Guild Wars 2

The excessive nature of hearts.

They don’t even have to be excessive there is plenty of content in the open world to last long enough without having to be tedious.

Sometimes i can get immersed in a unique heart- even if its just serving brew to patrons or finding distracted faction members at a party. I’m the type of guy developers can appreciate, i read all the text and try to truly get into the experience.

But this is impossible. I just finished a heart where i turned into an animal with one attack skill and i had to kill 15 rabbits with it. Why 15? I surely would have been like alright cool after killing about 5. But instead i have to run around and search for rabbits for 5 mins and click “attack” about 50 times.

Some of these simple tasks last longer than entire call of duty missions- it really could move a whole lot faster. As much as i appreciate all the hard work that went into guild wars 2- the tedious nature of hearts is enough to burn me out for the day after doing about 4 of them.

Which heart is that?

Oh hang on, the snow leopard heart. You can also play with the kittens and rev downed to earn heart credits there. There are more tedious hearts than that through the game but that one is pretty slow. I sort of enjoy it but I’ll come back to it sometimes. Same with the jotun traders.

While I agree that some maps have a few hearts too many, keep in mind there are different ways to complete them. Some of them are more rewarding in terms of completion percentage than others.

@zenleto: based on the description, i’d guess the snow leopard one in wayfarer

Sounds like the heart in Wayfarer foot hills… Turns you into a leapord and you must scare animals out or hunt them. I will agree, it’s not my favorite.

Some maps are fun to explore and complete, others are tedious and time consuming. Actually for the most part, I’m really not a fan of the hearts. I much prefer the open events and exploration parts of the open world.

yea, quality > quantity…

smekras.8203:

While I agree that some maps have a few hearts too many, keep in mind there are different ways to complete them. Some of them are more rewarding in terms of completion percentage than others.

@zenleto: based on the description, i’d guess the snow leopard one in wayfarer

I never complained about there being too many hearts, i’m only annoyed by how tedious and long some of them are- considering many include doing the same task over and over again. Many of the tasks are quite interesting at first but it just drags on and makes you keep doing them over and over and over till its just annoying.

While most hearts seem to go quickly for me, there are a few that drag. The “Snow leopard” heart was not one of them, though. I’d just kill all the animals in the area in my normal form, getting credit for “hunting” then become the animal and snarl at a couple of trees and kill what came out. By then, the dredge event would usually pop and I’d be done.

The one that sticks in my throat is the Hylek heart in NW Sparkfly Fen, where I have to use artillery on termite mounds. That one drags for me, and the alternative to shooting mounds is dragging meat to the fire, which is worse.

It kind of sounds like you might be new. Remember, there are several ways to complete Renown Hearts, and all of them may not be listed in the UI.

That particular one allows: playing with cubs, changing into snow leopard and chasing/killing other animals, killing moas without changing into a snow leopard, completing the event that happens there by killing dredge (again without changing form) and (I think, not 100% sure of this one) killing moose.

You can always just do part of a Renown Heart, and finish it when you return to that area at another time, if you find some part you are repeating is less-than-exciting. Also, as noted above, when an event happens in the vicinity of a Renown Heart, the Renown Heart is finished quite quickly.

Welcome to Tyria (if applicable), and good luck.

tedium…..sighs

IndigoSundown.5419:

While most hearts seem to go quickly for me, there are a few that drag. The “Snow leopard” heart was not one of them, though. I’d just kill all the animals in the area in my normal form, getting credit for “hunting” then become the animal and snarl at a couple of trees and kill what came out. By then, the dredge event would usually pop and I’d be done.

The one that sticks in my throat is the Hylek heart in NW Sparkfly Fen, where I have to use artillery on termite mounds. That one drags for me, and the alternative to shooting mounds is dragging meat to the fire, which is worse.

I hate the one in the Queensdale swamp where you have to go around asking ghosts what’s bothering them and running to portals that are far away from each other. You only fill the bar a little bit with each one and it takes ages to do.

You can get at least 50% completion by doing other things than “kill x” in heart range. When I do world exploration and I’m not a zerker, I often go for the other ways because its faster. The only time you really want to kill is when an event happen in heart range.

There’s one heart, I think it’s in Fireheart Rise, where the only objective is to stealth through this camp until somebody spots you, and then you have to go back and get stealthed all over again. It is the most painful heart in the entire game, or was, for me.

Just a flesh wound.3589:

IndigoSundown.5419:

While most hearts seem to go quickly for me, there are a few that drag. The “Snow leopard” heart was not one of them, though. I’d just kill all the animals in the area in my normal form, getting credit for “hunting” then become the animal and snarl at a couple of trees and kill what came out. By then, the dredge event would usually pop and I’d be done.

The one that sticks in my throat is the Hylek heart in NW Sparkfly Fen, where I have to use artillery on termite mounds. That one drags for me, and the alternative to shooting mounds is dragging meat to the fire, which is worse.

I hate the one in the Queensdale swamp where you have to go around asking ghosts what’s bothering them and running to portals that are far away from each other. You only fill the bar a little bit with each one and it takes ages to do.

Yeah, I only do that one when Behemoth is up. Boom! done.

And monastery when the pre is up, for that matter.

Unless the NPE somehow screwed with that heart I never had any problems with that one. Killing or at least fighting is almost always the fastest way to complete a heart.

Guhracie.3419:

There’s one heart, I think it’s in Fireheart Rise, where the only objective is to stealth through this camp until somebody spots you, and then you have to go back and get stealthed all over again. It is the most painful heart in the entire game, or was, for me.

The easy way to do that is just run between the two by the side.

Khisanth.2948:

Unless the NPE somehow screwed with that heart I never had any problems with that one. Killing or at least fighting is almost always the fastest way to complete a heart.

Guhracie.3419:

There’s one heart, I think it’s in Fireheart Rise, where the only objective is to stealth through this camp until somebody spots you, and then you have to go back and get stealthed all over again. It is the most painful heart in the entire game, or was, for me.

The easy way to do that is just run between the two by the side.

That one, you can get stealthed, go along the right hand wall, getting by that guard there and then there are at least 2 of the items you interact with back along the wall. They can’t see you back there and you can go back and forth between the 2 items as they come up. It’s still slow, but at least you don’t have to watch for guards.

I don’t think there are "too many hearts. But some of them are tedious, mostly the ones that require you take a form. I agree 15 bunnies isn’t very fun (although: turns out, you can do other things, too, for that one).

Hearts were meant as a way of guiding players unfamiliar with the dynamic event system to areas were such events would occur. Initially new players were confused and unsure what to do with GW2 lacked the classic quest system.
That said with the changes coming to map and event design in HoT (the outpost system) hopefully it will world to remove the need for hearts all together and maybe some time in the future ANet can start looking at old content.

Guhracie.3419:

There’s one heart, I think it’s in Fireheart Rise, where the only objective is to stealth through this camp until somebody spots you, and then you have to go back and get stealthed all over again. It is the most painful heart in the entire game, or was, for me.

I think you can get credit for that one if the area Event is up as well, because I do recall that heart description, but I never actually went to the NPC and started it. There was something going on in the area and by the time I finished it I was good.

Some hearts are just outright tedious. The one in Fields of Ruin where you have to Ogres… but sometimes they have been cleared from the area and you’re left with destroying a few weapon racks and picking up three piles of scrap metal. That one takes forever if you come after the raid on the area.

Prototypemind.4026:

Some hearts are just outright tedious. The one in Fields of Ruin where you have to Ogres… but sometimes they have been cleared from the area and you’re left with destroying a few weapon racks and picking up three piles of scrap metal. That one takes forever if you come after the raid on the area.

Ironically, one of the hearts that can be done instantly. Just buy the metal scraps off the TP, turn in, done.

This is what you get when someone gets used to this game’s revolutionary aspects.
If you find tasks tedious I dare you to try any other mmo to feel what tedious truly means.

There is like 10-15 hearts/quests/tasks at average per map. In all other mmos I played you are FORCED to do like 30 at minimum and backtrack all the way down to npc which gave you certain quest.

Maybe this genre just isn’t for you…

You’re being disingenuous if you can’t admit that there’s room for improvement with the hearts. Some are amazing, and the fact that many involve tasks other than “kill fifty of this” is a great thing, but some are not well-implemented. Cleaning them up would be great, especially considering that the majority of them we do are often only for world completion, though I doubt it is any kind of priority. Keeping them interesting and enjoyable keeps tedium to a minimum.

There’s 10 NPCs standing around, why am I the only one running up & down this dam wall plugging leaks? Does the lady really need 20 apples to make one apple pie? Do I really need to commit centaur genocide just to get that captain’s approval? How many friggin’ wasp nests are there in this forest?? etc etc.

Time sinks & MMOs just go hand in hand. Sure, quality can be improved but the quantity will always be there.

Dedlaw.9130:

Time sinks & MMOs just go hand in hand. Sure, quality can be improved but the quantity will always be there.

Hearts are not timesink since you cant repeat them. The timesink zones (orr, silverwaste, etc) doesnt even have hearts.

Of course not all are going to be high quality but Anet managed to keep them quite diverse compared to many random quests in MMO that seem like the mobs are placed there to kill, rather than the quest being there because of the mobs.

Dawdler.8521:

Dedlaw.9130:

Time sinks & MMOs just go hand in hand. Sure, quality can be improved but the quantity will always be there.

Hearts are not timesink since you cant repeat them. The timesink zones (orr, silverwaste, etc) doesnt even have hearts.

Of course not all are going to be high quality but Anet managed to keep them quite diverse compared to many random quests in MMO that seem like the mobs are placed there to kill, rather than the quest being there because of the mobs.

A time sink is simply an activity that consumes time. It does not need to be a repeatable event to qualify. Hearts require repetition of the same actions for no other reason than the sake of delaying completion. Hence, time sink.

The hearts that bother me are the ones in the human area where the main task of completion is to “kill centaurs.” Except that the area has no centaurs because they have all been pushed out of the area. So, you’re forced to do other things that take forever; because the assumption is that you should have been killing centaurs as the main focus. Arrrggh…

Some of my least favorite (the tormented spirits in SB swamp and the stealthed one in Fireheart) have been mentioned, but my least favorite of all is Bjarni’s stupid rabbit food in Wayfarer’s. I’d sooner kill the big cats that appear occasionally, but they don’t spawn often. It’s not as awful as it used to be, but it’s still pretty awful.

I also hate the Ettin-Centaur heart in Queensdale, but it’s fast if you just kill centaurs and don’t have the agonizing conversations with the ettins.

Metrica: The “card” that causes oozes to appear, but the card only lasts for two transformations and you have to keep running back for a new one.

I love the hearts. Thankfully, only 4 of my 8 characters have done world completion. Soon to be 5 with the new class. Orr is my least favorite part of completion, I hate that place.

But I stand alone, as with many things, and there won’t be hearts any more, so enjoy.

because the game needs to occupy you. If everything was collect 1 or kill 1, you would quickly complain about there being nothing to do.

I’d love to have some go away, like the Jotun trader one.

Riku.4821:

I’d love to have some go away, like the Jotun trader one.

Thats one of the quickest hearts when you figure it out. All you need is to gather some starting stones then run and buy/sell from them in one go.

Riku.4821:

I’d love to have some go away, like the Jotun trader one.

They’ve also updated it to give credit for killing local wildlife.

Dulcinea.2640:

Some of my least favorite (the tormented spirits in SB swamp and the stealthed one in Fireheart) have been mentioned, but my least favorite of all is Bjarni’s stupid rabbit food in Wayfarer’s. I’d sooner kill the big cats that appear occasionally, but they don’t spawn often. It’s not as awful as it used to be, but it’s still pretty awful.

I also hate the Ettin-Centaur heart in Queensdale, but it’s fast if you just kill centaurs and don’t have the agonizing conversations with the ettins.

Metrica: The “card” that causes oozes to appear, but the card only lasts for two transformations and you have to keep running back for a new one.

You don’t even need to obtain a ‘card’ in that Metrica Province one. You can just kill the little oozes after you ‘talk’ to them, rather than interacting with the big colored whatever-they-are’s. =)

I miss hearts. I enjoyed the majority of them. Yes, some of them are tedious, but you can say that about most things in the game.