Guild Wars 2

I’ve been playing this game consistently since beta, I used to love the leveling system, it was a great balance. I decided I would level up a new char since this new “leveling experience” was introduced. I thought I would share my experience with the forum and hopefully the developers.

So, I get all excited and create a level 1 elementalist. He looks cool, and I’m pumped to head into the game…

I enter the game, do the first quest, notice that I can’t learn anymore skills as they are level locked….. no biggie. I proceed with a few hearts around the starter area for my race, and slowly start gaining levels. I hit level 5 and wonder why I don’t have any skill points.. After a bit of hovering, I learn I can’t gain skill points until later levels… ok w/e.

I finished off my first personal story, and try to figure out why I cannot proceed with anymore personal stories… Oh right, LEVEL locked… So I complete all the hearts in the starter area ignoring the skill points AS I WALK BY THEM as I’m not high enough level.

So I head to the next zone as I’ve completed EVERYTHING I can do in the starter area. Enter the next zone, get one shot by some random NPC. I think, hmm, maybe I need to level up in EOTM so I can proceed with my progression. I enter EOTM and hop on the train, cap a tower and receive around 30Xp, I repeat 30XP. At this point I ask in map chat what’s up with the XP.. They then inform me that you start to gain XP at a proper rate (what is used to be) from level 30 onwards.

OK, I log out and enter Eternal Battlegrounds as I’m seriously stumped as to what I can do to level up. OMG, the up level system has been borked as well. I soldier on and start laying down the fields I’m allowed to at my level to support the team. Things are going well for about 10 minutes, but I notice I’m leveling exceptionally slow. I log out and in and try and figure out what I can do, but I notice I am unable to:

1. do any hearts I haven’t done unless I travel to another starter area as I’m too low level, no thanks;
2. do any gathering as it’s level locked;
3. do any skill points as it’s level locked;

So it seems my only option to is to grind npc’s around my level for a few levels, hmm no thanks, I log out and go and play PS4.

This is my story.

I think you can gain a lot of exp from the hearts until level 15

Here’s a funny story I didn’t find out about EotM until about 2-4 weeks into playing.
Even after playing EotM for a bit, I never knew there was a PvP window!
Good luck new players!

My wife rolled a new ele yesterday. It took her one hour to get to level 5. Dynamic events are always going, even if you finished hearts. You were never ever able to level on just hearts.

You can still craft and you can still go to edge of the mists to level. You can do vistas and points of interest and complete your starter city to level. Skill points and personal story are the only leveling things actually locked. Weapons skills are but those won’t make you level.

I think people who way they can’t level past five in the new system aren’t really looking to level past five in the new system.

This is MY story.

Here’s a funny story

New players have previously had issues finding avenues for XP besides the personal story even though ALL the events near them pop up all over the side of their screen, plus the map was loaded with markers.
Consolidating the nearest XP yielding event would have helped … not level locking.
Example: http://imgur.com/V2PcneG

New players don’t know about crafting.
New players don’t know about EotM.

In conclusion new players will become bored much more rapidly, and hiss at the fact it takes them X levels to achieve more than 3 abilities/skills.
They will also hiss when a quest/activity npc says come back later and they don’t understand what the hell that means … are there quests/objectives I need to complete, nobody thinks I need to level to fulfill this odd npc feedback.

My point is, why break something that isn’t broken, is that the new company moto??

Snorcha.7586:

My point is, why break something that isn’t broken, is that the new company moto??

Yes. Yes, it is.

Snorcha.7586:

My point is, why break something that isn’t broken, is that the new company moto??

It’s called aw kitten, we didn’t make the projected income we thought we would in china, let’s cut costs.

So we get what china gets cause their market is potentially much more rewarding.
Screw this multiple version crap, just clone it for who ever is left after china, cause now we wanna staunch the bleeding so any extra development time needs to be cut.

wiredrawn.7298:

It’s called aw kitten, we didn’t make the projected income we thought we would in china, let’s cut costs.

So we get what china gets cause their market is potentially much more rewarding.
Screw this multiple version crap, just clone it for who ever is left after china

Your theory sounds more plausible than the “new player” explanation for the changes.

How does this save on costs?

Colin specifically said this wasn’t about China. I’m not sure how the updates saves on anything. It certainly doesn’t save on whining.

They want you to have more playtime until you reach lvl 80 without putting in new content.

I just don’t get it, they taken the only game I used to love re-rolling multiple chars in and made it such a clusterkitten that I couldn’t even be bothered logging in my high levels now. It’s not as if they don’t have any new competition coming, baffling….

PS. The new system should have been called “NGE – New Gamer Experience”.

Vayne.8563:

How does this save on costs?

Less people working == less money spent.

Consolidate the differences between versions and you save on costs, simple logic I’ve played this game before.

I personally don’t think it has much to do with China, if at all.

What I think it has to do with is, like Colin stated, metrics.

They look at their numbers, charts, and graphs, and conclude that X needs to be done to effect Y, I feel they are ignoring the impact it will have on Z because they are so focused on X & Y.

It’s like you have this friend that takes nothing but vitamins because of all the well documented benefits they have. You tell this friend he needs to eat more than just vitamins. The friend insists that you’re wrong and points to study after study, chart after chart. Then when your friend is on his death bed suffering from organ failure, you tell him “I told you so.” and he mentions how he doesn’t suffer from inflammation and was never diagnosed with cancer.

It was never “this is my story” in the sense people think.

Its “This is my story – in the way Arenanet wants it to be your story.”.

pessimist.7294:

They want you to have more playtime until you reach lvl 80 without putting in new content.

I’ll wait till they fix the bugs before I decide that it’ll take significantly longer, or even a little longer to get to max level.

Snorcha.7586:

My point is, why break something that isn’t broken, is that the new company moto??

The problem is, and many, many people don’t realize this or don’t believe it, it has been broken. To quote Colin from another post than the one I just linked:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I want to make it clear: what we used to have absolutely wasn’t good enough for our standards of retaining new users. Before we do some of the other things we want to do with Gw2, we had to fix this, period.

Most of the people who post on the forum seem not to have trouble with the game’s complexity, but those are, almost (but not entirely) exclusively, players who have been retained after the early levels, while the problem group are those who start the game and lose interest. It might not seem like a problem in my gameplay experience, but I’m also not actively studying new player retention, and I don’t have any useful tools for doing that in a scientific way, either.

Does it make sense for them to upset the apple cart on this issue if everything is okay? I’m sure it took them by surprise as well; Anet can’t be any happier than we are about stripping out parts of the game that are already developed and paid for, and were intended as permanent content. I can’t say for sure that the changes they made were completely correct—They’re certainly not the ones I’d like to have seen made, for my own experience. But I think it’s safe to say that if the devs are getting a mandate that they need to fix this problem, the problem exists.

Redenaz.8631:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I want to make it clear: what we used to have absolutely wasn’t good enough for our standards of retaining new users. Before we do some of the other things we want to do with Gw2, we had to fix this, period.

Or maybe they weren’t retaining people because… well, they didn’t like the game that much?

Furyan.9578:

Redenaz.8631:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I want to make it clear: what we used to have absolutely wasn’t good enough for our standards of retaining new users. Before we do some of the other things we want to do with Gw2, we had to fix this, period.

Or maybe they weren’t retaining people because… well, they didn’t like the game that much?

Anet would never panic and throw the baby out with the bathwater.

/sarcasm

Furyan.9578:

Redenaz.8631:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I want to make it clear: what we used to have absolutely wasn’t good enough for our standards of retaining new users. Before we do some of the other things we want to do with Gw2, we had to fix this, period.

Or maybe they weren’t retaining people because… well, they didn’t like the game that much?

There is a ton of factors, graphics/skills/item shop/subscription/availability/development and on and on .. but the funny thing is I had a discussion with a buddy about this the other day and what kept creeping into the discussion? Ultima Online .. why I wonder, why.
Online games are a dime a dozen now a days, most you can download for free, most have a ton of classes/abilities/pvp modes but uniqueness is just that unique, offer the fundamentals, problems with solutions and the players will stay, regardless of what pulls them away.

Redenaz.8631:

Snorcha.7586:

My point is, why break something that isn’t broken, is that the new company moto??

The problem is, and many, many people don’t realize this or don’t believe it, it has been broken. To quote Colin from another post than the one I just linked:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I want to make it clear: what we used to have absolutely wasn’t good enough for our standards of retaining new users. Before we do some of the other things we want to do with Gw2, we had to fix this, period.

Most of the people who post on the forum seem not to have trouble with the game’s complexity, but those are, almost (but not entirely) exclusively, players who have been retained after the early levels, while the problem group are those who start the game and lose interest. It might not seem like a problem in my gameplay experience, but I’m also not actively studying new player retention, and I don’t have any useful tools for doing that in a scientific way, either.

Does it make sense for them to upset the apple cart on this issue if everything is okay? I’m sure it took them by surprise as well; Anet can’t be any happier than we are about stripping out parts of the game that are already developed and paid for, and were intended as permanent content. I can’t say for sure that the changes they made were completely correct—They’re certainly not the ones I’d like to have seen made, for my own experience. But I think it’s safe to say that if the devs are getting a mandate that they need to fix this problem, the problem exists.

I dunno man, did we really need a tutorial on how to dodge ffs??

Odyssey.2613:

Furyan.9578:

Redenaz.8631:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I want to make it clear: what we used to have absolutely wasn’t good enough for our standards of retaining new users. Before we do some of the other things we want to do with Gw2, we had to fix this, period.

Or maybe they weren’t retaining people because… well, they didn’t like the game that much?

Anet would never panic and throw the baby out with the bathwater.

/sarcasm

My point is that they’re panicking over a problem that exists, not that their solution is necessarily good.

Having old bathwater is a problem. Throwing the baby out with it is not a good solution, because then you have a new problem. Knowing this, you still have to find a way to get rid of the bathwater. It’s a lot harder to fix an MMO than “taking the baby out of the bath first,” unfortunately.

Maybe we do need a tutorial on how to dodge things. Maybe we don’t. But if their metrics indicate that people stick around better if the game keeps them away from bundles for a while, I can’t blame them for keeping newbies away from bundles. They have to try something.

I agree with you Red. I think a lot of other people do too.

I would even venture as far to say it’s not so much if the problem exists, or the solution being good. I’d wager most people are concerned with the reason these solutions are here to address the problem in the first place.

You can’t give people freedom and then take it away. History proves this time after time.

Adding tutorials is one thing. I rather like the new “hey, there’s stuff over here!” indicator (although it does need some tuning) and dodging tutorials. Those were good changes to help new players get into the game.

Level-gating everything was not. How did I learn to incorporate new skills into my play before? Well, the prior system was pretty much perfect pacing for that. With weapon skills, I got used to how the skills worked by killing a few enemies and getting an idea through actually experiencing the skill. Then, once I had some experience with the skills I had, the next one unlocked for me to learn about. Simple, effective, and it didn’t treat me like I was still in preschool. Underwater combat was also handled smoothly. I went into a lake the first time, and there was stuff there! Mobility took a little trial and error, but it was simple enough. Perhaps this would be a good spot for a simple tutorial.

So, a lot of the things that are “too confusing” for new players really should have just been addressed in tutorials. The dodging tutorial is excellently done. Easily ignored if you know what you’re doing, easy to find if you’re new, and it does a good job of teaching the mechanic to new players.

Looking at the new “new player experience” what other games out there share similar leveling experiences?

Edit: This was in response to Odyssey’s previous post. Couple people made it in while I was writing.

That’s fair. No matter how they’re told that _ is a major problem, if it’s not affecting them directly, they’re never going to be happy giving something up to fix someone else’s problem.

It’s basically how I feel about Town Clothes, for an example from another situation. I was perfectly happy with how they were, but I lost out on that one because other people weren’t.

You can give people something and then take it away. You might even have a good reason for it. But those people are rarely going to be happy about it, and they have a right not to be.

Redenaz.8631:

Snorcha.7586:

My point is, why break something that isn’t broken, is that the new company moto??

The problem is, and many, many people don’t realize this or don’t believe it, it has been broken. To quote Colin from another post than the one I just linked:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I want to make it clear: what we used to have absolutely wasn’t good enough for our standards of retaining new users. Before we do some of the other things we want to do with Gw2, we had to fix this, period.

Most of the people who post on the forum seem not to have trouble with the game’s complexity, but those are, almost (but not entirely) exclusively, players who have been retained after the early levels, while the problem group are those who start the game and lose interest. It might not seem like a problem in my gameplay experience, but I’m also not actively studying new player retention, and I don’t have any useful tools for doing that in a scientific way, either.

Does it make sense for them to upset the apple cart on this issue if everything is okay? I’m sure it took them by surprise as well; Anet can’t be any happier than we are about stripping out parts of the game that are already developed and paid for, and were intended as permanent content. I can’t say for sure that the changes they made were completely correct—They’re certainly not the ones I’d like to have seen made, for my own experience. But I think it’s safe to say that if the devs are getting a mandate that they need to fix this problem, the problem exists.

If this is true, then why are the “not-new” players also affected by the same changes? Surely if retaining new players was the problem, then ANet would make sure that the changes only affect new players, and not risk alienating them once they are no longer new. While it’s certainly possible (though I highly doubt) that ANet did not anticipate the backlash they’re receiving from the “vets” right now, I don’t think the situation is as innocent as you seem to think.

Odyssey also brought up some good points too.

Snorcha.7586:

I dunno man, did we really need a tutorial on how to dodge ffs??

Yes.

Snorcha.7586:

I
So it seems my only option to is to grind npc’s around my level for a few levels, hmm no thanks, I log out and go and play PS4.

Can’t blame you. I have zero interest to even try levelling a character in such a system.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Snorcha.7586:

I dunno man, did we really need a tutorial on how to dodge ffs??

Yes.

The things this game has needed the most since launch:

1) Downed tutorial. There still isn’t one, as far as I can tell.

2) Ability to view downed skills in hero panel. Was this ever added? I’ve never noticed them if they are there.

3) Dodge tutorial. Dodging is one of the most integral mechanics of the game, yet there was basically no in-game explanation about it.

I can’t remember when I learned to dodge. Does anybody have any idea when this might have happened?

Sokia.3710:

The things this game has needed the most since launch:

1) Downed tutorial. There still isn’t one, as far as I can tell.

Really does need one, perhaps in a training yard in each starting area much like the Dodge Tutorial is.

ANet, make a note

2) Ability to view downed skills in hero panel. Was this ever added? I’ve never noticed them if they are there.

It wasn’t. I had to mouse over them to learn what they were first time . . . but then I try to look before I flail at keys blindly. It’s atypical.

Again, ANet – note this please.

3) Dodge tutorial. Dodging is one of the most integral mechanics of the game, yet there was basically no in-game explanation about it.

And there were people who didn’t bother with it since it was more useful or easier to just tank everything . . . later on it’s actually pretty bad since highly-telegraphed one-hit-downs exist on some Champs and people still don’t bother dodging and just complain “one hit?!”.

Again, atypical of me but I played Monster Hunter Freedom Unite. I learned dodging was one of the best defenses you could have out of that game

Bertrand.3057:

I can’t remember when I learned to dodge. Does anybody have any idea when this might have happened?

Pretty much instincts for normal people. :P Never had a dodge button in any of the other games I played, but….you always end up accidentally clicking the button when testing the controls.
You see yourself role, and think “well kitten , maybe I can roll out of the bloody way when they hit”.

Anyone who didn’t inspect or mess with controls when they started playing, really had to be sleep walking threw the game, I’d say.

So there was a hint for it, but I was probably just so enamoured by the asura dodge animation that once I discovered it I couldn’t stop. I still can’t, actually.

I’ve been playing this game consistently since beta, I used to love the leveling system, it was a great way to make gold through key farming

Fixed that one for you.

So I head to the next zone as I’ve completed EVERYTHING I can do in the starter area. Enter the next zone, get one shot by some random NPC.

How long have you been playing again? Oh right…since beta. I could go into the next level appropriate zone naked and not get one shot by an NPC. Obviously you are doing something wrong.

OK, I log out and enter Eternal Battlegrounds as I’m seriously stumped as to what I can do to level up.

(scratches head…) Since beta huh?

OMG

Never take anything anyone says seriously when they put stuff like this in their post.

So it seems my only option to is to grind npc’s around my level for a few levels, hmm no thanks, I log out and go and play PS4.

Well there you have it. The game is just too hard for you.

Nothing about this post is remotely accurate. The game is different for sure but it is in no way difficult. I can level a new toon to 40 or so in a couple of evenings the way the game is now and the devs themselves admit that some fine tuning is required due to some unintended problems. So I can surmise that leveling will be even better when they rectify those problems. I have a mesmer that I have only just been piddling with since patch release and it is already level 37.

I do urge everyone reading these posts to take them with a grain of salt. Consider the true source of their discontent and perhaps really give the new experience a try for yourselves. If you get one shotted by an NPC in a level appropriate zone while wearing level appropriate gear and while actively trying not to get killed…I will give you a shiny red apple.

Thank goodness I didnt go through beta. I might not have survived.

I think it would help substantially if they would just buff the baseline XP gain from normal enemy kills, at least at lower levels. It has always been too low IMO.

Redenaz.8631:

Edit: This was in response to Odyssey’s previous post. Couple people made it in while I was writing.

That’s fair. No matter how they’re told that _ is a major problem, if it’s not affecting them directly, they’re never going to be happy giving something up to fix someone else’s problem.

It’s basically how I feel about Town Clothes, for an example from another situation. I was perfectly happy with how they were, but I lost out on that one because other people weren’t.

You can give people something and then take it away. You might even have a good reason for it. But those people are rarely going to be happy about it, and they have a right not to be.

THANK YOU! I was about to say that myself. I’m still sore over that, and they don’t seem inclined to even do anything as simple as turning the Clothing Tonics into Clothing Outfits. I still haven’t purchased any new gems since I got my TC refund. So while I was once a big monetary contributor to the game, their shortsightedness has made me a no-contributor for 5 months now.

I started an engineer, Tilly Cogsmith, on EU. Here is my story:

I started with Shaemoor as usual. I followed the compass blindly, only doing what it told me to do.

It led me to the small farm, where I wondered why I couldn’t feed the cows or put out burning bales when bandits attacked (no buckets). I continued to follow the compass, never went above my character’s exp level, and only downed on the mission where you escort a convoy to Claypool.

When I hit level 10, I did the story missions when they popped up.

I zapped through Queensdale in about 3 1/2 hours and was level 15 before I finished the zone. Never had to buy one piece of gear.

I found it ok, to be perfectly honest.

Oh, and you get an Order weapon of your choice after joining an Order.

Redenaz.8631:

Does it make sense for them to upset the apple cart on this issue if everything is okay? I’m sure it took them by surprise as well; Anet can’t be any happier than we are about stripping out parts of the game that are already developed and paid for, and were intended as permanent content. I can’t say for sure that the changes they made were completely correct—They’re certainly not the ones I’d like to have seen made, for my own experience. But I think it’s safe to say that if the devs are getting a mandate that they need to fix this problem, the problem exists.

Now riddle me this: Is the new player influx on NA/EU so much bigger than the current active playerbase, that you need to spend all your resources on “improving” the leveling experience instead of adding new content for those who finished the game and most likely supported it from the beginning on?

Sogradde.8016:

Now riddle me this: Is the new player influx on NA/EU so much bigger than the current active playerbase, that you need to spend all your resources on “improving” the leveling experience instead of adding new content for those who finished the game and most likely supported it from the beginning on?

I could say yes or no to this question, but I’d be wrong for trying to answer it, because there’s insider information I need to answer it objectively and correctly. You’re asking an objective question more than a subjective one, and I only have enough information to give a subjective answer.

We can go with our gut feelings, our impressions, and our experiences, but those aren’t enough to make a fully-informed answer to the question, “How urgent is the new player retention problem?”

It’s important to let them know when we’re not happy with changes like the NPE. It’s also important to keep a sense of perspective about what we do and do not know as we discuss it. We can tell them we’re not happy, and we can tell them why, but there are business questions involved that we don’t have enough information to answer.

I have 9 level 80 characters and highly doubt that I will start another unless a new race/class is introduced but please clarify something for me. Can you still get the skill credits in an area even if you cannot use them or do you have to go back to that area once you have gained a few levels just to get/clear the skill challenge?

Sogradde.8016:

Redenaz.8631:

Does it make sense for them to upset the apple cart on this issue if everything is okay? I’m sure it took them by surprise as well; Anet can’t be any happier than we are about stripping out parts of the game that are already developed and paid for, and were intended as permanent content. I can’t say for sure that the changes they made were completely correct—They’re certainly not the ones I’d like to have seen made, for my own experience. But I think it’s safe to say that if the devs are getting a mandate that they need to fix this problem, the problem exists.

Now riddle me this: Is the new player influx on NA/EU so much bigger than the current active playerbase, that you need to spend all your resources on “improving” the leveling experience instead of adding new content for those who finished the game and most likely supported it from the beginning on?

Could be if they’re planning more free demo weekends.

Theftwind.8976:

I have 9 level 80 characters and highly doubt that I will start another unless a new race/class is introduced but please clarify something for me. Can you still get the skill credits in an area even if you cannot use them or do you have to go back to that area once you have gained a few levels just to get/clear the skill challenge?

I started a new Asura Friday and found that I could get credit for a skill point if I joined in the combat after it was started by a player who met the level requirement. I could not activate it myself at the lower level.

LindaW.4308:

Theftwind.8976:

I have 9 level 80 characters and highly doubt that I will start another unless a new race/class is introduced but please clarify something for me. Can you still get the skill credits in an area even if you cannot use them or do you have to go back to that area once you have gained a few levels just to get/clear the skill challenge?

I started a new Asura Friday and found that I could get credit for a skill point if I joined in the combat after it was started by a player who met the level requirement. I could not activate it myself at the lower level.

Then that totally blows. If I want to clear a map before moving on I do not want to have to come back to that map just to do the skill point challenges. When I leveled my toons to 80 the wife and I would both start new characters and work as a duo to get through maps and personal stories. Working as a team we found it a faster and more efficient way of leveling then doing it alone and could challenge things that were above our levels.

We told everyone in our server an our guilds that if they had any alts or toons they wanted to level to 80 . " DO IT BEFORE THE PATCH". Anet does not disappoint , we knew from the start that the system would be broken after the patch. As for the new peeps, well you will find out very fast as most of our Vets have found .Your on your own. Good luck.

I dont see the big fuss really ive been playing since beta and ye ive created 3 new alts after the patch and to be honest you fly by most of those level gates in no time.
And people complaining bout the rewards have you actually seen the leveling rewards they are awsome later on.

Just a small list : Crafting bags, rare armor and weapons, Racial amor skins, champ bags, dyes, order weapon skins heck they even finally added some new underwater masks for leveling.

Believe me folks the bit of level gating you go through is no big deal nor game breaking imo.

Theftwind.8976:

LindaW.4308:

Theftwind.8976:

I have 9 level 80 characters and highly doubt that I will start another unless a new race/class is introduced but please clarify something for me. Can you still get the skill credits in an area even if you cannot use them or do you have to go back to that area once you have gained a few levels just to get/clear the skill challenge?

I started a new Asura Friday and found that I could get credit for a skill point if I joined in the combat after it was started by a player who met the level requirement. I could not activate it myself at the lower level.

Then that totally blows. If I want to clear a map before moving on I do not want to have to come back to that map just to do the skill point challenges. When I leveled my toons to 80 the wife and I would both start new characters and work as a duo to get through maps and personal stories. Working as a team we found it a faster and more efficient way of leveling then doing it alone and could challenge things that were above our levels.

Skill points unlock before you leave the first map, though. You just have to backtrack a bit. At level 12 the waypoint cost is a few copper. I mean yeah, it’s inconvenient but not that inconvenient.

wiredrawn.7298:

They will also hiss when a quest/activity npc says come back later and they don’t understand what the hell that means … are there quests/objectives I need to complete, nobody thinks I need to level to fulfill this odd npc feedback.

Yeah, when an NPC says come back later, I have never in all the games I’ve played over the last 20 years imagined this is part of the NPCs dialogue because my level is too low.

I would assume either 1) The NPC doesn’t actually have content yet, maybe this is something that will be programmed into the game in the future, or 2) I have to accomplish some quest related task in order to open up the dialogue. In both situations I leave and forget to come back to that NPC.

Same with something like diving goggles, if I’m not allowed to use them, my mind will put them into “non-interact-able scenery” and I may not think to attempt to interact with them again for a long time, if ever.

Is my reaction so unusual? Out of the norm?

Penarddun.6827:

wiredrawn.7298:

They will also hiss when a quest/activity npc says come back later and they don’t understand what the hell that means … are there quests/objectives I need to complete, nobody thinks I need to level to fulfill this odd npc feedback.

Yeah, when an NPC says come back later, I have never in all the games I’ve played over the last 20 years imagined this is part of the NPCs dialogue because my level is too low.

I would assume either 1) The NPC doesn’t actually have content yet, maybe this is something that will be programmed into the game in the future, or 2) I have to accomplish some quest related task in order to open up the dialogue. In both situations I leave and forget to come back to that NPC.

Same with something like diving goggles, if I’m not allowed to use them, my mind will put them into “non-interact-able scenery” and I may not think to attempt to interact with them again for a long time, if ever.

Is my reaction so unusual? Out of the norm?

In Guild Wars 1, Mox didn’t actually unlock until level 10. You got a message to come back later. That was all there was. Level 10 and you could interact with him. Pretty sure the early PvP arenas were the same. You went to Yaks Bend and if you weren’t high enough level you couldn’t intereact with the NPC that allowed you access.