Guild Wars 2

I’m probably being really slow on the up-take here, but has anyone else noticed that tranditional questing is in this game, it’s just a lot rarer than in most RPGs and kind of hidden because there is no quest log and no announcement that you’ve been given a quest?

For example Gardener Keemi in Overlake Haven tells you how much she wants truffles from the nearby Hylek cave. She doesn’t directly tell you to go get them but if you bring one you can give it to her.

Or there’s a norn (I can’t remember her name) who tells you Kani has gone to the Grawl caves to rescue a bunch of norn hunters who got themselves into trouble. Again she won’t ask you to go and help but you can announce that you’re going to, then you can go to the cave, find Kani and help her out. (Which you might well have done anyway, but even so.)

Those are the two I remember right now, I know I’ve seen more, and it’s made me wonder how much others I’ve missed when I wasn’t paying enough attention to the dialogue.

You don’t get any rewards, other than what you’d normally get for those actions, but it’s fun anyway.

It’s been bothering me slightly not having quests (aside from the personal story) in this game because theres some story arch’s that aren’t suited to dynamic events or heart quests (mainly single-item fetch quests, things that don’t involve large mobs of monsters showing up) and I like the idea of randomly helping out people as you’re passing. But I also like the fact that these people aren’t just standing around waiting for some random to help them. They don’t even ask (and some will turn you down if you offer to help), which combined with the fact that it’s not a designated ‘quest’ makes it feel more like something you, or your character, is choosing to do.

Yes I noticed this- It makes the world seem much more real and it also helps to flesh out your different characters.
My guardian for instance is a very helpful person and she will go out of her way to chat to random NPC’s just to see if she can help out.
My elementalist loves kids since she is so tiny herself and she always stops to chat to them. The other day in Queensdale I found a spot I have never noticed before right above the dam, with an older woman and two children. There is a tree house with a chest right at the top that you cannot open- it looks like there must be a way to trigger and event there, I have just not found out how to do it yet
My Mesmer is very bookish and will actually read any book she finds.

It makes the game very interesting having these hidden things, I love it.

I love those things.

In Queensdale, there’s a cave that has a sign that warns adventurers to stay away. So I enter the cave, and there’s nothing but harmless grubs that won’t attack you unless you attack them. But in the middle of the cave was this idol that you can pick up. So I did and wouldn’t you know it there’s a gigantic troll running towards me.

So I run out of that cave still carrying this totem. I threw it at the troll, hoping it would leave me alone. Nope. It was hellbent on catching me and calling me dinner. But out in the open were other adventurers. They came in and helped me subdue this fiend. But we fought the troll near a farm, and this farm was suddenly under assault by bandits.

So we all fought, fought our hardest and mightiest. Around us were bandits and in front of us was a livid troll. We eventually killed them off and was victorious.

You do have the feeling that you are miss things while playing but I have no problem it.

This is the first MMO where I have regretted needing to log out of a PvE zone at any particular time. Like last night, I ran a dynamic event fighting off a bunch of Inquest from a merchant hub. Once it was done, a couple of asura said that the Inquest had stolen some golem parts so they would go up to their heavily guarded fortress and demand they give them back!

I laughed at that and really wanted to follow those poor asura as they ran off but it was too late and I had to log out. I won’t get to see what happened to them (though I can guess) and I might not have a chance to run that event again and actually help them.

And for whatever reason, I’m okay with that. I’m something of a completionist but there is just so MUCH content in GW2 that I feel like I can let an event chain like that slide and still know that there will be something else new and cool to discover the next time I log on.

And that’s pretty darn cool.