Guild Wars 2

With LA finally getting the TLC it deserves, I’d like to hear your opinions on the past, present and future iterations of the city .

Layout – How did you find the original layout of the city? Was the bank, trading post, crafting areas convenient? Did you prefer everyone focused on the one area or more spread out as it is currently? What’s the best approach for New LA?

Aesthetic – New LA will be more modern. Did you prefer the old nautical theme, and want some old areas retained? How should the new architecture look, more Pact-themed or still adhering to the nautical aesthetic?

Size – Old LA felt smaller than the other major cities, with large rural areas within the city limits. Should New LA expand out and become more urban, or are the beaches and greenery part of LA’s charm?

Future events – LA has seen its fair share of threats and destruction, and it seems that a future Karka attack is possible. Do you think LA deserves a break from large scale events in favour of other cities?

Layout: I prefer the newer spread out layout, and I hope they build onto that with the rebuilt version.

Aesthetic: I personally hope that the new look will draw upon gw1 LA’s theme and stone work. They can keep the dashes of pirate theme, and maybe add some other cultural touches from the other races, but the new LA is getting further away from pirates with every new crisis. It’s a metropolitan open to everyone, and it should be looking as such.

Size: I like the touches of the rural areas in between the bases. They can better interconnect the main gathering points with roads and bridges, but I do hope they will keep the farms and housing areas in-between them all.

Future Events: I hope Mad King Thorn christens the newly rebuilt LA by breaking the lion statue again in the upcoming Halloween.

“Together we’ll make the new Lion’s Arch a metropolis for the ages.”

I expect something completely different from what we have now. They said metropolis..make it so..not some boats tied up together with ductape. I want to see something that rivals a capital city. It’s the main hub of the game..you can call it the capital of the whole game. It should be awesome.

Oh yea..and PROPERLY OPTIMIZED THIS TIME!

That dude on the screenshot looks ready to fight don’t you think? I predict that LA won’t be repaired that easily

Layout- It was not without it’s charm, but it player’s clustered around the central hub between the bank, Black Lion, and crafting stations. Many other areas were rarely visited, other than people doing jumping puzzles, WvW reset day (the hour before), and for a short time – the Moa races.
I hope they keep the basic idea of how ruined LA is, in that spread people out through out the map with a few banks, crafting corners, Black Lion, etc.

Aesthetic – Old L.A. was fun, and I enjoyed the pirate/nautical theme – but that time has past. While I would certainly welcome the new L.A. to have places that celebrates the nautical theme, the days of Ships/boats turned to homes and stores are gone.
I like the few concept drawing that they have shown, and I think the are on the right path.
We have to remember that the New L.A. will be Tyria’s newest city. It should have architecture and technology which shows the current state of the world. This technology should be subtle, but ever present (not so in your face like Rata Sum or Black Citadel – where the purpose of tech in those places differs than would be used in L.A. )

Size – Spread it out across the whole map – to encourage people to explore and hang out.

Future events – Here I look to Ebonhawke for inspiration. In that city (which technically is part of the zone) there are several small triggered/timed events that occur.

Layout
It’s mostly more convenient now than it was before, with the TP much closer to most crafting areas, and multiple areas to go to. Plus some places don’t require running huge detours to get to from the nearest WP (Old LA made heading up to the Crow’s Nest take quite a while). The city planners have the ability to start mostly from scratch, they should consider such things. I’ve lived in planned communities and cities and in ones that grew up on old cattle paths, and I find myself vastly in favor of planned wide avenues and good transport.

Aesthetic
I love love love that concept art of the sweeping stone building with overflowing greenery. There should indeed be plants everywhere, spilling down walls, lining streets. There should be parkland. But there also should be walls and streets and enough buildings to support the populace. Make me believe tens of thousands of people live here.

Size
Build up all around the bay. Give us districts, taverns, marketplaces. This is the trade hub of the known world. Make it bigger than DR. Old LA in canon held 40K people but in game it looked like a small resort with quaint cottages here and there.

Future Events
Yes please. The trade hub of the world is also a target. NoxInfernus has a neat idea there with the Ebonhawke model, though game play convenience should trump events that shut down portions of the city if those portions contain the only place to do something (eg crafting stations, I’m looking at you, Mabon Market in Caledon).

I’d love events to hit other cities, and other cities to notice events that happen outside their walls. NPC gossip should alter when something big happens, it’s not like news takes a long time to propagate through the Asura gates.

I’d like to see a multi tier layout, with several gun emplacements at stratification locations, not sure If I’d prefer char or Audra weaponry, but for heavy guns add the super heavy cannon form blaze ridge steppes, and then lighter AA guns, as well as defenses located on the beach. I’d also like to see claw island become playable, and bolstered defenses there too