Guild Wars 2

BobbyStein.2315:

I think you need to balance how you use particular characters. I think it’s bad form to throw “one-offs” all over the place that are there for purely functional reasons, but have zero personality or reuse potential. In Ela’s case, she’s a natural fit for imparting a lot of supplementary info of current (and past) events, and since she was a (small) part of the Season 2 story there’s a bit more context. Granted, she doesn’t have much to say outside of factual info, so if we were to do anything else with her I’d hope we’d flesh out her personality some more. But I hear where you’re coming from.

Your Herald was mostly a functional creation from what I understand. The dungeon letters needed to come from someone, and since we had some technical constraints that made it difficult (if not impossible) to originate from multiple potential sources based on your character’s decisions a nameless character was introduced. It’s kind of like the Tyrian Explorers Society notes you get for map completion. I think both have the potential to be very interesting but there wasn’t much need to develop them beyond the initial implementation. Perhaps that will change in the future. No promises, though.

I’m going to have to HEAVILY disagree with Ela there.

She started out as a Field Reporter, who showed up at the Molten Alliance attacks. Then she was documenting the Zephyrites. Then suddenly a krait expert talking about the Toxic Alliance, then suddenly warning us about Scarlet’s Secret Lab underneath the Priory. Out-of-game we got blog posts about her joining Lionguard forces into LA to take it back – a practically suicide mission. Then she returned in Season 2 suddenly a Magister teaching a class, and is now back in LA talking about common events.

She was all over the place in Season 1, gaining new capabilities based on the release, with no real reason to such. If she was an expert on krait, why was she reporting the attacks of unknown origins in the Shiverpeaks, or visiting the Bazaar of the Four Winds, or joining the Lionguard squad? If she’s now a magister that teaches classes, why did she go to LA to tell people about Scarlet or study the ley line stuff?

Most roles don’t really fit her. She is what you say is a “one-off character” used for more than makes sense. She far from a natural fit – instead, she’s been nothing but jarring since the Tower of Nightmares arc to me.

LOR-748 Field Reporter was around for only Kiel’s stuff, giving a brief recap of the Molten Alliance during the Secret of Southsun arc, then talking about Kiel and Evon’s pasts during Bazaar of the Four Winds/Cutthroat Politics – its entire design was a lore database, and thus would have been more fitting to return for that TA knowledge in the ToN arc, or for recaping Season 1 (though listening to a golem voice for that cinematic would be a bad choice – I’m talking functional comparison).

If Ela wasn’t proclaimed a “krait expert” in ToN (there to study the current situation while LOR-748 or someone else was there to give the lore on krait and nightmare court) or used during Hidden Arcana (instead using a different known magister or something), then she’d be less jarring since she would just be a field reporter who happened to be around for all of Scarlet’s doings – and her ley line studying would just be her next project due to Scarlet’s tampering with them.

(Side note: letters from multiple sources isn’t impossible, given that you did that with the letters from the DE member of your race in the PS, and during F&F which was from DE of your race or Almorra if you were vigil )

I do hope the “Your Herald” guy returns. It would be very fitting to me if he turned out to be working for E, in fact.

BobbyStein.2315:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

(Side note: letters from multiple sources isn’t impossible, given that you did that with the letters from the DE member of your race in the PS, and during F&F which was from DE of your race or Almorra if you were vigil )

It was impossible from a budget standpoint. Having to write 5 letters per dungeon meant we’d have to write 40 letters total instead of 8. From a logistical standpoint it would have driven up costs for localization and editing. These mails were generated very late in the development process. Multiplying them would have resulted in the wordcount ballooning by 5 times.

Maybe you’d make better use of your scarce writing resources than to have them write raid ‘lore’ which only a small minority of players will ever experience and even fewer will ever bother reading on their charge through the instance to get to the phat lewt most of them are there for.

Just saying.

BobbyStein.2315:

Kraggy.4169:

BobbyStein.2315:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

(Side note: letters from multiple sources isn’t impossible, given that you did that with the letters from the DE member of your race in the PS, and during F&F which was from DE of your race or Almorra if you were vigil )

It was impossible from a budget standpoint. Having to write 5 letters per dungeon meant we’d have to write 40 letters total instead of 8. From a logistical standpoint it would have driven up costs for localization and editing. These mails were generated very late in the development process. Multiplying them would have resulted in the wordcount ballooning by 5 times.

Maybe you’d make better use of your scarce writing resources than to have them write raid ‘lore’ which only a small minority of players will ever experience and even fewer will ever bother reading on their charge through the instance to get to the phat lewt most of them are there for.

Just saying.

“Your fallacy is to think that ‘their customers’ view the game entirely the same way and all want the same thing.”

yeah! some people generally think there special running around with a Dawn or Sunrise like …most of the player pop that has them

btw any chance to get some lore on the Legendary weapons and the reason why there legendary and stuff

Budman.2934:

BobbyStein.2315:

Kraggy.4169:

BobbyStein.2315:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

(Side note: letters from multiple sources isn’t impossible, given that you did that with the letters from the DE member of your race in the PS, and during F&F which was from DE of your race or Almorra if you were vigil )

It was impossible from a budget standpoint. Having to write 5 letters per dungeon meant we’d have to write 40 letters total instead of 8. From a logistical standpoint it would have driven up costs for localization and editing. These mails were generated very late in the development process. Multiplying them would have resulted in the wordcount ballooning by 5 times.

Maybe you’d make better use of your scarce writing resources than to have them write raid ‘lore’ which only a small minority of players will ever experience and even fewer will ever bother reading on their charge through the instance to get to the phat lewt most of them are there for.

Just saying.

“Your fallacy is to think that ‘their customers’ view the game entirely the same way and all want the same thing.”

yeah! some people generally think there special running around with a Dawn or Sunrise like …most of the player pop that has them

btw any chance to get some lore on the Legendary weapons and the reason why there legendary and stuff

^this would be nice. The only legendary that makes any real sense, lore wise is the Flameseeker prophecies. The rest not so much.

What is the rough percentage of Sylvari that are in the nightmare, to Sylvari who are among the ranks of the Nightmare court (since we know not all nightmare Sylvari are part of the courts)?

What are the official viewpoints of other cultures toward the nightmare court? Seraph/humanity, Lionguard/LA, Asura, Norn, Charr, etc?

BobbyStein.2315:

“Your fallacy is to think that ‘their customers’ view the game entirely the same way and all want the same thing.”

Hey Bobby Stein, just wanted to say that I’m incredibly grateful for the work you and your team have done for the raid. I don’t usually comment on the GW2 forums but I really couldn’t keep myself from reacting here. No, most if not all of the raiders I know or played with aren’t here only for the loot. We loved the setting, we loved the bosses, we loved the lore and of course the writing. Kudos to you and your team for this wonderful content

Leybi.1405:

BobbyStein.2315:

“Your fallacy is to think that ‘their customers’ view the game entirely the same way and all want the same thing.”

Hey Bobby Stein, just wanted to say that I’m incredibly grateful for the work you and your team have done for the raid. I don’t usually comment on the GW2 forums but I really couldn’t keep myself from reacting here. No, most if not all of the raiders I know or played with aren’t here only for the loot. We loved the setting, we loved the bosses, we loved the lore and of course the writing. Kudos to you and your team for this wonderful content

the only draw back it needed is more Sand about 2 cubic tons of sand somewhere over near the Crystal Desert better yet forget the sand just head over to the Dev team and say OPEN CRYSTAL DESERT UP!!! and lore the KITTEN OUTTA IT

Cheers from everyone in the background
that cares about advancing the story into Elona

Kalavier.1097:

What is the rough percentage of Sylvari that are in the nightmare, to Sylvari who are among the ranks of the Nightmare court (since we know not all nightmare Sylvari are part of the courts)?

This was answered a long time ago and the number we were given was “roughly 15%”.

Though this was prior to the actions of Toxic Alliance and Mordremoth’s rising. So it’s no doubt different now.

Kalavier.1097:

What are the official viewpoints of other cultures toward the nightmare court? Seraph/humanity, Lionguard/LA, Asura, Norn, Charr, etc?

There’s a pirate in Lornar’s Pass which calls them sadists with disdain, while being someone who enjoys killing others himself, IIRC.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Kalavier.1097:

What is the rough percentage of Sylvari that are in the nightmare, to Sylvari who are among the ranks of the Nightmare court (since we know not all nightmare Sylvari are part of the courts)?

This was answered a long time ago and the number we were given was “roughly 15%”.

Though this was prior to the actions of Toxic Alliance and Mordremoth’s rising. So it’s no doubt different now.

I almost answered that myself, but that’s how many Courtiers there are vs Dreamers. Kalavier’s asking how many Nightmare sylvari there are that aren’t affiliated with the Court- something that’s theoretically possible, but never been confirmed. I put it up on the list.

BobbyStein.2315:

Kraggy.4169:

BobbyStein.2315:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

(Side note: letters from multiple sources isn’t impossible, given that you did that with the letters from the DE member of your race in the PS, and during F&F which was from DE of your race or Almorra if you were vigil )

It was impossible from a budget standpoint. Having to write 5 letters per dungeon meant we’d have to write 40 letters total instead of 8. From a logistical standpoint it would have driven up costs for localization and editing. These mails were generated very late in the development process. Multiplying them would have resulted in the wordcount ballooning by 5 times.

Maybe you’d make better use of your scarce writing resources than to have them write raid ‘lore’ which only a small minority of players will ever experience and even fewer will ever bother reading on their charge through the instance to get to the phat lewt most of them are there for.

Just saying.

“Your fallacy is to think that ‘their customers’ view the game entirely the same way and all want the same thing.”

Which is exactly why developing a PVE game mode specifically for a small subset of the population is such a bad idea – and a doubly bad idea to embed story related to the holistic narrative therein.

Accessibility. Cohesion. Entertainment. These should be the primary goals. Then deal with the varied playbase through difficulty tiering, challenging achievements/motes, etc.

It’s amazing how no one gave a kitten that there was story and lore restricted to the elite missions in GW1, but there’s a god kitten kitten storm about it in GW2.

It’s not like the raid has super critical lore that you can get nowhere else.

It merely has relevant lore related primarily to that location. No different than GW1’s elite dungeons of Tombs, The Underworld, Fissure of Woe, Urgoz’s Warren, The Deep, Domain of Anguish, or Slavers’ Exile.

I got a question (If anybody knows, even if not from Anet, please let me know):

Back in GW1, in the The Wilds mission, there was a runic stone showing some carvings (dragon related, apparently): https://wiki.guildwars.com/images/2/20/Runic_stones_in_the_Wilds.jpg

I, for some time, thought these were the ones shown on the Mystery Cave Seal, until I realized these are Ascension runes: http://storage9.static.itmages.com/i/14/1204/h_1417668212_9865493_0776d4069c.png

Are the carvings Druidic? Will they be addressed at some point? Or just random interesting stuff the map developer threw in there for flavor?

Because in GW1 time they seemed random, but now… in retrospect… I mean, the triangle could be interpreted as the Bloodstone regulating the flow of magic, via wavy lines in an out (leylines?), there’s the dragon, and then the square divided in 4 sub-squares (Four schools of magic?).

BobbyStein.2315:

Kraggy.4169:

BobbyStein.2315:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

(Side note: letters from multiple sources isn’t impossible, given that you did that with the letters from the DE member of your race in the PS, and during F&F which was from DE of your race or Almorra if you were vigil )

It was impossible from a budget standpoint. Having to write 5 letters per dungeon meant we’d have to write 40 letters total instead of 8. From a logistical standpoint it would have driven up costs for localization and editing. These mails were generated very late in the development process. Multiplying them would have resulted in the wordcount ballooning by 5 times.

Maybe you’d make better use of your scarce writing resources than to have them write raid ‘lore’ which only a small minority of players will ever experience and even fewer will ever bother reading on their charge through the instance to get to the phat lewt most of them are there for.

Just saying.

“Your fallacy is to think that ‘their customers’ view the game entirely the same way and all want the same thing.”

Your comment has no bearing on mine, since I didn’t make any such suggestion that everyone thinks the same thing .. but I’m sure you felt pleased with yourself for posting that.

Kraggy.4169:

BobbyStein.2315:

Kraggy.4169:

BobbyStein.2315:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

(Side note: letters from multiple sources isn’t impossible, given that you did that with the letters from the DE member of your race in the PS, and during F&F which was from DE of your race or Almorra if you were vigil )

It was impossible from a budget standpoint. Having to write 5 letters per dungeon meant we’d have to write 40 letters total instead of 8. From a logistical standpoint it would have driven up costs for localization and editing. These mails were generated very late in the development process. Multiplying them would have resulted in the wordcount ballooning by 5 times.

Maybe you’d make better use of your scarce writing resources than to have them write raid ‘lore’ which only a small minority of players will ever experience and even fewer will ever bother reading on their charge through the instance to get to the phat lewt most of them are there for.

Just saying.

“Your fallacy is to think that ‘their customers’ view the game entirely the same way and all want the same thing.”

Your comment has no bearing on mine, since I didn’t make any such suggestion that everyone thinks the same thing .. but I’m sure you felt pleased with yourself for posting that.

Actually it does, as this game tries to have a certain quality and to inovate with every step it does.
Even if it does insignificant to you, there is new tech, tools and other things developed, to get these done.

The things you are proclaim as “unneccessary” right now, might become relevant later down the line.

Heck, how much was raged against LS1 and then we see things being better implimented later on?

Do you even realize how many things have to work together to get a certain things to be fun and to the quality it ends up?

Aaron Ansari.1604:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Kalavier.1097:

What is the rough percentage of Sylvari that are in the nightmare, to Sylvari who are among the ranks of the Nightmare court (since we know not all nightmare Sylvari are part of the courts)?

This was answered a long time ago and the number we were given was “roughly 15%”.

Though this was prior to the actions of Toxic Alliance and Mordremoth’s rising. So it’s no doubt different now.

I almost answered that myself, but that’s how many Courtiers there are vs Dreamers. Kalavier’s asking how many Nightmare sylvari there are that aren’t affiliated with the Court- something that’s theoretically possible, but never been confirmed. I put it up on the list.

This. Partly because of a nightmare court/nightmare debate going on elsewhere. :P

I think there is a certain justified anger that what is basically the setup to Season 3 has been content that by design locks out a large proportion of the playerbase, whether through lack of skill, lack of equipment (remember when the introduction of Ascended grind was excused on the basis that it would only be needed for high-level fractals, a game mode that was designed for the grinders in the first place?), lack of being able to get together a suitable group, lack of enjoyment in a style of play very different from the core game, or a combination of the above.

Guild Wars 1, by contrast, did a good job of having elite missions that had interesting lore, but where the story of the elite missions was a sidequest or epilogue to the main story, not an integral part of it… and even then, max stats were easy to get and by and large they mostly played like the core game rather than being built around raid-boss mechanics, so the only barriers were skill and getting a team together. Explorable dungeon paths (while still being designed, on release at least, to be doable by sub-80 characters in yellows or even greens: exotics were the reward for completion, not a requirement for entry) and fractals followed a similar model. The raids have been a significant departure in that the events in the raids are closely bound to what’s been teased for Season 3 thus far, which is exacerbated by possibly being the most excluding PvE content that ArenaNet has ever made.

There’s a simple answer, which has multiple precedents: implement a split between a story mode for people who just want to experience the story (and, which, incidentally, could also act as a training mode for people who do want to move on to the hard mode) with substantially reduced or no extrinsic rewards, and a hard mode for people who want the full raid experience. But ArenaNet thus far has indicated that this is off the table.

draxynnic.3719:

There’s a simple answer, which has multiple precedents: implement a split between a story mode for people who just want to experience the story (and, which, incidentally, could also act as a training mode for people who do want to move on to the hard mode) with substantially reduced or no extrinsic rewards, and a hard mode for people who want the full raid experience. But ArenaNet thus far has indicated that this is off the table.

Which is why it is important to make sure they continue to hear from us on this topic on these forums, on Twitter, on reddit and anywhere else it makes sense (of course, keeping the conversation civil, focused and on message).

Upvote posts and replies on the topic – respond and make the point whenever story or raiding is discussed – and encourage others to do the same.

Anet has a good history of listening to their players – much better than most MMO developers. I know they have read and heard the community concern over this issue – and I feel confident they will remember that concern as they work on future content (hopefully with significant changes in how they deliver raids).

If it turns out that the White Mantle are a big part of the next living world, it is important that we come back to these forums and make sure they understand why the current raid system is not a good storytelling medium in GW2.

I haven’t played the raids yet, I don’t know if I ever will but, I do know that they are also about the white mantle. So, is the raid story important for the living world story? does the raid happen bevor or after the LW?

muchas gracias

Kai.9264:

I haven’t played the raids yet, I don’t know if I ever will but, I do know that they are also about the white mantle. So, is the raid story important for the living world story? does the raid happen bevor or after the LW?

muchas gracias

Between HoT and LS3.
It is a sidestory and not really needed to understand the narrative.
However it might fill in some little gaps

Kai.9264:

I haven’t played the raids yet, I don’t know if I ever will but, I do know that they are also about the white mantle. So, is the raid story important for the living world story? does the raid happen bevor or after the LW?

muchas gracias

Raid Story is a Sidestory. You’ll learn everything you need to understand in the LS and the Paper Scraps you’ll find in Bloodstone Fen. You won’t miss anything if you don’t raid.

Kai.9264:

I haven’t played the raids yet, I don’t know if I ever will but, I do know that they are also about the white mantle. So, is the raid story important for the living world story? does the raid happen bevor or after the LW?

muchas gracias

If you go into the third raid wing and talk to Glenna and her journal, and talk to Bennet in Bloodstone Fen, and read the three journals whos pages are scattered across Bloodstone Fen, you will get about 95% of the raid story.

The only things you’ll really miss is the visual and dialogue of the bosses themselves.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Kai.9264:

I haven’t played the raids yet, I don’t know if I ever will but, I do know that they are also about the white mantle. So, is the raid story important for the living world story? does the raid happen bevor or after the LW?

muchas gracias

If you go into the third raid wing and talk to Glenna and her journal, and talk to Bennet in Bloodstone Fen, and read the three journals whos pages are scattered across Bloodstone Fen, you will get about 95% of the raid story.

The only things you’ll really miss is the visual and dialogue of the bosses themselves.

oh ok, where can I enter the third wing? But, do I need a full group and pretty much all the masterys to enter the raid?

Same place as the other two wings – NE corner of Verdant Brink or the Aerodome.

You just need to be in a 10 man squad, you can be solo.

You don’t need any mastery – just HoT – to enter raids.

Why was Primordius inactive did he not woke up quite a while before the other elder dragons?
Also what did he do while inactive not sleep since he woke up so what?

I put your question on the list, adormtil, since what I’m about to say is more inference and pattern than established lore, but our current understanding is this- after a cataclysmic ‘breakout’ period where they awaken and establish the core of their territories, the dragons seem to largely settle in for what you might consider passive consumption, not doing much of anything personally and allowing their minions and corruption to slowly spread on their own along the borders of that territory. They will from time to time throw together an invasion force to strike at settlements beyond their territory, sometimes lead by a much stronger minion- the attack on Claw Island was an example of this, and the Claw (or Claws) of Jormag harrying the kodan south might be considered in a similar light- but for the fairly long gaps between attacks, a dragon might be considered ‘inactive’ in the sense that it’s not doing much that we can see.

I believe it was stated sometime in Season 2 that the Elder Dragons push minions out of their territory in pulses. Even if not mentioned, that’s what we see really.

Zhaitan for example had only been active in four bursts – when he woke, when Port Stalwart was destroyed, the final battle at the end of SoS novel, when Port Noble was destroyed, and the personal story.

BobbyStein.2315:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Kai.9264:

I haven’t played the raids yet, I don’t know if I ever will but, I do know that they are also about the white mantle. So, is the raid story important for the living world story? does the raid happen bevor or after the LW?

muchas gracias

If you go into the third raid wing and talk to Glenna and her journal, and talk to Bennet in Bloodstone Fen, and read the three journals whos pages are scattered across Bloodstone Fen, you will get about 95% of the raid story.

The only things you’ll really miss is the visual and dialogue of the bosses themselves.

If you can join a player who has completed the raid for the week, you can explore the cleared raid instance and talk to the characters that are there, find the collectables, inspect the clues, etc. There are a few achievements you can get this way. Sometimes folks will post on Reddit or Twitter that they will let people in.

My advice: go to the raid lobby in Lion’s Arch or use LFG to find a cleared instance if you’re not seeing a lot of people hanging outside the Forsaken Thicket portal in Verdant Brink. But if you can’t readily find a person who can open it for you, Konig’s suggestion is a good one. Enter each raid, talk to the characters, and read what you can in the first area. It’ll provide a bit of context. Then when you play Episode 1 you’ll have a little extra reference when you read the notes and hear the dialog.

And if you catch me in the game (I usually play on NA but sometimes switch to EU) give me a shout.

Once again, you are missing an extremely important point. This is a video game. It isn’t about hearing the story secondhand, watching a youtube video (or even in game cinematic) or getting a guided tour from the “real heroes.”

It is about experiencing the content as the hero of the story (quoting from day one – “this is my story”).

The current raid model limits that experience. You need to either make them more accessible (my vote) or not use them as a storytelling tool – especially if that story ties into the current narrative (which it does – the raid is chapter one of the current story).

BobbyStein.2315:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Kai.9264:

I haven’t played the raids yet, I don’t know if I ever will but, I do know that they are also about the white mantle. So, is the raid story important for the living world story? does the raid happen bevor or after the LW?

muchas gracias

If you go into the third raid wing and talk to Glenna and her journal, and talk to Bennet in Bloodstone Fen, and read the three journals whos pages are scattered across Bloodstone Fen, you will get about 95% of the raid story.

The only things you’ll really miss is the visual and dialogue of the bosses themselves.

If you can join a player who has completed the raid for the week, you can explore the cleared raid instance and talk to the characters that are there, find the collectables, inspect the clues, etc. There are a few achievements you can get this way. Sometimes folks will post on Reddit or Twitter that they will let people in.

My advice: go to the raid lobby in Lion’s Arch or use LFG to find a cleared instance if you’re not seeing a lot of people hanging outside the Forsaken Thicket portal in Verdant Brink. But if you can’t readily find a person who can open it for you, Konig’s suggestion is a good one. Enter each raid, talk to the characters, and read what you can in the first area. It’ll provide a bit of context. Then when you play Episode 1 you’ll have a little extra reference when you read the notes and hear the dialog.

And if you catch me in the game (I usually play on NA but sometimes switch to EU) give me a shout.

alright thanks, gonna try that;)

Effectively you want a story mode for Raids, which is soloable. If they made it a no-reward purely story instance (or some minor one-time only reward), then I wouldn’t have an issue with that.

Issue with that is, and I expect this is a frustration Bobby experiences, is that doing that requires resources that he’s probably not in control of, i.e. people to implement it, people to adjust the boss encounters so they can be soloable, adjust the enemy encounters, etc. etc. etc.

And frankly, I’d rather he focus on creating good stories for raids and having someone else worrying about the implementation or the resources to do a story mode rather than have a basic raid with a lack of story or one so disconnected from the world it’s irrelevant and not worth caring about.

I think the raid storytelling is some of the best group storytelling in the game. It beats the storytelling in dungeons by a mile, so I want all of the community to be able to experience it as well (as I’m sure Bobby does!). I hope that a story mode IS implemented at some point but if they don’t have the resources available to do that, I’d rather he still sticks to making raids have a compelling and interesting story that is relevant to the world of Tyria.

I get the frustration, I do. I had to wrangle together 3- 4 other people just to get the full story experience of dungeons since most groups want to rush through, skip cutscenes and not absorb the story (a balance they’ve actually quite brilliantly achieved in raids) and I would have killed for a solo story mode for them back then.

JayMack.8295:

Effectively you want a story mode for Raids, which is soloable. If they made it a no-reward purely story instance (or some minor one-time only reward), then I wouldn’t have an issue with that.

Issue with that is, and I expect this is a frustration Bobby experiences, is that doing that requires resources that he’s probably not in control of, i.e. people to implement it, people to adjust the boss encounters so they can be soloable, adjust the enemy encounters, etc. etc. etc.

And frankly, I’d rather he focus on creating good stories for raids and having someone else worrying about the implementation or the resources to do a story mode rather than have a basic raid with a lack of story or one so disconnected from the world it’s irrelevant and not worth caring about.

I think the raid storytelling is some of the best group storytelling in the game. It beats the storytelling in dungeons by a mile, so I want all of the community to be able to experience it as well (as I’m sure Bobby does!). I hope that a story mode IS implemented at some point but if they don’t have the resources available to do that, I’d rather he still sticks to making raids have a compelling and interesting story that is relevant to the world of Tyria.

I get the frustration, I do. I had to wrangle together 3- 4 other people just to get the full story experience of dungeons since most groups want to rush through, skip cutscenes and not absorb the story (a balance they’ve actually quite brilliantly achieved in raids) and I would have killed for a solo story mode for them back then.

Well said.

As someone who has taken more than my share of swings with the axe, I do applaud Bobby for putting his neck out to talk and interact with the community on this.

I agree that the issue is not with the story – and that the raid story is extremely well done.

It is solely an issue of accessibility – which goes back to the mechanical implementation of raiding.

There definitely needs to be a better way for players to experience this story – whether it is through tiered difficulties in raiding (my vote) or some other interactive playable content. The important part is that the player gets to feel like the hero of the story. Relying on access to cleared instances really feels like the opposite of that – nothing more than a guided tour from the “real heroes.”

But again, I don’t see this as something Bobby can fix – and his work on the story has been amazing.

But, as he is the only raid developer to really engage with the community on this topic, he is the one that gets to dodge our swinging axes .

BobbyStein.2315:

I think you both have summed it up quite nicely: certain player frustrations aren’t with the fact that there’s a story in raids (or that the story is “bad” or “poorly told” in their opinion) it’s just that the content is out of reach for them and they want to experience playing it somehow.

Since that’s not something I can personally change, I’m hesitant to engage in discussions surrounding that because I have nothing to add. I can’t/won’t/don’t want to convince anyone that their opinion is bad or invalid, but since many of these suggestions fall outside the scope of what I do (or what the vision for raids as a whole is) I can only listen.

It is true you personally are not responsible for this, but you are also working for the developer who produces this content. So suggesting it to you, who can in turn suggest it to the people who actually can change something, is more fruitful than trying to reach the upper echelons from here.

That said, I personally don’t mind the raids as they are, even though I never set foot into one, as neither free time and probably skill (or time to develop that skill) would allow it. I would actually like a solo-able story mode, without rewards, but I realize that this needs time and effort you guys can’t spare with your limited resources.

Aaron Ansari.1604:

*Celine- When do asura reach adulthood?
*Gnomex- What age are most asura during college?

I also would like to know how old are the Asuras when they start college, and while we’re at it, how old are the young asuras when they enter pre-college school (Splorge Metamystics Lab)

I’ve seen many roleplayers put in their backgrounds that their asura characters started college at age six, but since there are only two young looking asuras presented as students there (near PR-1000 Prototype Golem in the College of Dynamics) I doubt this can be right.

Age six definitely seems too young. I always saw and read asura colleges as being equivalent to American high schools and colleges combined. Which means starting at early teens.

Taimi is considered a genius even by individuals most consider a genius (Zojja), and iirc we meet her when she’s eight (so by now she’d be… ten? eleven?) and she’s in her post-pre-college stage. As I understand asura academics it is “pre-college” → “mentorship” → “college” – and Taimi is in that mentorship phase.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Taimi is considered a genius even by individuals most consider a genius (Zojja), and iirc we meet her when she’s eight (so by now she’d be… ten? eleven?)

I would’ve sworn I read somewhere that she’s fourteen. I’ll poke around and edit the post if I find anything.

The important thing, though, is that she’s definitely in the double digits and still using a progeny model. Those young looking asura might be older than you’d think.

EDIT: That was quick. According to the wiki, the livestream after her introduction established that she was born in 1314, which’d make her about fifteen now. The vod is no longer available (of course) but when the wiki cites something directly it’s usually reliable.

That makes more sense to me too. I was pulling eight from a recent discussion, and didn’t actually fact check it – I just remembered she was young.

Still, Taimi seems to have been in mentorship pre-college but post pre-college schooling when we meet her. Given the events of S2 with Phlunt, it might be that she is now officially part of the college, so hard to really say where she is.

BobbyStein.2315:

Blaeys.3102:

JayMack.8295:

Effectively you want a story mode for Raids, which is soloable. If they made it a no-reward purely story instance (or some minor one-time only reward), then I wouldn’t have an issue with that.

Issue with that is, and I expect this is a frustration Bobby experiences, is that doing that requires resources that he’s probably not in control of, i.e. people to implement it, people to adjust the boss encounters so they can be soloable, adjust the enemy encounters, etc. etc. etc.

And frankly, I’d rather he focus on creating good stories for raids and having someone else worrying about the implementation or the resources to do a story mode rather than have a basic raid with a lack of story or one so disconnected from the world it’s irrelevant and not worth caring about.

I think the raid storytelling is some of the best group storytelling in the game. It beats the storytelling in dungeons by a mile, so I want all of the community to be able to experience it as well (as I’m sure Bobby does!). I hope that a story mode IS implemented at some point but if they don’t have the resources available to do that, I’d rather he still sticks to making raids have a compelling and interesting story that is relevant to the world of Tyria.

I get the frustration, I do. I had to wrangle together 3- 4 other people just to get the full story experience of dungeons since most groups want to rush through, skip cutscenes and not absorb the story (a balance they’ve actually quite brilliantly achieved in raids) and I would have killed for a solo story mode for them back then.

Well said.

As someone who has taken more than my share of swings with the axe, I do applaud Bobby for putting his neck out to talk and interact with the community on this.

I agree that the issue is not with the story – and that the raid story is extremely well done.

It is solely an issue of accessibility – which goes back to the mechanical implementation of raiding.

There definitely needs to be a better way for players to experience this story – whether it is through tiered difficulties in raiding (my vote) or some other interactive playable content. The important part is that the player gets to feel like the hero of the story. Relying on access to cleared instances really feels like the opposite of that – nothing more than a guided tour from the “real heroes.”

But again, I don’t see this as something Bobby can fix – and his work on the story has been amazing.

But, as he is the only raid developer to really engage with the community on this topic, he is the one that gets to dodge our swinging axes .

I think you both have summed it up quite nicely: certain player frustrations aren’t with the fact that there’s a story in raids (or that the story is “bad” or “poorly told” in their opinion) it’s just that the content is out of reach for them and they want to experience playing it somehow.

Since that’s not something I can personally change, I’m hesitant to engage in discussions surrounding that because I have nothing to add. I can’t/won’t/don’t want to convince anyone that their opinion is bad or invalid, but since many of these suggestions fall outside the scope of what I do (or what the vision for raids as a whole is) I can only listen.

One thing you can influence is what happens next. What your team does next and how the story is told are very important. You’ve got the player base invested in the hunt for Lazarus and the White Mantle, as well as the hunt for the next dragon.

Do not leave them out of story steps associated with these storylines.

Given the current model, I realize that ties your hands a little from a story teller’s perspective. That is why I think the logical solution is making the raids more accessible to the average player.

Dear Narrative Team,

In Guild Wars, Manzies has as much known about him as your foreboding underwater dragon. with little more then that known about his “Shadow Army”. In Guild Wars 2, the only real possible indications of Manzies are the Shadow Behemoth and Shadow Fiends(which players will largely argue are Dhuum’s minnions) and the pallet swap torch skinn “Fate of Manzies”(shameless orange “Razah’s Nightmare”.)

Now i piece together lore theories about the Lord of Destruction but without legit lore i get met entirely by naysayers. Does Manzies have a story for Guild Wars 2 or will he be neglected again?

We’ve already got a Menzies question, so I’ll leave the list be, but quick reminder- even if the devs come back to this thread, they’ve already laid down that they won’t talk about future story lines. Not even to say what they won’t be addressing. They feel like narrowing the field of speculation for players steals something from the experience.

Nightbringer Tenchi.5794:

In Guild Wars 2, the only real possible indications of Manzies are the Shadow Behemoth and Shadow Fiends(which players will largely argue are Dhuum’s minnions) and the pallet swap torch skinn “Fate of Manzies”(shameless orange “Razah’s Nightmare”.)

Players would largely argue the Shadow Behemoth is Dhuum’s minion because they come from the Underworld (and Menzies has no ties there) and we have an item that basically tells us that, it is indeed related to Dhuum

Also, Razah’s Nightmare came second so that is the shameless reskin of The Fate of Menzies. :P

At what age do Norn start getting their tattoos typically?