perfect but they really can’t just abandon the HoT area situation to bring everything back to core lands at this point.

They kind of can lol Core gamer’s can use guild halls after all. I do get it though, and all things they eventually figure out with HoT will serve them for better expansions in the future. So the sooner they get it figured out the sooner we can get back to the story and the other dragons, specially bubbles.

well since the launch of HoT they have been fixing the game. Just by reading through the patch notes that much is apparent. So thats why we have had such content Gaps. But I still cant excuse it. we paid money for Access into HoT and it took them 7 Months to deliver many of the much needed fixes to make it playable (Have not had a DS crashed Map since May).

They needed to delay Hot and deliver Fillers into HoT’s story instead. Instead of releasing an unfinished Product. its not like HoT was unpolished and just needed to be tuned. They had to fix most of what the Expansion brought to the game.

And All I can hope for is that the break from HoT to LS3 is so that Anet, Finally, releases a complete product that is just short of Tuning and Polishing rather then a rushed incomplete pile of trash. Much like what HoT was when it was released.

To summarize who can do what in LS3:

• F2P can unlock content, but cannot access it
• Non-expac players can unlock content, but cannot access it
• Expac players can unlock and access it

Yunielesca.2850:

That’s not free, you’ve paid an expansion for it…

That depends on your interpretation of the word ‘free’. There is the ‘you buy one, you get one free’ offer alternatively known as BOGOFF.

You bought GW2, you got Season 1 and 2 free. You buy HoT, you get Season 3 part 1 free.

If you log in while it’s available, IE before the second instalment comes out.

Anet employees would love to be able to work, designing the great content they do, and give it all away for free. Unfortunately you live in the real world, as do they, and that means someone has to hand over the cash so they can live, eat, pay the bills, feed the kids and pets, curse the tax man, etc, etc…