Guild Wars 2

This is not a zone review.

I read so much intimidation and suggestions to keep away from this zone.

Well, about the psychological effect this zone has on people I want to ask the ones who are afraid to go there:

1. Do you realize it’s a game? Seriously, you’re sitting on your chair, at home, clicking your keyboard and mouse. Nothing is going to happen to you. Really, dying in Orr is just like dying everywhere in the game. You die, you choose your waypoint, and you resurrect. That’s it. Unlike the descriptions in the forums about it, you’ll live. Really, it’s proven. you’ll still be in your chairs, still clicking your keyboard and mouse.

2. The zone is there, and it’s part of the game you already paid for, why not try it? So your character dies, and you’ll have to pay for the waypoint and repair. big deal. This, in fact, is part of the game. Your real life bank account won’t suffer from this experience.

3. When you do encounter problems, and die, try a different approach. try line of sight pulls for monsters who are far from you, it works, I tried it.
Try a different spec and gear.

It’s pure psychology, it’s not about the game, just try, what’s the worst that can happen?

And if you don’t like it, don’t go there.
It’s as simple as that.

Personally, I find Orr to be more the most blah area in the game. I don’t think Orr frightens people, however, I do think people find Orr to be very annoying.

moirweyn, read some posts about this.
There are people who are frustrated, and annoyed by it, but there are some people who are afraid of it.

It doesn’t frighten me, I mean I’m not scared of it, lol. As moirweyn said, the place is annoying. The Risen do everything to stop me and it takes forever to reach the place I’m going to… Stuns, pullbacks, whatever you can imagine. Also, Orr has his gloomy feeling, everything’s brown and grey with underwater stuff… No wonder it scares people away. I’d like a lvl 80 map that looks pretty like Timberline Falls.

I don’t think people are frightened of Orr, more likely people find it boring and irritating. Orr is just a high lvl farming zone that pays off in T6 mats, Karma and loot.

If you took notice of your story line it was mentioned on a couple of occasions that Orr should be tackled with groups and that you will have a harder time going out on your own.

omerk.2709:

moirweyn, read some posts about this.
There are people who are frustrated, and annoyed by it, but there are some people who are afraid of it.

From reading Orr related posts, it is my clear impression that most complaints about Orr is about the zones being annoying and not enjoyable.
I don’t know where you have the “afraid” part from or why you make a topic out of it.

Personally, I’m not going back there for all the whiskey in Ireland, and since it’s more or less the only level 80 pve part of the game, it will in the end shorten my time with Guild Wars 2 considerably which is a shame as I’ve been enjoying it greatly since I got it. It’s just too frustrating, and one of the reason why I personally like this game is for its casual easy going.

Everyone….come!

I love Orr, it’s like a constant battleground.

People are not afraid of Orr,
Its BLOODY annoying, the pulls are not a fun mechanic or a learn to play issue.
Its just not fun whom ever put it in place really needs to learn about fun and enjoyment factor in level design. Taxing/Difficult mobs can be fun but Orr is far from any thing relating to fun its just plain annoying.

Massi.1608:

since it’s more or less the only level 80 pve part of the game

Frostgorge Sound

Anyways, I don’t recall anyone actual saying they are “afraid” of Orr in the sense that it actually scares them but more that they are afraid of how rough it’s going to be due to all the well deserved criticism surrounding the 3 zones.

• Events are almost all aimed towards groups being required to complete, including events that are not labeled as a Group Event but will slaughter you time and time again if you even think of trying to solo them since you didn’t see [Group Event] on the pop-up. This is a problem for 2 reasons. The first is going into these improperly labeled non-group events expecting a far lesser challenge and getting smashed. The second is all the group events are hard to complete because the zones themselves are fairly empty most of the time on many servers. Also, they like to be bugged, a lot.

• All but 2 Waypoints in each of the 3 zones are contested 90% of the time, forcing you to run everywhere and deal with the massive amount of mobs just to get from point A to point B. This is due to even when small groups are doing the events, the CD in between the events ending and starting again are way too short. Think the Centaur events in NW Kessex Hills but zone wide, across 3 zones.

• If a primary temple is corrupted, all of it’s lesser statues throughout Orr have the corruption field around them, making getting skill points, vistas, points of interest, or doing events at them more difficult then they already are because of the aura in the area. The aura field is too large at these locations and causes numerous problems.

• Just the Risen mobs themselves. Never mind the fact the there are far too many Risen all across the zone, both on land and in the water, or that they have a respawn rate of “wtf I just killed you 5 seconds ago”. It’s that every single one of them has 20 different ways to knock you down, push you back, pull you forward, immobilize you, anchor you, and just all around annoy the crap out of you. Try fighting with a group of Risen Krait and it’s like playing a game of Pinball, and you’re the ball.

The zones themselves are artistically impressive. Orr would be a great place, if not for those glaring issues. The rest of the games zones are quite enjoyable, and I’ve had no issue running 4 characters through them on my way to 80 and getting 100% World Completion on all of them. But Orr, I can’t stand the place. It’s not fun in any form. Even when you’re running with a group, it’s still a grind just to get around as it seems the respawns actually manage to go from 5 seconds to 2 seconds when a group is killing them.

Yeah omerk, somehow you’ve confused fear with frustration. These two are worlds apart and if you’ll read most of the complaints, you’d understand that. People are far from afraid of Orr, they just find it bland and uninspiring, and most of all, a chore to play.

As for your points:
1. Exactly, this is a game we paid for, it’s supposed to be enjoyable, and yet the fun moments in Orr are lost amongst the drudgery.

And no, dying in Orr is not like dying anywhere else in the game. Most of the waypoints are contested, so dying during a DE means you’d either have to wait for a rez, or go to a far off waypoint. The second option is made even worse if you consider the fact that risen cover the landscape like pimples on a teen’s face, most of whom have immobilize, chill, pull, stun, or knock down… yeah, there’s very little fun about that.

2. Yes, it’s in the game, and like I said above, this was supposed to be the difficult end zone that really challenges you. Not really. Replace difficult with a monotonous chore and challenge with cheap gimmicky combat, and you have the gist of Orr.

I rarely die, so dying isn’t the problem. It’s the actual playing part. Fighting mobs with pull or launch/knockback and then being flung all over the screen doesn’t equal a challenge, just cheap and annoying. Or trying to get to a DE fast, and then being immobilized by the three mobs at your back, either you stop and kill them, or continue on with the frustrating charade. I fail to see the difficult part.

In another thread I wrote some ideas of what I think difficult mobs could be like, and how Orr can be made challenging. It just seems like ANet took the quick and cheap path, placing easy mobs all over, while giving most of them movement hindering (cheap) abilities.

3. A different approach, in this case, means squat. All I take to Orr are stability and projectile reflection. Not really even ‘survival’ abilities. That’s how easy the place is. I can do three to five mobs, no problems.

The issue is, Orr consists mostly of large, open stretches of land that you need to cross in order to get where the actual decent stuff is happening, which is the temples in my opinion. These ‘open’ pieces of landscape is then littered with annoying risen. No wonder people have grown so adverse to seeing risen in upcoming content.

With the small amount of players moving in groups around Orr Anet should create more npc patrols going from checkpoint to checkpoint and points of interest.To give the lone wolf an easier ride.

You have the option to go it alone,or have an armed escort.And more of a chance of taking back a contested checkpoint with fewer players.Or what about having to pay 1 silver for an armed escort at a base,and click on the destination?

Three of us turned up at a contested checkpoint with all the npc’s dead.The Risen catapults stopping you from rezzing npc’s,and constant swarms of incoming Risen.
We survived somehow,but it would have been nice to have an npc patrol turn up to even it up a bit.

kistell.5684:

People are not afraid of Orr,
Its BLOODY annoying, the pulls are not a fun mechanic or a learn to play issue.
Its just not fun whom ever put it in place really needs to learn about fun and enjoyment factor in level design. Taxing/Difficult mobs can be fun but Orr is far from any thing relating to fun its just plain annoying.

Pretty much this.
Orr is frustrating and annoying. Not challenging or scary.

The respawn rate, mob density and what not makes it a zone I do not venture into simply because it’s annoying. So I stay away and do other more fun things in the game.