Guild Wars 2

As someone that spends a lot more time looking for neat areas to explore than following the loot train, I agree that peaceful areas are something we need to have. I think the OP misses the fact that what seems to be the largest peaceful area in the game is in the Silverwastes, the Drydock Scratch jumping puzzle.

I’ve spent hours just looking at the temple ruins hidden under the Silverwastes, trying to find awesome new nooks and views and wondering how it all came to be there. The only enemy (besides a single veteran ‘Legendary Skritt Burglar’ you have to want to fight) is gravity, and even then a helpful Skritt will get you back on your feet.

There are other relatively peaceful areas in high-level zones, even in Orr. From the dizzyingly tranquil Stepping Stones in Southsun to the rigging of Kodan ships in Frostgorge to the blighted Scavenger’s Chasm in Malchor’s Leap to the verdant Dry Top oasis, look around, there are areas in level 80 zones where exploration means more than combat. While I have my reservations about HoT, I don’t think we’ve seen the end of exploration.

Civilis.2547:

…I don’t think we’ve seen the end of exploration.

Of course we haven’t. But there’s “stop and smell the roses” exploration, and there’s “get across the street as fast as you can before you get hit by traffic” exploration. Lately, Guild Wars 2 has been far too much of the latter and not nearly enough of the former.

silvermember.8941:

peaceful areas wouldn’t make sense in the context of the story. You cannot have a peaceful area in a dragon control area. You could create a new peaceful map but that would simply be a waste of resources to create something that is not relevant to the game.

Peaceful areas could still work. You replace “peaceful” with tense. An area just on the fringe of conflict, but a place we could essentially let out guard down momentarily. Furthermore, you could break up the peace with defense events like we already have in many areas.

The gameplay shown in the latest Points of Interest didn’t impress me either.

darkace.8925:

Civilis.2547:

…I don’t think we’ve seen the end of exploration.

Of course we haven’t. But there’s “stop and smell the roses” exploration, and there’s “get across the street as fast as you can before you get hit by traffic” exploration. Lately, Guild Wars 2 has been far too much of the latter and not nearly enough of the former.

+1 Good point.

Aomine.5012:

Why not be patient and wait for more news about HoT before you make quick judgement?

Some of us can be patient, other will not. In any case, Is it good for anet to ask that from its players? I dont think so, they should want us to buy, to be prayng for the day this will come. But what we are experiencing is dissapointment… before buying it… That should be wrong.

darkace.8925:

Civilis.2547:

…I don’t think we’ve seen the end of exploration.

Of course we haven’t. But there’s “stop and smell the roses” exploration, and there’s “get across the street as fast as you can before you get hit by traffic” exploration. Lately, Guild Wars 2 has been far too much of the latter and not nearly enough of the former.

With all due respect, what game have you been playing? I often find myself wandering around places like Sparkfly Fen, Frostgorge Sound, and the Fields of Ruin – places that are actually war zones – for hours on end without fighting anything I didn’t deliberately engage and no events going off in my vicinity. Even Southsun Cove and Malchor’s Leap have significant down time where nothing happens. I’m sorry, but this hectic, frantic pace you describe simply doesn’t exist. If you don’t believe me, I’ll show you some games where the pacing IS frantic and we can compare.

Now, I do love me some exploration, I found Anton months before the Wiki knew about him, but except for one vista/puzzle in Caledon Forest (I’m sure you know the one… blasted skritt), I’ve never felt my exploration was hindered by action. To the contrary, actually, I’ve often found myself getting bored with the glacial pacing this game has at times. It’s not as shallow as Skyrim, certainly, but it could stand to be busier. Of course, I’d rather have events like cattlepult gambling than zombie invasions… which might be the core of this discussion, come to think of it: the same or more “volume” of content, but more ambiance and less action.

As a side note and random thought: if ANet could find a way for us to have our profession skills interact with the environment in specific ways, similar to the Divinity series – i.e. a fire arrow lighting a torch, or chill-inducing skills soothe an overheated Hylek or machinery – that could add some very interesting elements to exploration as well as this “build diversity” thing people keep complaining about. See also: Pokemon X/Y, specific attacks in specific environments “accidentally” reveal hidden items/treasures during combat.

Trise.2865:

darkace.8925:

Civilis.2547:

…I don’t think we’ve seen the end of exploration.

Of course we haven’t. But there’s “stop and smell the roses” exploration, and there’s “get across the street as fast as you can before you get hit by traffic” exploration. Lately, Guild Wars 2 has been far too much of the latter and not nearly enough of the former.

With all due respect, what game have you been playing? I often find myself wandering around places like Sparkfly Fen, Frostgorge Sound, and the Fields of Ruin – places that are actually war zones – for hours on end without fighting anything I didn’t deliberately engage and no events going off in my vicinity. Even Southsun Cove and Malchor’s Leap have significant down time where nothing happens. I’m sorry, but this hectic, frantic pace you describe simply doesn’t exist. If you don’t believe me, I’ll show you some games where the pacing IS frantic and we can compare.

I think he means the latest LS updates (Dry Top and Silverwastes) by “lately”. Southsun is something I’d discard entirely, to be honest, because IMO it’s one of the worst areas of GW2 when it comes to DE design, so it’s an outlier.

Of course, I’d rather have events like cattlepult gambling than zombie invasions… which might be the core of this discussion, come to think of it: the same or more “volume” of content, but more ambiance and less action.

Yes, I think that’s it. Of course, an area needs some DEs to work as a hub of activity, and DEs count as “action”, but what I dislike is the focus on Hollywood-like action scenes.

As a side note and random thought: if ANet could find a way for us to have our profession skills interact with the environment in specific ways, similar to the Divinity series – i.e. a fire arrow lighting a torch, or chill-inducing skills soothe an overheated Hylek or machinery – that could add some very interesting elements to exploration as well as this “build diversity” thing people keep complaining about. See also: Pokemon X/Y, specific attacks in specific environments “accidentally” reveal hidden items/treasures during combat.

Unfortunately, it looks like Masteries will server that function. I think using skills to accomplish these tasks would be great, but it’s probably too hard to pull off when all content must be equally completeable by all professions.

darkace.8925:

But there’s “stop and smell the roses” exploration, and there’s “get across the street as fast as you can before you get hit by traffic” exploration. Lately, Guild Wars 2 has been far too much of the latter and not nearly enough of the former.

If you didn’t stop and smell the roses at least once when traversing Drydock Scratch, you missed a lot. Well, stop and smell the dust and Skritt.

I understand where you are coming from, though. There’s a number of places in Silverwastes and Dry Top that look awesome that you never really get to see when not pursued by Mordrem or Inquest that I’d love to get a better look at, and I always feel guilty looking at the big zone events tracker (number of forts owned, etc.) because I’m not participating. It’s gotten better lately, since I have no hope of getting the Luminescent armor I’ve mostly stopped caring…

dekou.6012:

Trise.2865:

Of course, I’d rather have events like cattlepult gambling than zombie invasions… which might be the core of this discussion, come to think of it: the same or more “volume” of content, but more ambiance and less action.

Yes, I think that’s it. Of course, an area needs some DEs to work as a hub of activity, and DEs count as “action”, but what I dislike is the focus on Hollywood-like action scenes.

I like a lot of the less combat intensive events, gathering X and bringing it to collector Y. They work even with a handful of the regular enemies attacking you. I’d love to see more of those sorts of events. The problem is the scaling, and this is the one place where the new dailies really annoy me. When it’s a daily to do events in a particular zone, you get a zerg for practically every event, so either the amount of enemies scale and you get Champion-level enemies spawning left and right or there aren’t enough enemies and collectables to guarantee you get credit for the event.

dekou.6012:

Trise.2865:

As a side note and random thought: if ANet could find a way for us to have our profession skills interact with the environment in specific ways, similar to the Divinity series – i.e. a fire arrow lighting a torch, or chill-inducing skills soothe an overheated Hylek or machinery – that could add some very interesting elements to exploration as well as this “build diversity” thing people keep complaining about. See also: Pokemon X/Y, specific attacks in specific environments “accidentally” reveal hidden items/treasures during combat.

Unfortunately, it looks like Masteries will server that function. I think using skills to accomplish these tasks would be great, but it’s probably too hard to pull off when all content must be equally completeable by all professions.

As soon as ‘bring a person with a fire skill to event X or location Y for extra treasure’ hits the wiki or Dulfy, any sense of surprise goes out the window. I miss the special dialog options for certain personality archetypes, even if it didn’t really change the events.

darkace.8925:

A trip through Silverwaste is like a walk through Time Square; it’s constant motion and noise. Sometimes I just want to peaceful hike through Yellowstone where I can enjoy the lovely vistas.

Try Timberline Falls or Harathi Hinterlands? The number of LVL 80 areas is severely limited in this game so expecting the Devs to build a “serene” LVL 80 area is not very realistic.

Hey, I enjoy just looking around in this game as well, but LVL 80 zones are not tourist spots or scenic overlooks….

dekou.6012:

Andred.1087:

dekou.6012:

The big problem are Mordrem themselves: they’re beyond boring lore wise. They look nicer that the undead, but they’re still a bunch of evil things that want to kill you. They don’t talk, they don’t have conflicting thoughts, they just whack stuff until it stops whacking them back. This forces the Pact into being a bunch of generic good guys, because when things try to kill you you can only kill them back, with little in-between. I suppose now we’ve got corrupted Sylvari to kill, as well, but brainwashed puppets don’t make for particularly interesting antagonists, either.

Lol, if you’re looking for a compelling story in a T-rated MMO, you’re going to be looking for a long, long time.

M rating is all about sex, drugs and brutal violence. That’s it. Sex, drugs and brutal violence aren’t required to make a villain interesting.

Mature content is, you know, mature and closer to the ground. Sex, drugs, brutal violence is here, irl. What do you expect, fairies and Final Fetish stuff?

Andred explained that pretty well. Mature content allows characters to be more human-like and to blend the good-bad differences into grey. They can have good reasoning, act more naturally, use less deus ex machina solutions.

And you don’t have to use as much “oh, it’s magical!” stuff.
“No, it wasn’t because of magic. It was flawed morality”.

Exploration is the one area this game lacks in with new development. “Empty” maps aren’t really when you consider that building a world that has quiet places among all the chaos is what makes it believable that it’s a world. They’ve decided that in this x-pac it doesn’t even need to be spread out over a large portion of the world and include many varying climate types to break up the monotony. It’s a high-rise MMO x-pac in a dense city(jungle)bustling with activity.

I like having a lot to do. It’s necessary. It’s better than having nothing to do, but leaving out quiet swaths of landscape is detrimental to the world building aspects of games. When you don’t break up the action the pacing gets thrown out of whack. We will see what happens though.

Rym.1469:

dekou.6012:

]M rating is all about sex, drugs and brutal violence. That’s it. Sex, drugs and brutal violence aren’t required to make a villain interesting.

Mature content is, you know, mature and closer to the ground. Sex, drugs, brutal violence is here, irl. What do you expect, fairies and Final Fetish stuff?

Andred explained that pretty well. Mature content allows characters to be more human-like and to blend the good-bad differences into grey. They can have good reasoning, act more naturally, use less deus ex machina solutions.

The notion that sex, drugs, and brutal violence are required for a story to be mature or for a character to feel grounded is an immature one. Up features no sex, drugs, or brutal violence and is appropriate for children of all ages. Pineapple Express features plenty of of each and is intended to be watched by adults. Is there anyone who would argue the latter is a more mature story than the former? Don’t confuse “mature content” with “adult content”. A story does not require “adult content” to be a good one.

darkace.8925:

Civilis.2547:

…I don’t think we’ve seen the end of exploration.

Of course we haven’t. But there’s “stop and smell the roses” exploration, and there’s “get across the street as fast as you can before you get hit by traffic” exploration. Lately, Guild Wars 2 has been far too much of the latter and not nearly enough of the former.

I tried smelling some big pretty flower in SW, and it bit my head off

While I do miss the sense of peaceful exploration (which did sometimes happen in lower level areas), I can see why ANet moved away from it. You have to admit that creating large meaningful non-combat (or minimal combat) areas requires a lot of developer effort for little payoff (most players will end up the action packed, loot filled combat areas instead).

Example: How many people spend time in SW Skritt cave after finishing the jumping puzzle/coins? That place is HUGE, and I am sure took a while to put together. Yet everyone is outside, farming the Breach/VW/Chests.

Perhaps in the future they can play with the moment the new dragon is introduced in the expansions to come.
You might as well have gotten an invitation from the current Emperor in Cantha concerning “other problems” And the dragon will then awaken at a later point in the story.I understand OP somehow.If all dragons are introduced in the same fashion of “oh no minions overwhelm us,new endless warzone !” it might get old indeed.