Guild Wars 2

Greetings, This is my first foray into the forums and my honest opinion about the closed beta for Heart of Thorns, what I think and hopefully, this will reach the concerns of others. Now, I will say this, I don’t PvP much, nor do I World vs World, so if anything I mention about certain aspects (Stats, Runes, Ect) this is not my expertise. (It took me a while to write this but I wanted to be sure)

Starting from the first beta test block, I was “Of course” Playing the new Profession, Revenant and I named him the majestic name of “Quagganbert”. (As a in-joke with my guild of a human with the face and brain of a Quaggan) Anyways, right from the get go, I was invested. The cut scene, though I’ve seen it plenty of times, was still very neat to see, and made want to go in, within the story once again.

I loaded in the Silverwastes, (I’ve spent a good chunk here before anyways, so this wasn’t too new to me) and looked at my revenant and started to use the skills on unsuspecting enemies and it was so satisfying. That five skill on the hammer on a Mordrem, Just Priceless. The Legendary hero swapping is more fluid than I thought it would be, turning from Jalis Ironhammer and then to Mallyx the Unyielding was very flavourful, plus I like that they each have something to say when you switched to them, The first time I heard “Stone has patience, but I hunger for battle” It was just the icing on the cake.

I’ll admit, I spent a good 15-20 minutes of my beta time playing that small instance in the Silverwastes, but it was so great that I got to play revenant in a normal PvE area, even if it was just a instance, the feeling of excitement and wonder as exploring this world again as a revenant alone has me excited (Along with more to come.) I keep trying which skills that I like the most, but in the end, both of them from each of the weapons are fun, along with all the Revenant skills (Though, It took me a little while to understand it). The only thing at this period I didn’t try was the traits and the stats. Celestial stats were okay and keeps it balanced, but I’m thrilled to try different stat combinations.

The story segment though short, was interesting. I jumped for joy when I heard my character talked during conversation, and more thrilled that the other characters voiced their opinions on the situation. I ultimately chose to save the pact members from the tunnel. It was a little rough, but manageable and watching everything end in a battle to protect the camp was familiar, but intense. (Though, that cut scene with Rytlock felt a bit shoehorned in, with the quality of the video and such, but it was beta and it will hopefully be looked over).

Its when I went over to Verdant Brink, after the story, that I started to get a somewhat salty taste in my mouth. I’ll admit that the atmosphere was down to a tee and as well as the music. The day/night cycle was an interesting implementation of it (even if I think the night time was a little too bright for the “night” when it did came). Overall, even with all the good things I’ve said, it was just a bit underwhelming. The events were like what was going on in the Silverwastes, just some being more complicated than others for the purpose of levelling up your mastery points.

You see, I wanted to learn how to glide and such, but in order to DO that, I had to level it up. Which wouldn’t be a problem, if there were more ways to level it than just events. I know that you could level it up anywhere, but it doesn’t excuse the fact that the only way to do that in the beta quickly, was events. I mean no disrespect to events in general, as I do like the little stories that appeared around these events. Even if I would miss the starting conversations, it was still interesting to me. I would still be able to follow the same event story with the Itzel Hylek area with the Zintil Hylek missionaries trying to convert them, which was a very interesting side bit. However, the event stories dealing with the personal story characters mixed in, such as Laranthir, with high moments from the characters, the events ended on very low keys after completion. (With few exceptions)

This concluded my first hour and began my second block of 30 minutes. Yes, I stopped at the 30 minute because, let me tell you something, at least with the hearts system, I had something to work towards and I can STILL choose to do events. Don’t get me wrong, I like events, especially the ones that tell a story to enrich the world, but here, it felt forced. I mean, yes it’s a beta and you supposed to at least see if you need to iron out the system and what you can do with it, but why do I feel the need to “grind it”. Yes, I did my far share of grinding, but it was because I had a some tangible goal that felt good to complete. I really didn’t think it was necessary to grind again on something that is not finished and waste time instead, rather than see what it’s like having everything to do something else. I did manage to get one mastery track in something, however within the first and second “30 minutes.”

That mastery track that I grinded for let me experience at least gliding. Gliding was a mixed bag, for it did save me from dying from falling and when I did get it to work, it was cool, but for the majority of the time, I didn’t know how to control it or even, if I got it. I liked the fact every time I gained a mastery point, you had a indication that you got it. That would be great when you complete a mastery track and it give you that feeling of “I did it!”. However, my reaction was like this when I got gliding: “Oh…, did I get it? I did? Yay….?”. I would love to have a toggle glider button as well, so you don’t have to always count on the spacebar (That, I remind you is used for Jumping). Also, when I did get it, every time I jumped, I would hear the infuriating sound of it unfolding, which, while not game changing, it did hinder a bit of my experience.

The Silverwastes while fun, Didn’t really bring me into the world, it’s just insanely lucrative after a while. Going into Verdant Brink, I was about to explore it, when I was bombarded with events. I mean after a while, once you know what to do, It becomes more of a way to get masteries up rather than a challenge , which is grinding. The “Heart of Maguuma” part of the mastery system, for most part, will only effect your gameplay in the new Maguuma areas.

I’m worried that all these maps will just become these humongous event maps and because its new and shiny, players will go there for a little while and experience the stories once. Besides either natural mastery track progression (Not by farming for experience by events and doing it casually ) or grinding, for the “Heart of Maguuma” tracks specifically, there will be no other reasons besides Adventures and self-curiosity, no other reason to explore…. unless there is more incentive to do so or to enrich the experience. (Which, I hope will come to in the actual expansion)

When my third Hour, came up I decided to take a look at the world itself rather than the events and that’s when I started to have more fun, even if it was limited. It was the ways the world were shaped and even the little ambient dialogue from the NPCs that made me break a smile. Those night events with the pact soldiers were almost not meant for one person though. Again, it’s not the worst thing if it wasn’t so impossible with the fact that mordrem menders and Mordrem vine thrashers have too much healing synergy and the mordrem husk is there, bothering you making it ridiculous. I mean unless you single out the enemies fast enough or interrupt them, you’re going to be playing a game of cat and mouse, (Then again it could be the fact, we had Celestial gear on, so yeah.)

Anyways, it was great to explore. I did some of the adventures and they were hard, but still pretty fun. I can’t say more about them honestly, I didn’t spend enough time with it, since the areas around it was usually contested, making it inaccessible. Going around the map with what little time I had left, I found a griffon Roost on top of a mountain you would have to jump to, overheard couple of dialogues from NPCs you don’t normally hear, unless you wait for it. In the end, these little attentions to details are what made it more engaging to invest my time in this new world.

In conclusion, My beta was literally, mixed feelings. The following list of Pros, Con and what I would like to see in my own opinion on the final product (Or the next beta)

What I liked
- Revenant
-The Atmosphere and music
- The Glider (when it worked)
- The Enemy Designs (Which I didn’t mention but, are interesting)
- The small details and the land that could be explored were interesting
- The adventures were amusing
- Small event stories with Laranthir
- The Personal story, the dialogue parts
- Player character talking more

What I didn’t like
- That Verdant Brink at night was a little too bright
- The fact that when you complete a mastery track, there is no on-screen indication like a bonus chest or when you get a mastery point.
- (Nitpick) The fact that even if you participated in some events if you didn’t kill a certain number of enemies, you get nothing.
- Essentially grinding for events for Mastery tracks
-The fact that I did get gliding in one session. (It doesn’t bode well for the mastery system lasting long unless there is a lot of them.)
-(Nitpick) The fact that there is no Toggle glider Off/On (So that way while jumping you don’t get that sound of it unfolding when you jump all the time)
-(Nitpick) Learning to “Lean forward and back” on the glider
-That the map was entirely focused on events and almost nothing else
- (Nitpick) Rytlock’s cut scene being low resolution.
- Wanted more payoff for events in the end (Not as in reward but the feeling of satisfaction)

What I hope to see
-More places and hidden places to explore
-More Ambient Dialogue
-Masteries are harder to get
- The events are more smarter than just dodge the circle
- Side things like the lost coins (Though please don’t make them ridiculous to get like you did for the Silverwastes. I mean I’m observant but I’m not going to say to myself “I’m gonna just jump off a ship and go on this small rope and traverse it WITHOUT falling then jump on the world’s smallest beam and then have almost no margin for error to get a bloody coin”.
-More Lore incentive, Like that one Hylek in Dry Top, that gave you a story you could read.
-Gliders being more friendly to use rather than haphazardly jumping off a cliff with your head flailing about, hoping your glider is on (I didn’t know how to glide so that didn’t help either) A toggle button for your glider in the options. Please.
-Darker nights when night comes around
- Events that are at least possible in solo play

And that’s basically it, my Impressions of this beta that I play for the first time on the 26th of May 2015.

I read it all and found it very interesting. Well done.

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Essentially grinding for events for Mastery tracks
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I’m seeing signs that this is just a product of the choices made for this closed beta. If you went close to the west, near the path that leads deeper into the map (closed off by vines during the beta), the event notification (nightfall in xx minutes) dissapppeared. So while the playable area was leaning heavily towards events, I’m hopefull that the rest is not. This was only a part of the map, and only one layer.

I personally had lil issues with the glider. It worked when I wanted/needed it and stopped working when I didn’t want it. But I did hear more people complain. I think it would be good if Arenanet would test this some more and see if it is a matter of practise (which is fine) or really need to be more fluid.

mercury ranique.2170:

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I’m seeing signs that this is just a product of the choices made for this closed beta. If you went close to the west, near the path that leads deeper into the map (closed off by vines during the beta), the event notification (nightfall in xx minutes) dissapppeared. So while the playable area was leaning heavily towards events, I’m hopefull that the rest is not. This was only a part of the map, and only one layer.

I understand where you are coming from and I’m hopefully, but a beta while incomplete, It shouldn’t leave the player being , “Oh I Worked for my gilder mysteries, And…. now what.” Because that means the content didn’t last you long. I mean even a little something to deviate from rest of the map, and yes, if we are going there

Like imagine: Your going along that far side of the map, you find a group of trapped priory members by, something and you free them and they promptly thank you, and ask if you would like to aid them in going into this cave that belong to a race no one has seen before, You and others that are with you or not accept and you go in You have to through it dealing with puzzles and Morderm till you reach the final room that give you that feeling that you made it. Then you figure out in order to get the (Something) You need to beat three Elementally charged guardians that take less damage unless a certain condition applied and they you win, and if you lose that Knowledge is lost until another time

And considering the amount of nooks here, and everything here has been implemented in other parts of the game, so it wouldn’t be too hard to recreate, It would not only be a challenging event that is not only fun, but enriches the lore. The ones that like to play the game can get their loot and Loreseekers get more to sink their teeth into the stories of the world.

My point is on the matter is you shouldn’t feel like your doing a event, It should feel like your doing this event because it’s an adventure and your hero is there to go and help (Or not help) If you giving everyone the chance to use most of the mysteries right off the bat in this one scenario you can learn more than making your fans farm for it waste their beta time getting it and when they do get it they didn’t get a chance too till later or never because beta’s over.

(I’m not saying that you should outright giving it away (I kinda wanted it to cost more so you wouldn’t get in most of them in 6 hours). It’s more to say that if, you do let the players the powers to do so, you can get the "Oh my! This is amazing, Will totally get this if, when this comes out.)

Baccano.2356:

My point is on the matter is you shouldn’t feel like your doing a event, It should feel like your doing this event because it’s an adventure and your hero is there to go and help (Or not help) If you giving everyone the chance to use most of the mysteries right off the bat in this one scenario you can learn more than making your fans farm for it waste their beta time getting it and when they do get it they didn’t get a chance too till later or never because beta’s over.

I trimmed your quote down to what is in my opinion the essence of what you said.

The issue is immersion. This is an MMORPG. The RPG requires you to loose touch with your physical you and immerse you in the virtual you (that is the actual role playing). This means that you need to act beyond game mechanics.

Now keep in mind that you can never take away all barriers blocking immersion. You are still watching a screen. You still are operating your virtual you with your hands. Those barriers are uncapable of being torn down (maybe with the oculus rift one day, but let’s not get there yet).

Another thing blocking it is often forgotten in these kind of discussions. It is your capacity to imagine. This is not a solid point. It differs from person to person, but for a person also from game to game and from situation to situation.

it is very easy to say that a lack of immersion is the fault of the devs (specially the writers). But often it has other reasons. If you start to develop a dislike for the game in general (e.g. cause you start to get worn out cause of not enough refreshing content), this can damage your capacity to imagine and therefor the immersion severely.

A last thing to add to the equasion is how much a lack of immersion matters. Why does one play a game. It is a known fact that MMORPG’s have a bigger lack of immersion then one player RPG’s (compare the elder scrolls online with skyrim for example, same world, same devs, but a huge difference in immersion. one is a MMO and the other a regular RPG). The main reason for this is, I believe, that it is less important to the players. To me, when playing, I like to be with friends, on TS, drink a beer and do stuff in the game while having a good time. It is my experience that this goes for most guilds.

A proper offline RPG is a theater where you go to a play. you obvious can have a drink, but the core is to experience the play itself. An MMO-RPG is more like a pub where on the background the TV is running the match of the day. It is there and it is important, but the meeting others and having fun is much more important.

So are you right that the game needs more immersion? yes!
But you also have to keep in mind that for most people, the lack of it, is not game breaking.

mercury ranique.2170:

Now keep in mind that you can never take away all barriers blocking immersion. You are still watching a screen. You still are operating your virtual you with your hands. Those barriers are uncapable of being torn down (maybe with the oculus rift one day, but let’s not get there yet).

it is very easy to say that a lack of immersion is the fault of the devs (specially the writers). But often it has other reasons. If you start to develop a dislike for the game in general (e.g. cause you start to get worn out cause of not enough refreshing content), this can damage your capacity to imagine and therefor the immersion severely.

A last thing to add to the equasion is how much a lack of immersion matters. Why does one play a game. It is a known fact that MMORPG’s have a bigger lack of immersion then one player RPG’s (compare the elder scrolls online with skyrim for example, same world, same devs, but a huge difference in immersion. one is a MMO and the other a regular RPG). The main reason for this is, I believe, that it is less important to the players. To me, when playing, I like to be with friends, on TS, drink a beer and do stuff in the game while having a good time. It is my experience that this goes for most guilds.

A proper offline RPG is a theater where you go to a play. you obvious can have a drink, but the core is to experience the play itself. An MMO-RPG is more like a pub where on the background the TV is running the match of the day. It is there and it is important, but the meeting others and having fun is much more important.

So are you right that the game needs more immersion? yes!
But you also have to keep in mind that for most people, the lack of it, is not game breaking.

First point, I mean’t Masteries and the auto correct put it to Mysteries. (Auto correct can be a pain.)

Second, I understand full well the one needs a balance of immersion such but with point one, I really meant Masteries. You can only be immersed in something far, I still love this game very much, I love playing the game with friends, but I like learning more about the world I’m playing in as well, and getting more insight.The event in my last post was for being a hero, and adventurer and a loreseeker. So it’s fun, rewarding and insightful about the world around you if you choose. And Immersion is less important to_*some*_ players. There just as much people that like to go in their games, but there is a balance to it.

Third, The point I meant though was, It would of done more to show off what the Mastery system does for the player base if in this one beta instance we had it all unlocked to us rather than having to grind for it. It gives us a goal to work for when the game actually comes out because we won’t have these masteries right off so we would try to get them to become better and see if it’s worth getting them. Instead the beta, directed us to the main events but I mean for some they didn’t want that. They wanted to explore this new area, and having at least one event that deviates from the main story would of really helped and who know it could of been that “Cool” moment for them

(I had the unfortunate side thing that the I could never fight the Wyvern since that event bugged on me so I didn’t get to experience it)

Baccano.2356:

First point, I mean’t Masteries and the auto correct put it to Mysteries. (Auto correct can be a pain.)

Don’t worry, I never really noticed it and it was mostly the first line that I was reacting too. I’m always a bit cautious to trim too much in a quote, cause it can pull stuff out of context. Thats why I quoted the entire paragraph.

Baccano.2356:

Third, The point I meant though was, It would of done more to show off what the Mastery system does for the player base if in this one beta instance we had it all unlocked to us rather than having to grind for it. It gives us a goal to work for when the game actually comes out because we won’t have these masteries right off so we would try to get them to become better and see if it’s worth getting them. Instead the beta, directed us to the main events but I mean for some they didn’t want that. They wanted to explore this new area, and having at least one event that deviates from the main story would of really helped and who know it could of been that “Cool” moment for them

(I had the unfortunate side thing that the I could never fight the Wyvern since that event bugged on me so I didn’t get to experience it)

The issue with this is that it is a misconception to think that the beta is there to showcase the content for us. Although that is a secondary goal, the primary goal is to test things. And as we are the labrats, we are not told what the testing objectives are. It might very well be that they want us to be able to get the first mastery unlocked within two hours (something that sounds reasonable to me) and they wanted to test how many of us would make that mark.
And as pointed out before, we also don’t know why we didnt get access to the rest of the map. It might be that they wanted to test the event part of the map, cause it is hard to test it large scale events with just the Q&A team. So while it is perfectly ok to express fears based on the direction shown in the beta, also don’t use it to judge it and keep an eye out for all possibility’s. As said, the main purpose of the beta is not to showcase the content, so drawing conclusions bout it is dangerous as well

This is true, they have the right to test the system and such I’m just worried that it’s going to be so very easy I did it in an hour and a half while it’s not that bad but I hope that the quantity and the quality, bring us the end result and the Q&A team will do their best, hopefully. So yes we will see in due time.

And I’m also know most of everything else is subject to change but for sure is I want them to at least make a Toggle Gilder button, It would be nicer than jumping off a Cliff and hope you time.

you only unlocked the first track of the gliding mastery. The 5th one is to deploy your wings more frequently (which is the reason why it fails sometimes now).

The first track is easy (one mastery point and 254k experience). The second tier is allready steeper (1 masterypoint but 1012k experience). So bout 4 times as much. I assume that the last and 6th tier will require atleast 10 million experience (and it is allready known it requires 10 heropoints).

mercury ranique.2170:

you only unlocked the first track of the gliding mastery. The 5th one is to deploy your wings more frequently (which is the reason why it fails sometimes now).

The first track is easy (one mastery point and 254k experience). The second tier is allready steeper (1 masterypoint but 1012k experience). So bout 4 times as much. I assume that the last and 6th tier will require atleast 10 million experience (and it is allready known it requires 10 heropoints).

That doesn’t change the fact a toggle button for the gilder would change so much (And get rid of the obnoxious sounds it makes when you jump a we bit more annoying or not even a problem), the fact that jumping off a cliff with your gilder on and with it off would change the projected path of flight without having to “guess”. I say this because when you do get that one and jump of the first time if you miss that space bar queue at the right time. Without prior knowledge your first time might end in dying.

A toggle button would mean you would have more control than just “falling off”, As much as I loathe the game I’m about the reference, Archeage was my first experience with Gliders and that part of the game. It does have a toggle button so you could glide from anywhere at anytime, You can get it pretty early and the first one you get is garbage, you get kitten poor air time and it’s not even great, but you use it anywhere at anytime (I know that gliders are a HoT only thing at the moment). You can use it from a mountain starting off, and if you wish you can still jump off and do it but you just don’t map it to the same button you jump with.

As for mastery progression, I guess I can say for the most part it’s servicable till the actual game comes out, I worry that the there will not be enough Mastries balance out and sooner or later without more added it would later it will finished before it started