Guild Wars 2

Here’s a contradiction: I haven’t played for months, although GW2 is my favourite game. I was thinking about why this is the case, and I’m sure I’m not the only one who finds this. I’d really like to start loving it again. My purpose in posting is to promote constructive discussion on what can be done to improve things, both by players and developers.

My play time is limited and irregular, ranging from a 3 day game weekend, to not logging in for weeks. Rarely, I might have a week where I can log in for 30mins a day, but more often it’s complete immersion, followed by total abstinence. And I’m very goal-oriented.

So for me, my dissatisfaction boils down to this: goals around exciting new content (Living Story content) are unachievable for me, so I have to choose between (slowly) achievable goals or playing fun new content.

When I’m able to play properly, I get half-way through a bunch of Living Story achievements (and I hate grinding, so I only do what I think is fun – and this incidentally gets me the achievements – works perfectly as intended, I love it.) Then I’m all excited but I can’t play for ages… and then when I next log in, I have to choose between trying desperately to finish off the ones I’d started before they become unavailable, or giving myself the best shot at the new ones by focusing on those instead – or, of course, ignoring them altogether and going back to my original goals which don’t revolve around Living Story. There are many other achievements to go for, I know, but if I ignore the Living Story completely, I can’t shake the feeling that I’m really missing out – afterall, this is where all the focus and attention is, both in the out-of-game communication, and where the playerbase is in-game.

So what’s been happening is that when I’m finally able to log on again, instead of being excited by all the things I want to do, I’m slightly disheartened, and daunted. That makes it easier to just not play GW2 that particular weekend, which exacerbates it all.

Don’t get me wrong: the Living Story is great and definitely fills a gap – if I was one of the ‘first to finish’ crowd, the frenetic pace of the Living Story would keep me playing and excited. I want to be there! (But sadly, <rant about life getting in the way>). But I’m ok with slowly chipping away at my goals – so long as I don’t get half way through only to find they’re no longer achievable.

So what to do about it? Two things: a change in my playstyle, and perhaps some different kinds of content changes.

My new playstyle approach is going to be to deliberately ignore the LS hype, which leaves me with a lot of unfinished goals in the static content: map completion, personal stories, alts, and I’ve only scratched the surface of any form of PvP. Plenty of content to keep me interested. So why does it feel like I’m settling for being a second class citizen? Because to achieve these ‘older’ goals, I have to play in zones where I’m lucky if I find 1 other player, unless it happens to be zone with a LS focus. Because when I log on, everyone talking about stuff I now don’t want to do. Because when I see a blog post, it’s all about content I’m trying not to get sucked into. It feels like I’m cutting off my nose to spite my face – but the disappointment of never quite being able to reach my LS goals is worse than having to turn my back on the fun new stuff. What a choice.

As for the content, is there a half way house? If the non-LS content is too static and the LS too fast-paced, perhaps there could be a gradual change (driven by players, in the same way the LS does) that I could influence? (That’s something the LS does really well – you bust a gut to fight off this invasion, and at the end of the chapter, it feels like that made a difference. The static content absolutely lacks that – I’ve been cleaning up undead stuff for 18 months and nothing is different.) Maybe something involving the Orders?

Seems the LS content is analogous to weather, but what I’m missing is climate.

TL,DR:
-If you’re a goal-oriented player who can’t play frequently enough to keep up with Living Story, what can keep you excited about the game?
-There are lots of goals which aren’t on a limited time, but to choose them over the LS content feels like you’re missing out on all the good new stuff. The whole game/community focus goes there.
-What kind of content could be added that gives these players a sense of world influence and longer-term achievements?
-This content would broaden the focus if you’re not into LS, there’s a non-static alternative, and so the population could be more evenly spread.

Am I alone in this? Am I missing a trick somewhere? Can we think of some constructive ways to improve the situation? If you were the sole shareholder, how would you solve it?

You’re not alone – I really dislike that about the LS concept to the point of quitting a couple of months ago. Giving the game another run right now to see what has changed, but it looks like same-old LS.

It seems that living story content is changing. looking at the last few chapters, the content is kept alive longer. The origin of madness was time consuming (bout 2 hours farming probes + max 5 marionette events (if they all fail with only 1-2 chains broken). But after the introduction (10 minutes) you can do one marionette event (20 minutes) and off course disable a single probe.

So you miss the end reward only, but you see most off the story. The only thing your missing is the diary, but that content is also in the much shorter edge of the mist map. So you can experience the full story in bout 30 minutes.

Edge of the mist.
This one is much shorter storywise.
1: instance in LA
2: instance in DR
3: visit the edge of the mist for 1 dialogue and optional one short task to travel to the senter of the new map to get an item
4: visit the instance in DR again and do some riddle solving.

In total this one doesn’t take more then 60 minutes to fully complete.

I think that this is the answer that you seek. You shouldnt need to invest 5-6 hours to be able to follow the story and you should get some rewards. Off course for the hardcore players the living story should also be challenging. but the story itself should be short enough for someone like you.

So my advise is to give the living story a new change. a lot has changed.

I suggest you get into PvP and stick with it. There’s very few updates with WvW and tournaments for sPvP/tPvP happen frequently enough that it may interest you when you are playing. These modes are often exciting and hectic for the time you are playing them. They also don’t require a lot of your time. You can enter sPvP, play 2-3 rounds, complete your PvP dailies, and log off. Or, you can log into WvW, roam a bit, follow the zerg a bit, complete your PvE dailies and log off. Map completion can be achieved when you have a bit more time on your hands.

That’s really good to know, Mercury. Is there any way I can see how how much longer an achievement will be doable?

Reverence, that was my back-up plan for if I can’t bear to be PvEing without doing the LS, hehe

This is why if you want to do LS style content you have to have a big, permanent, old school expansion too for the people like the OP. What happens when this game is 5 years old and gets “retired” like GW1 did? At least there we had 3 full games, and an expansion of permanent content. This game has released a TON of content so far, but in a lot of it, there isn’t permanence. When the game is put on life support it won’t be as robust as GW1 was.

That is the main thing about the LS, it’s all gone and if you miss it it makes the game feel less like it would be with larger areas. I am all for expansions, much better than the LS ever could bring.
But think of it this way, there are over 300 people working at anet, just a few of them on the living story. Makes you wonder what the other lets say 200 are doing. Expansion or perhaps another game.

The wurm in bloodtide is permanent.
The twisted marionette is announced as a new world event, but the achievements are listed as living story so not a clue if it remains.

The edge of the mist is likely to stop this tuesday cause it is all about setting the stage for whats starting then.

As said during the first CDI a lot of promises are made by the devs. So shooting that living story is not permanent is a bit premautre. If they keep the twisted marionette in and the jungle wurm, and off course whats happening this tuesday (wich is permanent) means that it isa lot different. But too early too judge.

I feel exactly like the OP.

I am reinstalling the game right now, but I feel like I’ve missed a lot and that I am missing out. It’s easier not to play and feel the pressure (I know it’s my issue).

Anyway, I am back to give it another try. I hope I can fit right back in and have some fun.

Ya, I hear what you’re saying OP. Personally, I rarely ever try to do LS anymore because the whole Scarlett invasion goals just wrecked me. I actually hated the game after that for a while. I remember vividly playing for 8 solid hours on a Saturday waiting for that one last map to be invaded so I could get my achievement – being completely frustrated by the entire experience.

I finally decided to make it my goal to get a legendary instead, but that ended up feeling like just a HUGE grind. Made one and sold it, now can’t even bring myself to grind out another.

I tried WvW, and I love it, but it seems like I don’t have the time to devote, as there’s so much running around that I end up having to log off before I get anywhere.

I tried the new wurm thing once but hated the entire experience. Never tried Marionette. In fact, haven’t done a LS since Scarlet invaded, and feel completely left out of the loop on them.

Personally, I’m bored now. Too much new hard content, which is fine for those who are hard core, and I’m not complaining and saying it shouldn’t be added. However, for us casuals, not really feasible. I’m sick of the Frostgorge train, and don’t even know what I want to spend gold on anyway. Dungeons are a joke, with poor $ for time or run through mechanics that make them boring, and the problems with group leaders leaving, etc, etc.

I will be putting this game on the shelf for a while and playing Skyrim again, I think.

TL;DR. I don’t think I’m much help. I’m no longer excited about the game. I feel left behind and bored.

Personally I’ve been ignoring the LS. It has gotten too team oriented/huge event for me. I prefer LS segments where I can accomplish most of the achievements without being forced to play with a bunch of control freaks (aka Commanders) or those who’ve played the content 24/7 since it’s introduction and gets upset that you didn’t read the guides or watch the YouTube videos so you know what to do.

I can understand that ANet wanted a “raid” style event that forces more structured play but the vast majority of the game isn’t that. The arcs introduced Scarlett and the Clockwork Nightmares was the last LS I really participated in. Everything since then was just annoying.

Mastruq.2463:

You’re not alone – I really dislike that about the LS concept to the point of quitting a couple of months ago. Giving the game another run right now to see what has changed, but it looks like same-old LS.

Same. I quit before the Taco LS and just re-started after the New Year. (Work was partially to blame for this… End of the year deadlines and such.)

In my opinion, the Living Story is actually worse now than it was in Frost & Flame.

Frost & Flame had a Title, reward skin, etc.

It impacted two whole zones.

Oh, and the FLedge seemed cooler than the Toxic Alliance.

I come back to see that the Ascended crafting is overly time-gated (and overly expensive) with requirements to do Jumping Puzzles and World Bosses.

Linsey’s whole “here’s Ascended weapon crafting” video really turned me off of the game.

She’d promised at the end of 2012 to work on a more “adventurous” way to obtain Precursors than simply RNG.

However, it’s 2014… We’ve heard nothing more about that. Just been given Ascended grind.

I don’t really have any faith that there’ll be a decent way to obtain Precursors.
The grind required will probably not be worth the TP value of the items.