Guild Wars 2

I have a fear of heights. Doing most jumping puzzles, getting to Vistas etc causes the muscles in my legs to tingle, my stomach to churn, my heart to beat faster and my breathing to increase – put all together, not a pleasant experience!

I am now on ‘Establishing a Foothold’ trying to get my Glider and am in Jaka Itzel – OMG it’s such a long way down (feels sick, AGAIN)!

I have never played a game that relies so bloomin’ heavily on jumping and going up high. Please, developers, take pity on those of us who have a fear of heights!

Go seek treatment for phobias.

I’m sorry for your condition, but the symptoms sound more like the symptoms of motion sickness, than a fear of heights, in which, you shouldn’t really be playing 3-Dimensional games anyway.

penelopehannibal.8947:

I’m sorry for your condition, but the symptoms sound more like the symptoms of motion sickness, than a fear of heights, in which, you shouldn’t really be playing 3-Dimensional games anyway.

Not sure where the ‘motion’ comes in, I’m sitting very nicely thank you. I’ve been playing 3D games for about 10 years, it’s only GW2 that makes me feel sick!

penelopehannibal.8947:

I’m sorry for your condition, but the symptoms sound more like the symptoms of motion sickness, than a fear of heights, in which, you shouldn’t really be playing 3-Dimensional games anyway.

Nah, the symptoms do sound like common ones caused by being faced with a big fear (I get the same symptoms when I drive over a bridge because it’s one of my phobias). Motion sickness has similar symptoms, sure. But I would imagine that OP has lived with this fear long enough to know what the typical reaction feels like for them.

OP: Unfortunately, heights are just a major part of this game. You can try altering your camera angle, zoom, or field of view to see if you can find a set up that doesn’t let you see just how far up you are. But you’re not going to be able to do much more than that, other than just finding a way to deal with the side effects.

However unfortunate that may be, you will just have to deal with this. Either learn to control your fear or continue to avoid heights. People with arachnophobia (fear of spiders) aren’t better off. Phobias can be treated.

Limiting the developers’ creative freedom for every phobia out there really isn’t a good solution.

If it’s anything like my fear of spiders it may be possible to manage it by a complicated form of ‘not looking’.

I realise that sounds like trivialising the issue, but it actually can help. Whenever I find myself in a situation where I’m going to be fighting spiders I make sure my camera is zoomed all the way out and positioned overhead and away from the spider/s so they’re as small and far away as possible. I use ranged attacks if I can so my character doesn’t have to get too close (although I’m actually more inclined to see the camera as me than my character) so having them near the camera bothers me more).

I also focus on other things – I’ll look at my skill bar and focus on timing my skills more than I usually do, if I need to see what the enemy is doing I’ll look at the red circle underneath and the health bar.

(Sometimes I also lean back, which is really silly but does help, or look away from the screen to help remind myself that it’s not real and I’m safe at home.)

Something similar might work for you – zoom the camera in (maybe even adjust the field of view) and keep it horizontal as much as possible. Focus on the foreground and/or your destination. It might even help to turn down the graphics so it looks less detailed and realistic. (I’m not sure if any of the options reduce how far you can see or add fog but it couldn’t hurt to try them out and find out.)

I don’t know how exactly this phobia works, but the heights might become a lot less intimidating once you unlock gliding. It’s like a permanent safety net.

I have a horrible fear of deep dark water, and…well, thankfully there’s not MUCH of that in the game, but sometimes I have to grab a vista or we’re doing the underwater fractal. The worst was and still is the wreckage under Lion’s Arch. I still feel light headed when I have to swim down there for map completion, but I’ve found that doing it over and over and over again has really helped to sort of…trivialize the fear for me? Don’t get me wrong, IRL deep water still causes me to panic, as it does in other games, but I suppose I’ve become so used to it in GW2 at this point that it’s not so bad.

I also have a horrific case of arachnophobia and pretty much do what Danikat does! I focus on anything but the spiders, maybe even busy myself with something else on the screen until they’re all dead.

I wish you the best of luck with your phobia though! I know it can be hard, but eventually (hopefully) you find ways to minimize the fear response and enjoy the game to its fullest!

I hope some of the suggestions above help you. Phobias aren’t something you can just ignore or get over without a lot of effort and time.

However, I am the opposite to you in this regard: I love heights. Sure I can get vertigo at a RL cliff edge but man, I love the view. I actually dislike being at ground level in a building. So if ANet took away the heights because there are a few players who get dizzy, they’d be making the game unpleasant for others.

I don’t like PvP and WvW because I don’t like the paranoid feeling that someone’s going to attack me. Not rational, true. And not a constant; if I go in with a team and the other side is playing fair, I can even enjoy it. But on the whole I really get the heebie jeebies from PvP settings — yet I’m not asking ANet to eliminate PvP from the game. I just don’t go where the PvP is. Yes, it’s a tad harder to avoid heights than PvP in Tyria. If it’s impossible for you to deal with then this may not be the MMO for you (I hope that isn’t the case and you can find coping methods), just as MMO’s with open world PvP aren’t the ones for me.

OP, I also have a severe fear of heights, and soem of the jumping puzzles in this game filled me with dread – the Tribulation Rift scaffold made me physically freeze the first time i came across it, but like somebody else has mentioned change your camera views this will help you combat the feeling of sickness.
Its taken some time now- but ive also eventually come to the realisation that if my character does fall – i will not be harmed, its a pc game afterall. Now i know some people reading this they will scoff, mock and generally take the pee, but seriously when your stuck on a JP concentrate solely on where you’re jumping to next and move your camera so you cant see down, or so its side on – like an old school arcade type fo view.
I purposely went out of my way to complete all jumping puzzles to prove to myself that i could do them,
you can do it, youll be fine.

D’you know, there are actually quite a few really nice, caring people out there. Thank you for your understanding (most of you) and helpful suggestions which I will try out. (I’m a, ahem, older girl [lady] and normally fairly level headed and sensible, but where heights are concerned, all sense goes out the window! Yep I have been known to lean right back in my chair and fight without trying to look!
So thank you one and all. xx

OP, we have a couple folks who also have the same issue you do. When that happens we all just make sure the only thing they have to focus on is getting past whatever point they’re at and we do our best to keep their focus off of it.

If you’re not already I would totally suggest finding a guild to join that does the whole range of activities in the game. I’ve found it’s much easier to “ignore” the scary bits when you’re busy chatting about other things. As for JPs there are some awesome folks out there who spend time in the jumping puzzles to help folks through them, with your case being that while we can’t eliminate heights we can certainly help it be a lighter load.

If you’re trying to earn xp for mastery points in HoT I would suggest spending your time in Auric Basin, as that is one of the least vertical maps with it being possible to do most everything without coming off the ground or only going up a short distance.

If you need help with anything feel free to shoot me a line, I would be happy to help out if I can.

Sphinx.8014:

People with arachnophobia (fear of spiders) aren’t better off.

People with Ailurophobia (fear of cats) sure have more trouble with all the charr. ;-)

Sphinx.8014:

Limiting the developers’ creative freedom for every phobia out there really isn’t a good solution.

This

I sympathize with the OP.

It does not help to be bluntly told to “go away”.

I also have a big issue with JPs and Vertical platform content. I play with one hand using a mouse while the misshapen club that used to be my left hand can manage a spacebar. I did not plan on crippling RA. My love of MMOs remains.

At launch this was not an issue, although I spent agonizing hours trying some vista’s some of you would consider child’s play. I assure you, for me, they are not. I figured out how to cheese a lot of vista’s using a portal gun, but that isn’t enough for JPs.

It was ok. Josh himself stated that separate JPs were originally not intended to be needed for world completion. And then.. they were. And the creep has continued. Needed for updates for unrelated content. Needed for Living Stories. Then, needed to simply access a new zone. (one I have not managed to do and gave up on). And now, basically an entire expansion requires platforming skills.

Different gameplay styles should exist and should co exist without becoming mandatory. They did take WvW out of world completion because people felt it was a playstyle forced upon them.

I have learned to live with the fact I will never get a world complete on my own because of the 3 mandatory JPs to get to Vistas. I have learned I won’t ever get every story achievement locked behind a JP. I won’t ever craft or acquire gear locked behind a JP.

I do mind Dry Top access is locked behind a jumping puzzle, even if not an official JP, what purpose did it serve as an access point? Could it have not been standalone somewhere in the Zone? It gates me and I see no reason why.

And now HoT. I watched every Wooden Potatoes vid hoping there might be something for me. There is not. Frustration and failure simply isn’t fun. I feel the Game at this point only cares for a single Demographic, and in some ways said “go away” as forcibly as the most indifferent and toxic forum poster could.

Simply put, playstyle options are great. No options is not.