Guild Wars 2

I have a few praises for the story, dialog and writing in general of the overarching story arc of Guild Wars 2, a few constructive criticisms, and some suggestions for the future.

I think things have gotten better as we have gone along. Iteration works. I am not a fan of iteration as a consumer in GW2 as much because things like the precursor system and various other things, but the quality for the patient man does pay off. It has paid off for the storytelling for sure. The cut scenes are better. The characters are more fleshed out. Overall I think the direction is good.

My issue is this: Because of the iterative nature of the design of the game, I think the story team gets the short end of the stick and that leads the fans getting a story that isn’t as good as it could be. Let’s face it: The Personal Story and the LS S1 were not the best parts of GW2. I don’t know if they even make a top ten list of “Best Things in GW2” While I felt LS S1 had great moments it wasn’t something I felt was fantastic all the way throughout. Hopefully Season 2 sees an improvement on that front.

I think the dialog when it’s trying to be serious is not that great. It feels very melodramatic. The comedy parts are fantastic though. I have always admired the comedic dialog between characters and ArenaNet does a great job of it. I almost feel like the drama should come in the form of the combat situations and the dialog should be the comedy relief to break up the tense action. Han Solo crackin’ wise while shooting Storm Troopers was always preferable to Anakin and Padme getting romantic next to a fireplace with a Bantha Rug in the scene. What I am saying is, “I really like Jory and Kas when they’re being funny, not so much when every update is public displays of mushy pillow talk”. A good example would be Mhenlo and Cynn’s relationship. It was always silly. It made it enjoyable. Gwen and Thackeray? It was never silly and she was always whining and it made me wonder what he saw in her in the first place. Jory and Kas seem to be a mix of both but lately they have leaned more on the Kieran/Gwen side of the romance fence.

I guess what it boils down to is if everyone at ArenaNet is deciding to hang their hats so much on story this time around, My hope is that it is a vastly improved experience as a whole. People said they wanted permanent content but I think that meant they wanted the Events/Rewards/Achievements to be that. Maybe I am wrong, but that is what I wanted. I would love for storytelling in GW2 to reach the same heights of amazingness as the combat mechanics, world design, art style, sound design, and music and so many of those other things that make it what my opinion is; The best MMO on the market. I don’t feel that it is the best because of the storytelling. I feel it’s the best in spite of the story. That doesn’t mean I don’t think the potential is there. I do.

The Future

I want to be the hero for once. Not Kormir. Not Trahearne. Not Rox or Braham. I want to be the focus of the adulation.

I want the story to be about dragons from here on out. That’s what we were sold on. That’s what it should be. I suppose this is where a lot of the story issues come from The design team shifts focus and then the story team has to weave a different tale.

Well, whatever the case, thanks for your time and thanks for a wonderful game.

To OP, you do know that the “hero” board in LA has your name on it right? (well, whatever character talks to it if you killed scarlet). And if you did LS season 1, you get introduced as the leader of the team (Rox Braham, etc).

That’s in response to the “I want to be the hero for once” Likewise, You get a LOT of credit in the personal story… <_<

Amen brother. Both the forums and the facebook has always been infested with nay-sayers who can’t get over the issues and look at the assets of gw2. It’s good that the devs also hear the other part of the playerbase.
I think the mayority of the players who are invested in the story are excited for season 2.

Btw, I’m glad I’m not always the hero. There are millions of characters in the gw2 universe, it would seem rather crappy that they would all be the awesome hero who saved the universe from doom. I like being among the ranks: a commander in the pact, a faceless wanderer who joins up with some others and become the heroes of LA… It’s just a personal taste, I like being a not-so-extrordinary character who the steps up to the plate when he’s needed to.

Angel McCoy.1832:

Bellyboomer.3048:

Btw, I’m glad I’m not always the hero. There are millions of characters in the gw2 universe, it would seem rather crappy that they would all be the awesome hero who saved the universe from doom. I like being among the ranks: a commander in the pact, a faceless wanderer who joins up with some others and become the heroes of LA… It’s just a personal taste, I like being a not-so-extrordinary character who the steps up to the plate when he’s needed to.

This is a very interesting opinion since so many seem to feel the other way. We make every effort to put the player character at the center of the story because…well…it’s your story. But, I also believe that the player character doesn’t always have to be the one with the answers. Sometimes, your teammates (Rox, Braham, etc.) need to help out or risk becoming faceless flunkies. There’s a balance point, of course. Your teammates are an extension of you, living through your story with you.

I was actually surprised when I found out in another thread just how many people like being the ultimate savior. Even when that does not make a whole lot of sense in a world shared by heroes.

I’m with BellyBoomer on this one, but like Angel said, seems like we are the vast minority man.

I like it when there is a degree of “hero status”

Like where players can easily be “THE BIG HERO” or “One of the heroes/guys fighting”

Makes it easier to RP or write IMO.

I find MMO stories with “ONE SUPER HERO!” (player) to be blah. As one WoW video showed where an npc verbally hails you as the big hero to save the day.. then does it for everybody else who arrives in the area (and if you sit there, you see this clearly).

I have some thoughts on this issue. One of the possibly inevitable side effects of having thousands of other players around is that sense of just being a faceless number, one among a great many. In fact, there’s not much that reminds me of my own insignificance more than playing Guild Wars 2. For example…

While I understand the obvious technical reasons for it, I’m still a little bothered by the fact that we’re never mentioned by name. Even as Ellen Kiel introduces us to the Zephyrite leader along with all the others, each of the NPCs is mentioned by name. The PC, however, is “And their leader.”

I’m not trying to suggest that you develop some technology like an in-game text-to-speech engine that dynamically synthesizes a coherent pronunciation in the voice of a given NPC’s voice actor. I’m simply bringing this up as an example of the moments when I feel unimportant, like I’m pretending to be some brave hero who saved a city. It reminds me that I’m expendable; no matter who plays it, the game world itself won’t notice a difference. I don’t matter to the world. It’s a fact that can’t really be changed or disguised, only forgotten, and there are plenty of moments that remind me of it.

Another one: events that require distressingly large groups (>20) to complete. Fighting the Assault Knights alongside 149 other nameless leaders of our party, plus Rox, Braham, Marjory, Kasmeer, Taimi, Scruffy, Ellen Kiel, etc.

This one reminds me that while we’re all “super important leaders,” we’re not really, because we’re zerglings. Maybe hydralisks, at best. The NPCs are more important than we are; at least in the Marionette battle, the NPCs gave everyone else a buff.

TL;DR:
All this is to say, I can understand the feelings of wanting to be more of a hero and feeling like a nobody who gets lost in the crowd of GW2.

The problem with saying names is people with jumbles of letters… or the voice saying the name one way when you describe it as being said another.

But it would make it feel more interacting though.

Angel McCoy.1832:

Thanks for the long, respectful commentary. We hear both your praise and your critiques. Iteration is a core principal at ArenaNet, because we take pride in our work. So we are always striving to improve. I personally can’t wait for you to see what we’re making for you.

I am looking forward to it and thank you for the response. I felt like Factions was a great mix of “team effort” and “I’m the hero” at the end. You run through the Emperor’s Palace and all the people along the way are cheering you on. I don’t mind it the other way either, but it felt a lot better than the ending of Nightfall. The two endings we have had thus far have felt more along the lines of the team player—again, not bad— but it falls more in line with how I felt after Kormir ascended, which felt less rewarding by way of cutscene than did the feeling I got after running through the end of Factions if that makes sense. Sometimes a dude just wants to stand on the mountain alone and bask in the glory.

MakubeC.3026:

I was actually surprised when I found out in another thread just how many people like being the ultimate savior. Even when that does not make a whole lot of sense in a world shared by heroes.

I’m with BellyBoomer on this one, but like Angel said, seems like we are the vast minority man.

I don’t know if you could say vast minority. I think it’s true to say that the section of the community that doesn’t want to be the big hero isn’t as vocal as those who do, and probably are smaller, but I can’t see them being smaller by a huge amount.

The reason people care about this is immersion. Some people feel like being the centre of events is more immersive, which is true I suppose, but it has the effect of making an MMO feel like a single-player game with multiplayer elements, rather than the other way around. An MMO is an opportunity to tell a much larger-scale story, and something where a single player is the centre of their own personal universe feels like that opportunity is being squandered. This is the difference between a personal story and a living world.

At the other extreme, having the player as “just some guy” definitely achieves the feeling that you’re a part of the world in the sense that the story can progress in the open world without you having to pretend that the other 100 players fighting the Claw of Jormag with you aren’t also the Commander of the Pact who is responsible for the death of Zhaitan, but it can also make you feel like you’re not interacting with the game world at all; that you’re just an observer, or a nameless mook who runs around killing stuff for the “real” heroes, who take all the credit. I mean, it can’t be a coincidence that one of the most central aspects of Tybalt Leftpaw, a character beloved to the playerbase, was the fact that he had an overt relationship with the player.

I think the best solution is to strike some sort of a balance, but this is far more easily said than done. It means making every player feel like they are a part of the world and have had a small but measurable impact on the world, or otherwise somehow accounting for the existence of all these other heroes running around. I don’t know the best way of doing this, though.

FWIW, for all the flak that Nightfall gets for Kormir, I think that game actually does it best out of all the original Guild Wars games. Whilst it doesn’t satisfy all the (frankly unrealistic) requirements I set out above, joining the Sunspears and rising through the ranks throughout the story, all the while gathering allies with distinct personalities (to complement the sense that you are a part of a larger, faceless force), was the most immersive thing I think I’ve done in an MMO.

Eye of the North was similar in the regard that you’re gathering heroes, but the fact that everyone remembers the names of Jora, Pyre Fierceshot, Vekk, and Ogden, but not the player character who brought them all together is a jarring but (as far as I can see it) unavoidable consequence of the very problem this post discusses.

Another issue with Eye of the North is that it feels like you’re participating in three stories simultaneously across the world, and the fact that it feels like you’re involved with everything that happens in Tyria at the same time is a little immersion-breaking. It’d be as if Tyrion Lannister Game of Thrones was somehow present in every single story across Westeros at the same time just by dint of the fact that he is the “main” character. But then to involve the player in only some of the world’s events with the assurance that other things are happening elsewhere is surely contrary to the spirit of a living world. The branching nature of the personal story dealt with this reasonably well, but it seems clear that this isn’t a viable way of going forward.

Angel McCoy.1832:

This is a very interesting opinion since so many seem to feel the other way. We make every effort to put the player character at the center of the story because…well…it’s your story. But, I also believe that the player character doesn’t always have to be the one with the answers. Sometimes, your teammates (Rox, Braham, etc.) need to help out or risk becoming faceless flunkies. There’s a balance point, of course. Your teammates are an extension of you, living through your story with you.

This is an excellent point. Good examples of this in action is Trahearne verses Tybalt.

Trahearne abducts your personal story to the point where he takes nearly all credit at the end. It was forgettable at best despite the grand “save the world” scale of it all.

Tybalt treats you as an equal, neither the Player nor Tybalt feel like big players in the grand scheme of things. It’s a simple mission filled with character where Tybalt feels less of a mentor than a co-conspirator in some roguish hijinx.

It’s not necessarily the scope of the action, but the level of personal interaction that is the key. It’s not important to be the guy with all the answers, just that you weren’t just along for the ride, force fed story.

Ellen Kiel suffers somewhere in the middle. She was rarely directly involved in the action and was a glorified quest hub npc at times. Still it saddens me she has moved to near irrelevance, given the amount of time and interaction that was spent with her. Mayhaps she’ll redeem her character ( which honestly needs a bit of work ) in the future but, for now she might just as well be forgotten along side the Destiny’s Light drama club.

The current cast is light years better and shows some real progress in story telling. I hope to see some really memorable work coming from the future. This is an area where the Anet team really seems to have listened to the players and made some meaningful work.

Tamias.7059:

FWIW, for all the flak that Nightfall gets for Kormir, I think that game actually does it best out of all the original Guild Wars games. Whilst it doesn’t satisfy all the (frankly unrealistic) requirements I set out above, joining the Sunspears and rising through the ranks throughout the story, all the while gathering allies with distinct personalities (to complement the sense that you are a part of a larger, faceless force), was the most immersive thing I think I’ve done in an MMO.

I AGREE. Even if only because the other two GW1 chapters were WORSE in this aspect, as in both if felt that players were LED by the nose.

This is my MAIN issue with GW2’s storyline: the lack of player agency.

We are not the HEROES. We don’t even MATTER at all. Our characters make NO decision of consequence – the “illusion” of choice we have leads to MEANINGLESS things, while the TRUE heroes, the ones who give the orders and find out the dragons’ secrets and call forth their allies and make epic sacrifices, are the NPCs. GW2’s “personal” storyline is more about TRAHEANNE’s heroism and his rise from scholar to leader than about our characters. Season 1 was more ABOUT the team of MARJORIE and friends than about us.

Part of this is an issue of DELIVERY. ArenaNet probably can’t afford to hire the voice actors for all the 10 player characters just to record a few lines, so our characters are effectively MUTE; and even when it’s a matter of written text, our characters don’t say much anyway.

(Was it WORTH having so many voice actors for the player characters? I think NOT.)

The CINEMATICS are very poor. Which is rather puzzling, considering how cinematics were VERY good in Nightfall and GREAT in the Bonus Mission Pack. Not only the “two talking dummies” approach looks BAD, but also OUR characters rarely appear or DO something in the few action cinematics in the game; they’re usually about someone ELSE.

Yet, despite the PRESENTATION issues, the fact is that our CHARACTERS are usually in the SIDELINES. We are less the heroes than the NPCs, who are the ones that actually DRIVE the story ahead.

IMO, part of this is because ArenaNet is AFRAID. They think the players are so INFATUATED with each player’s OWN view of his/her character that ArenaNet can’t do ANYTHING to break away from said view – in other words, our characters cannot have any kind of PERSONALITY. That is, well, RIDICULOUS – the only way to avoid having a [blank] as the player character is is ArenaNet TAKES the risk and infuses the characters with SOMETHING, with a minimum of personality, with actual friendships with NPCs (and not just “yeah, we’ll do that” for a few levels and then that NPC never appear again), and being smart enough to DRIVE the story, instead of being DRIVEN by the others.

I’m sure SEASON 2 will begin with MARJORIE saying, “we’ll go investigate that jungle dragon now”. I would be VERY happy if it began with OUR characters going to Marjorie and saying, “We’ll go investigate that jungle dragon now. HERE is what we will DO:”.

Angel McCoy.1832:

This is a very interesting opinion since so many seem to feel the other way.

Just wanted to say that I agree 100% with Bellyboomer on this one. I’m being “the one single great hero and saviour of the entire world”, is just a bit too much to swallow.
Too me it doesn’t feel epic. What does feel epic, if is I was a part of that great great battle.
Just like the feeling people in the community shared when they overcame Triple Trouble or Tequila for the first time…

At the same time, I understand both sides, and I do understand that you’ll have to find a proper balance between the two.
(it is a multiplayer game though… and people should accept/love to share the glory)

I agree with OP. The story is OK and getting better, but GW2 is amazing because of its combat system.

Hopefully the new story gets some better more natural dialogue, but most of all lets me do some skilled play for achieves, which is what it sounded like!

Also as for my hero being the “centre,” I really don’t care either way as long as the story is well written. The reason I hated it when Kormir/Traehaerne took over was because I hated Kormir/Traehaerne. I didn’t really care when Togo was the focus in Cantha cuz Togo was a bad kitten .

It all comes down to the one true rule of all epic storytelling (and really almost all satisfying storytelling in general):

Everyone should be the hero of their own story. Everyone.

This is a Joseph Campbell thing. I’m not just talking players- in a perfect world of stories this would go for everyone from NPC’s dying alone in the flames of Lion’s Arch to Scarlet sitting in her lair, plotting a way to end her pain by sharing it with the world. All of them, in their own minds as they live the story of their lives, should see themselves as the hero, the protagonist, in the events unfolding around them.

That doesn’t mean we have to FOCUS on everyone, of course. We are focused on ourselves and the people close to us, so we naturally see more of our own story than the rest of the world. But every character should be built with the understanding that if the viewpoint suddenly shifted, if they took over the narration, they would be the new hero in a related story.

This doesn’t contradict MMO’s at all- on the contrary massively multiplayer gaming has the potential to fulfill the promises made by a thousand generations of mythic storytellers. Unlike movies or books, for once this is actually possible!

And it can really work when it works. I hate to bring another game into this, and I want to make sure it’s clear that I LOVE GW2, greatly admire the work of the story team, and I no longer play this other game… But one of the best examples I can point to was the Wrath of the Lich King expansion in WoW.

It was near perfection in this particular element of storytelling- especially if you created a new Death Knight. From character creation you saw a perspective of the world in which you actually made the transition from antagonist to protagonist while many others around you were doing the same. You became important, yet you were struggling to survive beside many others, increasingly trying to find your own path in a horrifying world. Then, as you joined the main story, you saw familiar faces again and again and watched as they too grew and changed, lived and died in their own struggles. Your own actions earlier would also come back to haunt you…

By the end of WotLK you saved the world and were adored and loathed by many factions- but there was never a moment in which you could do it alone. You were one of a legion but found yourself in the right place at the right time, again and again, to wrest dark power from the adversary and to make the sacrifices the world demanded to keep turning onward. It took a lot of new phasing technology and a LOT of side storylines and voice acting to make it feel natural, but it was really something to experience.

I’m not at all saying GW2 needs to copy that story or those exact techniques there. Tyria is it’s own world and GW2 is it’s own game, and both are really awesome. There are lots of reasons I’m playing this now… You already won me over. (And it’s worth remembering WoW took quite a number of years, not to mention a point of generating truly unreal revenues, before they were able to do something as ambitious and elaborate as WotLK.) But I wanted to give an example of one case, at least, where that kind of storytelling really worked. A world of many individual stories where you weren’t ever exactly at the center- just always close enough that, with enough strength and will, you could make your life (or death) count.

The big secret is: There’s really nothing odd at all with the idea that you are a hero in a world filled with heroes.

Truth is, that’s just life.

Angel McCoy.1832:

Thank you. This is very kind of you to say, and it makes me very happy. We’ve worked hard to make the PC’s best friends interesting and not cookie-cutter buddies. They’re the PC’s supporting cast, and as such, all their stories affect and reflect the PC’s story—your story.

You really do some great work, seriously.

One concrete example that I bet others would agree with: in the current event you can ask Taimi about her legs. And she answers you frankly- turns out honestly she’s not doing great, but it could be a lot worse.

And it doesn’t lead to your next quest. It isn’t a plot moment. You aren’t going to change her life for her or kill a dragon to stop her illness from progressing. You just care, and she appreciates it in her own way, and you’re both just a little bit more real because of it.

That shows a lot of thought- and I for one really appreciate things like that, alongside all the big stuff.

Angel McCoy.1832:

RoyHarmon.5398:

While I understand the obvious technical reasons for it, I’m still a little bothered by the fact that we’re never mentioned by name. Even as Ellen Kiel introduces us to the Zephyrite leader along with all the others, each of the NPCs is mentioned by name. The PC, however, is “And their leader.”

LOL! I know what you mean. You have no idea how hard it is to try to make that sound natural when we can’t use the PC’s name in voiced content. I could write a whole dissertation on it. Believe me, I wish we had that technology. It’s not an easy thing to create though. Quite complex, and very unlikely to ever sound natural. I think it would end up being more immersion breaking than the nicknames we use for your character now.

P.S. You may feel you don’t matter to the game world, but you do matter to us at ArenaNet.

i feel like the “nickname” technique actually works quite well, so long as you don’t stick to it, or treat it as an actual nickname. being called “commander” by everyone in the pact felt natural (at least to me), because it’s a rank, but that’s an exception.

direct dialogue really doesn’t need namecalling, as just referring to the character as “you” seems much more natural. for example, Rox could really tone down on the “my friend” and “our friend”. it makes it sound like she doesn’t realize we’re in the room.

in the case of the festival cutscene, a simple fix would be to introduce us first (as you would introduce the leader of anything). you could call us the hero of lion’s arch or something. maybe have kiel talk to you directly before the introduction to add a personal touch.

so it would be something like this:

“allow me to introduce you the hero of lion’s arch. he, alongside his group of friends [naming them would give the player the feeling of being left out, so keeping everyone unnamed feels better to me], put an end to scarlet”.

this way we get introduced without feeling like an afterthought, and the fact that kiel didn’t name everyone but the player doesn’t subconsciously write the player off as less important.

TL;DR: being directly called out, even if not by the name, is enough. try not to stick to nicknames (god knows how grating “hero of shaemoor” got), and use whatever makes the most sense in the current context. ranks are an exception, though it doesn’t mean you should shoehorn another military group just to justify a rank. for season 2, you can call us by our pact and/or order rank where it makes sense, for example. yes, three orders, but is it really that much more expensive to record the same line changing one word?

Just to be different, I actually like Traherne better than any of the LS story cast. I just can’t take any of them seriously.

And I’m not a huge fan of Traherne either, but at least he didn’t come off like a comic sidekick.

Perhaps I shall add another voice to the pile of those who don’t like being the One True Hero all the time. We are out there, after all, even if we’re quiet.

I’ve been feeling very awkward in every Living Story cutscene that paints me as the “Leader”. I do not feel like I earned the title, nor do I particularly want it. I would much rather be, say, a researcher who’s helping figure out the puzzle, or a soldier fighting against a dangerous enemy, assisting as I can.

I can’t recall any one point where a decision I made, as a player, affected how the group I am “leading” actually decided to act, which seems to me to be the one key requirement for leading a group. There were times I brought important information or lead the charge, but still, without being able to actually lead, I feel like no “Leader”.

This makes the various celebratory cutscenes of the last few updates rather cringe-worthy to me. I feel like a fraud, or perhaps a mascot, a puppet leader they can point to when someone asks. It feels similar to a salesman calling you “friend”, a title that you want to be called by most people, but in that particular case brings up all the red flags. It actually makes me feel excluded from the group far more than if I was standing on the side, unmentioned.

I would much rather have the story bring in the power of a multiplayer game. Our characters live in a world full of adventurers, full of heroes. There are many who answer the call, who run into danger rather than away from it. Each of us brings our own part to the story and there should be no One True Hero, for we are all heroes. We should be working together to forge the future rather than commanding others to follow behind as we lead.

Many games tell us stories of the Power of One, but few manage the Power of Many. There are so many interesting political scenarios, large-scale endeavors, even massive armies clashing like in Season 1, the things that only work if there are many heroes who all think and act differently. I want to lose every so often, to have others support me, just as I want to support them, let them take the limelight for the great things they do.

That’s one of the strengths of WvW, how it tells its own stories of politics and warfare, but there the story ends every time the maps reset. The slates are wiped clean, and while the politics may change over time, the battlefield is the same. But in the Living Story, such epic stories can continue to grow and evolve.

Now, I know that there are many who do want to be the Hero, so I do not request that you get rid of all those story elements. Merely let us tailor it a bit more, let me choose to be the power behind the throne rather than the fool on top of it once in a while. If I wanted to play a game where I ruled everything, well, that’s what single-player games are for. And there are many ways to be a true hero without being the One True Hero.

In some ways, what I want is the storytelling equivalent of the fight against the Marionette. There are times when working as a team is what’s important, where you have to band together to hold the lane against enemies. And then there are times when it comes down to just a few, where one player can make the difference between winning and losing. Those times where I was fighting my hardest, buffing all my allies with Empower so we could kill that warden before the last seconds ran down, those are some of the most exhilarating moments I have ever had in any game. But it would have meant nothing if those on the lanes weren’t fighting their hardest too, giving us few on the platform the space we needed to finish the job. In the story as well, sometimes I want to be part of the crowd defending the lanes, sometimes fighting as a small team on the platform, sometimes the last one left standing and the fate of many resting on my small shoulders.

Many times this game has already delivered on this careful balance of having many heroes via gameplay. But the story doesn’t always follow the same pattern. We’re cast in the starring role, no matter what we did or want. Even when others take the lead, such as Traherne, they defer to us, unable to act without our reassurances. Not our decisions, though, since we make few true decisions, and none that change the patterns of the world.

Perhaps the ones like the OP who ask to become the Hero and those like me who want to stop being called one are reacting to the same things. This “Leader” role feels hollow, unearned. Some players want more real power, others want the fake title removed to better match our real actions.

TL;DR. I don’t want to be the “Leader” of the Biconics, not unless I truly earn it. I’d rather be their friend, and not their only one. Let the story match the world, with every player being their own form of hero.

Tamias.7059:

FWIW, for all the flak that Nightfall gets for Kormir, I think that game actually does it best out of all the original Guild Wars games. Whilst it doesn’t satisfy all the (frankly unrealistic) requirements I set out above, joining the Sunspears and rising through the ranks throughout the story, all the while gathering allies with distinct personalities (to complement the sense that you are a part of a larger, faceless force), was the most immersive thing I think I’ve done in an MMO.

This was what I loved about Nightfall and Eye of the North, the element of rising through the ranks of the groups we fought for, gaining more respect as we went. I was quite happy to not be the leader, I was some guy from Tyria who travelled to Elona, they had no reason to respect me without me working alongside current structures.

This is where I think GW2 has improved in some areas, but taken a step back in others. I like that we worked our way through order ranks, and were then drafted into the Pact. This was referenced in the cutscenes, and was a clear part of the LS. But in the open world, I have no way of showing the other citizens of Tyria that I have done any of those things, other than wearing Order Armor really. I’d actually like to see Title tracks come back, like we had for Sunspears or EotN races. Playing through the campaign gets you so far, but then you could also go back and continue working through the ranks (which would work far better now with dynamic events).

(Off topic; I’d also like to see the same for Racial reputations. I’m a charr, but if I spend most of my time in Kryta, and earn reputation with the Krytans, can I maybe get some Krytan cultural armor? )

So yeah, I’m pretty happy with not being the center of attention. I do think though that Rox/Braham and the others were far better introduced to us as characters than Trahearne was.

@Angel: I am really curious about the LS2 What interests me the most is if the Destiny’s Edge won’t be the big part of the next story. Their mission was to go after the dragons but it seems that after Zhaitan they felt like “Oh well, our work is done”. I understand that some of the voice actors are really hard to get but I would be really interested in putting their personal reasoning into the game=so that Rytlock and company would personally explain to our character why they aren’t going after the next dragon. That would be cool.

Edit: and maybe I’m wrong, I guess I will have to wait and see.

Angel McCoy.1832:

Yes, you nailed it. I’m not sure we’ve completely figured out the best way either, but we’re getting closer all the time, and we’re always working toward that goal. Discussion threads like this help us to get a feel for how we’re doing and for what you want. Thanks for posting!

I used to think there were two sides of this debate, players that wanted to be the hero and players that wanted to play a faceless witness of other heroes. I used to think I was on the former side (I’m doing all these things, I want the story to recognise me) but after seeing all the NPCs recognise me as the one who took down Scarlet, I began to think that wasn’t right either. I may have been the only one in the instance, but the defeat of Scarlet was a community experience. I was on Teamspeak with my guild of dozens of other people. We had been organising trying to take down the Watchknights to reach Scarlet. I recognise most of the regular commanders on my server (and guild leadership types) and I also recognised them when taking down Scarlet. In a way, the gameplay really reinforced the idea that this was a community effort – an army of heroes united forces to take down Scarlet. That was the truth to me. I know Kasmeer and the group were there but they didn’t defeat Scarlet, it was the players (it’s always the players). While I was happy to see the world recognise my actions I was uncomfortable being viewed as the one as opposed to one of the many that defeated Scarlet. This might go back to the original post talking about fitting a story into gameplay, but while the story is selling this victory as my own, the gameplay told a very different story. I honestly would rather see the story credit the actions as many for the defeat of Scarlet, not a five person party. I am credited in that, but it also recognises that I did it with my friends – not the NPCs, but my actual friends.

Still, it’s interesting to see different player’s takes on the PC’s identity and role in the story. For instance, I am fine with Braham taking a front seat in the credit portion of things if it comes to him finally earning his own name, forging his own legend and moving out from underneath his mother’s shadow. As long as he truly and personally accomplishes the task (give the PC some other gameplay objective to aid him) and it’s not something huge (like taking down Jormag) I’d enjoy that story.

Angel McCoy.1832:

Thank you. This is very kind of you to say, and it makes me very happy. We’ve worked hard to make the PC’s best friends interesting and not cookie-cutter buddies. They’re the PC’s supporting cast, and as such, all their stories affect and reflect the PC’s story—your story.

I really don’t like that these characters are being written as the PC’s best friends. That’s not what a best friend is. It’s not someone your mother sets you up with and says “this is your best friend, spend all your time with them”. We don’t choose our family but we choose our friends. Calling these characters (or writing them that way) the PC’s best friends is not being true to my identity (and history) as the PC, it removes my ownership of my character and their role in the story, even if it’s just a trivial level. I have a warband, I have a close friend (Faren, Petra, Quinn – admittedly this has a similar problem to the biconics), I have countless allies I’ve worked with along the way to take down Zhaitan – and even in the official timeline I did this all before I met Braham and the group. Not only am I close with Trahearne and other Pact/Order members, I’ve personally been involved with reuniting Destinty’s Edge. Most importantly, my journey in Tyria isn’t a single player experience. I have guild members, I have a friends list, I have pugs and commanders all who work together to accomplish things in Tyria. It’s not my story when I can’t choose something as simple as who my friends are.

Personally I’ve found the biconics to be very self-serving. They are interesting individuals at times, but they don’t make the stories around them more interesting. They tend to draw focus towards themselves instead of the events they are participating in. I enjoy pieces of their portrayal (I think Marjory’s history in DR would be cool to explore, I’d be interested to see Braham forge a legend, Taimi is interesting to explore asuran culture) but I rarely feel like they enhance the story unless they are used as an exposition dump (like Taimi during EotM with leylines or her recent comments about suspicous cargo). Destiny’s Edge felt like they had a clear purpose in the story, I knew why I cared about them and I knew why the world did. Sure there was a lot of self serving conflict in the group, but I rarely found myself wondering “of all the people in Tyria, why am I with these guys?” like I do with the biconics.

Shiren.9532:

While I was happy to see the world recognise my actions I was uncomfortable being viewed as the one as opposed to one of the many that defeated Scarlet.

One comment on this, because there is something quite unusual about how it played out for MMO content:

Remember that you personally were the one that cornered the severely wounded Scarlet in her lair and ultimately delivered the killing blow. You literally were given the chance to use the game mechanic finisher for this, which shocked and impressed me, personally. Each character has their own version of that particular story moment, but in your personal narrative it really was you (character), and you (player) actually did hit the buttons to make it happen. To me that made it more real than the average “you killed it in a raid” tag.

I actually was really impressed with that bit of instanced content because it was a wonderful moment of existential moral ambiguity, particularly given that you (player) have very little choice in the matter, Bioshock Infinite style. (In fact it felt more than a little like the handing over of the infant in Bioshock to me.)

In the end each character’s personal narrative goes: one soldier/scholar/rogue among many, you were at the fulcrum of history at just the right moment. And at that moment you had the ruthlessness to take Scarlet’s piece off the board forever. The world will remember you for that. Your myth will grow larger than life, your role will be exaggerated, and perhaps one day long after the real you is gone you might be renowned as a hero still or perhaps revised to someone with cruel motivations. And it is all because you just happened to be the one with the sword/axe/unicorn-rainbow-shooting-greatsword-of-death in your hand at the moment where the only option seemed to be the one that ended with cold blood on the ground in front of you.

So just an alternate perspective, but that is pretty real to me- I bet there are long dead kings, presidents, and soldiers who would agree with your discomfort. Your discomfort in how you are remembered, as opposed to all that really happened, is perhaps a very believable part of your story.

The thing that stands out to me from the OP is the talk about melodrama. Most of the good dialogue is comedic, and a lot of the ‘emotional’ moments come off like a soap opera, like Kasmeer’s freakout in Scarlet’s End. I think part of it is that while most of the characters we spend time are pleasant company, we only know the broadest strokes about their personality, and the attempts at dimensionality (like Marjory’s relationship with Kasmeer) feel like they’re conflicting with rather than deepening what’s already established.

Bellyboomer.3048:

Btw, I’m glad I’m not always the hero. There are millions of characters in the gw2 universe, it would seem rather crappy that they would all be the awesome hero who saved the universe from doom. I like being among the ranks: a commander in the pact, a faceless wanderer who joins up with some others and become the heroes of LA… It’s just a personal taste, I like being a not-so-extrordinary character who the steps up to the plate when he’s needed to.

It really bothered me in the personal story that after only a few away missions I was already promoted to the highest rank in the centuries-old Order of Whispers and the natural choice to be second-in-command of the Pact. I think I’d have preferred it if advancing in the order had been an end-game thing, and you work your way up the ranks of the Pact as part of the story, eventually becoming Commander for the final assault.

LOL! I know what you mean. You have no idea how hard it is to try to make that sound natural when we can’t use the PC’s name in voiced content. I could write a whole dissertation on it. Believe me, I wish we had that technology. It’s not an easy thing to create though. Quite complex, and very unlikely to ever sound natural. I think it would end up being more immersion breaking than the nicknames we use for your character now.

I think the nickname approach is probably the most effective way to handle this, but I’ve seen some games deviate slightly between the written script and the voice acting. Usually they handle it in a way where the written script gets cut off after the player’s name, and before where the player’s name would be in the voice acting. I’m sure you’ve examined that approach, though.

First of all thanks for listening to us, means a lot to know that you’re listening. First remember we all want an escape valve from the day to day stress, so far you gave us:

1-A wonderful combat system (time flies away fighting in gw)
2-Companions I actually care about (love all of them)
3-A epic story is unfolding and the world is evolving
4-Bravo to the map designers, its wonderful to escape every day into your beautiful visions of tyria
5-You managed to create a world were we as players actually help each other, that is rare and makes coming to tyria rewarding

Now the not so greats:

1-Personal instance is a great idea but so underexplored
2-We as players are lost in our roles, the combat system conflicts with the story telling. In the combat system we’re no heroes, hell we even aren’t the best there are in what we do, those are the champions, the true legendary heroes, we are soldiers, part of an army composed by thousands of warriors/guardians/engineers/elementalists/necros/mesmers and thiefs, but in the personal story were commanders…so this doesn’t feel natural.

So now my sugestions about this two problems:

1-Use our instance as a place we’re we can have mini stories, let us have friends that care for us, family that wishes us well, people to fear for our lifes, let us feel there is a small place in the game world were we are loved and cared for, we all as humans want and love that feeling of having a small space we feel at home. I’d love going to my home instance and see people caring i die fighting a elder dragon, or simply welcoming me home as a war veteran.

2-Don’t treat us as super heroes or epic commanders,…treat the players as soldiers in a army composed by all players, this leads to several approaches to dialog and story telling:

-We can have ranks in the army based on our achievements or account points, this allows us to feel more engaged with our characters
-The dialog can refer to us by our rank, oh i heard about the infantry that lost so many fighting the elder dragon, welcome back my friend, i cant believe you are now an arch mage, you sacrificed much to achieve this, etc…
-Our home instance can change according to the rank, same with instances (in open world events, let us show our rank so that new players gravitate to more experienced one, to benefit from their skill) this will increase the feeling of being an army and feel so much more natural.
-Tie the achievements with our home instance, would be great entering it and hearing wow he killed liadri, or we saw you fighting liadri hope you make it next time…

Thanks for reading, wish you all the best and thanks for giving me a place to relax in my day to day life

[quote=4095485;Tamias.7059:]

Gundail.7594:

Angel McCoy.1832:

This is a very interesting opinion since so many seem to feel the other way. We make every effort to put the player character at the center of the story because…well…it’s your story. But, I also believe that the player character doesn’t always have to be the one with the answers. Sometimes, your teammates (Rox, Braham, etc.) need to help out or risk becoming faceless flunkies. There’s a balance point, of course. Your teammates are an extension of you, living through your story with you.

…

Trahearne abducts your personal story to the point where he takes nearly all credit at the end. It was forgettable at best despite the grand “save the world” scale of it all.
…

This one was just a bad call – still sticks in my craw (wherever that is).

Kain Francois.4328:

Hey Season 2 Writers, if you can hear us, we demand more Lord Faren~!

Love,
The Cult of Lord Faren

XOXOXOXO

PS. I’m rich, you know.

Umm, pretend this post never existed.

Talyn Sneider.1825:

First of all thanks for listening to us, means a lot to know that you’re listening.

Heck yeah! I’ve never seen another major MMO story team so obviously engaged. It is absolutely awesome. (And frankly it encourages me to spend more money on the game too, just for the record. Tell that to your BA’s, would ya?)

Talyn Sneider.1825:

-We can have ranks in the army based on our achievements or account points, this allows us to feel more engaged with our characters
-The dialog can refer to us by our rank, oh i heard about the infantry that lost so many fighting the elder dragon, welcome back my friend, i cant believe you are now an arch mage, you sacrificed much to achieve this, etc…

This is a darn good idea, and I’ll add to it:

What if you had your actors voice a nickname based on each title? (Naturally you’d do it for a ton of possible future titles too, so you could get it done all in a session to contain expenses.)

For example, “Mist Runner” could probably just be voiced as-is, while “Combat Healer” might be voiced simply as “Medic” so it would flow naturally into dialogue.

Add to that a couple generic ones such as race (“Norn” or “big guy” for males of that race, “Charr” or “Legionnaire” for them, etc.), class if course, and personal story faction (“soldier”, “scholar”, “rogue”, etc.) as well as “commander” for those with the tag.

Then based on what title you currently have selected and whether you have a commander tag up, the dialogue with npc’s could rotate through some appropriate nicknames.

That would add a touch to the fun of having a title too, especially if there’s any dialogue other players can hear. And as far as Talyn’s military idea, something like that could blend in seamlessly via earned military titles.

Honestly, the balance in LS1 is a little . . . off. For the first half the story was about people stopping events, not really a particular person. There were some NPCs which were rallied around but for the most part there was no singular identity for “the adventurers who stopped the Bad Stuff”.

Then Scarlet came into play, and it became a story about thwarting her plans or trying to anticipate them (in the one instance) . . . but the feeling of it being a group of adventurers started to shift into “and a group of NPCs plus a PC”. With the exception of the Marionette and Battle of Lion’s Arch, nothing was really feeling like it was “us”. A community victory, just personal ones.

I think the community victory earned is actually more satisfying than a personal victory. Seeing that recognized instead of the B-iconics plus one would be amazing, but technically difficult to make work without resorting to some out-of-game work such as one party making up a newsletter or something similar.

By the by, that’s one reason I do still try to get involved in WvW when I play – for me there is a better feeling of a couple commanders who are worth the 100g tag rallying to take Stonemist Castle and hold it for the counterattack, than there was for a successful marionette kill.

I love your work, but forgiveness…

I’m not against that. What bother me currently is the Sylvari-everywhere thing. I overdosed.

I would like to see more about Charr and Asura civilizations. I would like to see their city developped, becoming more roleplay friendly, solve some troubles inside, begin to discover what’s around but is currently unreachable and, step by step, experience a political plot story there. Slowly coming back to our origins, begin to explore the underground to recover our legacy and discover the past events.

Yes, I would like that the journey teach us more about environment, cultures. It’s important to feel close to its character, to know how it evolves. Personally, I don’t think that my character spent his free days away from home. I want a sequel! He’s he call back home at a time ?

I also wish to see the Consortium story, where it comes, the Southsun cove evolution. A well crafted script of their expansion goal, lucrative markets. Will they try to colonized other places, make ski station on the Shiverpeaks, make a seaside resort in Orr ?

Angel McCoy.1832:

RoyHarmon.5398:

While I understand the obvious technical reasons for it, I’m still a little bothered by the fact that we’re never mentioned by name. Even as Ellen Kiel introduces us to the Zephyrite leader along with all the others, each of the NPCs is mentioned by name. The PC, however, is “And their leader.”

LOL! I know what you mean. You have no idea how hard it is to try to make that sound natural when we can’t use the PC’s name in voiced content. I could write a whole dissertation on it. Believe me, I wish we had that technology. It’s not an easy thing to create though. Quite complex, and very unlikely to ever sound natural. I think it would end up being more immersion breaking than the nicknames we use for your character now.

P.S. You may feel you don’t matter to the game world, but you do matter to us at ArenaNet.

Aw, shucks. I bet you say that to all your players.

BrunoBRS.5178:

i feel like the “nickname” technique actually works quite well, so long as you don’t stick to it, or treat it as an actual nickname. being called “commander” by everyone in the pact felt natural (at least to me), because it’s a rank, but that’s an exception.

direct dialogue really doesn’t need namecalling, as just referring to the character as “you” seems much more natural. for example, Rox could really tone down on the “my friend” and “our friend”. it makes it sound like she doesn’t realize we’re in the room.

in the case of the festival cutscene, a simple fix would be to introduce us first (as you would introduce the leader of anything). you could call us the hero of lion’s arch or something. maybe have kiel talk to you directly before the introduction to add a personal touch.

so it would be something like this:

“allow me to introduce you the hero of lion’s arch. he, alongside his group of friends [naming them would give the player the feeling of being left out, so keeping everyone unnamed feels better to me], put an end to scarlet”.

this way we get introduced without feeling like an afterthought, and the fact that kiel didn’t name everyone but the player doesn’t subconsciously write the player off as less important.

TL;DR: being directly called out, even if not by the name, is enough. try not to stick to nicknames (god knows how grating “hero of shaemoor” got), and use whatever makes the most sense in the current context. ranks are an exception, though it doesn’t mean you should shoehorn another military group just to justify a rank. for season 2, you can call us by our pact and/or order rank where it makes sense, for example. yes, three orders, but is it really that much more expensive to record the same line changing one word?

I agree with the “commander” thing. I totally felt like I was being addressed directly when someone called me “Commander.”

As for the rest of it, you also have to consider things like file download size (more lines of audio mean larger files and longer downloads, which can matter for those with monthly data quotas and such), gender-specific pronouns (in your example, “he, alongside his group of friends”) that would have to be recorded differently (possibly have a modular system in which one-word recorded clips of the pronouns could be spliced into the dialogue on a per-character basis, though that sounds — no pun intended — as complicated as this sentence structure), and potential legal issues with the splicing of SAG voice actors’ audio recordings, although I don’t know how any of that works.

Wow, was that really all once sentence? That’s why I’m not a writer.

Silalus.8760:

Everything.

You’re right.

I agree that we don’t each have to be the main hero. That sort of scenario worked okay in gw1. There, I ran the entirety of gameplay with just heroes and henchmen, so I felt like I was central to the story. Easy, when every combat area was an instance so I’d never see anyone else.

In gw2, the entire game seems to be about the massive community. And, while it’s different, it’s also very cool. In a world where we can, quite literally, see hundreds or thousands of other players, the sense of community-driven story fits fine.

Also, I’ll be honest, I don’t care which NPC is able to recognize my accomplishments. That doesn’t mean anything. I think other players being able to recognize accomplishments is way cooler. This already happens with things like the map star, titles, and even some reward items (although this is becoming less meaningful as people are able to circumvent reward requirements through PvP which should have its own reward system, but that’s a whole other topic.)

So, in the end, coming away with a title you can display is actually pretty rewarding. Look, I was there, I did X. And it displays your accomplishments for real people to see.

Maybe, instead of having ridiculously-difficult titles attached to a portion of the meta that isn’t the main storyline, we could get a title for living-story participation at certain segments. This “proves I was there” without having to code scripts for NPC interactions that are completely void of long-term meaning.

For that matter, how about an “inspect” feature that, instead of inspecting gear or skills (which would be terrible) we could inspect certain account accomplishments?

I know this isn’t all related to story-telling, which is what you’re looking for. But it’s my take on the value of the story interactions versus the long-term title-type rewards.

i think personal story was way more balanced than LS because of feeling that "they need you and you need them concept ".
from very beginning of PS(personal story) you need help and guide of your race hero like zoja,caitie,logan, rytlock etc. without their help you are lost and no idea what to do.
later in personal story you need pact and the sylvari hero with power of cleansing ore( i forgot his name) and their ships to weaken zaitan greatly and finally finish him off. all of them also need you to help them join together as alliance including helping destiny edges. and on top of all do the dirty job of killing bad guys(lol). so at the end it is very mutual relationship and balanced.
LS lost that feeling by introducing other npc heroes and focusing on them, this made story like their story and you are not important any more.
in LS you became more like soldier of them to do their biding, to do the dirty job of killing . i might as well watch season 2 on you tube rather than doing it for hours to become to know what happened. my character is not important anymore like he was in his personal story. LS is not personal i know but you might as well remove the requirement that player should be present, you go a head and made story like animation series which develop/unfold very slowly by the way. and i will watch that kind of story on youtube rather than playing through it.

All really good points in here. I think we have strayed way too much into the “i’m the hero/I’m just one person” part of the discussion though. It was a very minor point of my original post. The majority of my post was about how the dramatic parts of the story line need to be on par with the comedic parts. That was mostly what this was about.

Shiren.9532:

Angel McCoy.1832:

Yes, you nailed it. I’m not sure we’ve completely figured out the best way either, but we’re getting closer all the time, and we’re always working toward that goal. Discussion threads like this help us to get a feel for how we’re doing and for what you want. Thanks for posting!

I used to think there were two sides of this debate, players that wanted to be the hero and players that wanted to play a faceless witness of other heroes. I used to think I was on the former side (I’m doing all these things, I want the story to recognise me) but after seeing all the NPCs recognise me as the one who took down Scarlet, I began to think that wasn’t right either.
…..
…..
…..

Still, it’s interesting to see different player’s takes on the PC’s identity and role in the story. For instance, I am fine with Braham taking a front seat in the credit portion of things if it comes to him finally earning his own name, forging his own legend and moving out from underneath his mother’s shadow. As long as he truly and personally accomplishes the task (give the PC some other gameplay objective to aid him) and it’s not something huge (like taking down Jormag) I’d enjoy that story.

The big problem is that most people only see two sides of the debate.

@all, for example, If I disagree with being a faceless soldier among dozens of others whose contribution meant nothing in the long term, then half of the community will (and has)immediately accuse me of wanting to be the super heroic god king that demand everyone kneel in front of me, then the accusations of narcissism and delusion follow soon after because for some reason, I am wrong for disagreeing with you.

Those are the two most extreme ends of the debate, the faceless collective on one side, and the god-king emperors on the other. But, as real life should have taught everyone by the time they became an adult, there is never only two sides to any argument. There is never just your side of the coin. The world is always gray, and there could be dozens, even hundreds of separate points of view on the same issue.

In my case, I believe that the characters who did absolutely nothing should be recognized for doing absolutely nothing (such as the many AFK’ers that people complained about during these events [and I bet you remember a name or two that stuck out. I know I did!], as well as the NPCs that I thought don’t deserve what they got [Ellen Kiel for example, who did nothing but play key master while watching you get filleted by cannon fire in a dungeon])

Iason Evan.3806:

All really good points in here. I think we have strayed way too much into the “i’m the hero/I’m just one person” part of the discussion though. It was a very minor point of my original post. The majority of my post was about how the dramatic parts of the story line need to be on par with the comedic parts. That was mostly what this was about.

True, but that’s not as interesting to talk about as the extremely polarizing “I want/don’t want to be the hero” part of your post.

Iason Evan.3806:

All really good points in here. I think we have strayed way too much into the “i’m the hero/I’m just one person” part of the discussion though. It was a very minor point of my original post. The majority of my post was about how the dramatic parts of the story line need to be on par with the comedic parts. That was mostly what this was about.

Good point, and I completely agree. The Han Solo comparison really hit the nail on the head. My family and I all stopped killing Scarlet because we couldn’t take the forced (and seemingly out-of-place) shoehorned love story embedded in the instance. However, the follow-up in the bar where Braham keeps replying to Taimi with “Uh huh” was so classic. I went and re-watched it several times for the laughs.

Of course, I’m a parent of 3 kids, one a talkative little 5-year old girl, so I could relate to the humor.

Angel McCoy.1832:

Tamias.7059:

I think the best solution is to strike some sort of a balance, but this is far more easily said than done. It means making every player feel like they are a part of the world and have had a small but measurable impact on the world, or otherwise somehow accounting for the existence of all these other heroes running around. I don’t know the best way of doing this, though.

Yes, you nailed it. I’m not sure we’ve completely figured out the best way either, but we’re getting closer all the time, and we’re always working toward that goal. Discussion threads like this help us to get a feel for how we’re doing and for what you want. Thanks for posting!

FWIW, and as others have indicated, the Prime Hologram fight was something that did this really well. Fighting the Assault Knights beforehand meant splitting up into multiple groups, which automatically makes the player feel like a more important part of the battle without putting them at the centre of the universe (this is something that worked really well in the Twisted Marionette battle as well, first with the lanes and then on the platforms), and then fighting the Prime Hologram in a huge group gave the feeling that although you weren’t necessarily the key component in the battle, you were certainly an important one, you were there when it happened, and you really contributed in some way. I would have actually been entirely satisfied if it had been Scarlet up there rather than the Prime Hologram—beating the “final boss” of a story arc in a world event like that is an entirely appropriate way of going about things in an MMO, and it did more to make me feel like a part of a giant assault force than the final battle against Zhaitan did. Hopefully, the same thing will be possible when it comes to fight Mordremoth, but I imagine that’ll take place in a dungeon, or a story instance.

Of course, the final blow against Scarlet was struck in a short story instance instead. This isn’t something I have a problem with, but I have been told by a few people that it felt anticlimactic after the decidedly more epic battle against her Prime Hologram (I think the music went a long way toward achieving that feel), despite the fact that it is “you” who personally finishes her off.

One of the things I did really like about Scarlet’s End was Kasmeer. Making her an integral part of the boss battle mechanics was a stroke of genius, and made me really value her character in a way I might not have otherwise. Defeating Scarlet without her really would have been much more difficult. More of this would really curb the complaints that story NPC’s are “taking the credit”, I think. Upping the difficulty of dungeons and story instances, but as compensation increasing the power and usefulness of NPC’s would be a huge step forward, but making them a part of boss mechanics, for example, would be much better. The NPC’s being so useless was definitely one of the most immersion-breaking aspects of the personal story, and by design, most interaction a player does in Guild Wars 2 is combat. Making allies a part of that as well as foes could be the secret to making players like them and want to hang out with them.

Hum, a well written and developed thread, which has attired Anet attention. I find it wonderful, so I’ll say what I feel.

The Personnal Story and LS1 where mostly good. Not great, or incredible, but good nonetheless; however, the Lion Arch battle was awesome. I must confess that, for the first time in an MMo, I felt incredibly in the mood to kill Scarlet for various reasons : a truly ruined LA (and not just an occupied with some smokes) and more than anything else, the screams in the audio background. And inside this wonderful theatre, the characters ‘especially Rox and Braham) felt real, and it gave me some more reasons to go and get Scarlet’s head, even though I couldn’t play much at that time.

But such epic battles can’t constitute the beginning and the end of GW2 Living Story. In my opinion, to achieve greatness, the Season should mix both epic-scale trials and more political/mundane actions. Example : on of the patch deal with the player and other heroes fighting Mordremoth’s minions to prevent them to swarm some important place, then, as the danger seem to recede, the players could deal with political struggle in Krytia (which is probably bolstered by the state of LA, since there is probably some nobles and Ministers seeking to reclaim the city as a part of the Krytian Kingdom, hoping to get enough political clout to threaten Jennah) so we would get both epic battles and political deals which would be extremely important in the lore.

Furthermore, I fell that the LS could be used to advance some plot points which aren’t necessarily that important, but which would still make the world a more living place. Imagine the patch where we deal with Krytian political struggle. It could seems too little for some, so what about adding something about another race (how does the Asura deal with the revelations brought on the Enquest actions in the dungeons, how does the Arcane Council act, etc./ How does the Wolfborn are a novelty in the Norn’s customs and traditions of being lone hunters and how do they deal with the Sons of Svanir in Hoelbrak… or maybe some insight of the Sons to make them more than random evil mooks ?).

But, whatever ANet will do, I’m sure that the LS2 will be better than the first, so I can’t wait for July the First !

Well, I’ll try pitching my small grain of salt towards my outlook on the Living Story, as well as personal story. The more the merrier!

I believe Guild Wars 2 has taken a very nice approach to the multiple choice setting with its Personal Story setup. Making sure to keep whenether or not the multiple choices, with due exceptions, take place regardless of your presence; And in many cases hinting that even if you don’t partake in the process of getting things done, someone else will and then succeed in what you would have otherwise done yourself. This, however, is something you must figure out yourself by knowing the NPCs that show up as you course along. I would have very much enjoyed it, personally, if it was made clear and canonical that most of these initiatives happen. Simply because you didn’t want to save the Priory Scholars in Orr, doesn’t mean everyone should have shrugged it off and gone “Oh well, we’ll get more.”; I would have liked to simply appoint someone else to the task. Because it makes sense. Because that’s what anyone with common sense would’ve done, even if they had to lead an army themselves on the other hand.
Choices and NPCs faded over time; This was one of my gripes. Each time I see a cameo of the old start-of-the-game npcs, even now in Living Story, I get fuzzy feelings. This is a good thing! It means the game was NPCs you want to remember. That you -can- remember. And yet, despite we were told our actions would reflect the people that would be interacted with in our storylines, and after these, our home instances… I never get to see the characters I’ve supposedly made to join me. Or my army. Or simply heavily bonded with. These NPCs lose any and all impact on my character soon as he becomes a commander, despite Living Story assumes my character has enough free time to come and save everyone’s behind’s with the guest star appearance of Kasmeer.
This is a let down. And as Valmir noted, there are so many things NPCs, factions and organizations -could- and -should- do, yet they don’t… that I feel as if the world around my character was pretty null and hardly mattered, as everything will fail and everyone will hit against brick walls unless I hand-guide them to not be completely ignorant in their behavior. The setting has so many great leadership and minds that it feels underwhelming no one else in the world can bother to do any of these menial tasks but a passing traveler raising to utmost glory; And while the hero complex is always enjoyable in these games, the “if you are not there, the world implodes.” feeling is rather… lackluster.
How things behave, specially how much time it takes for things to take place, in my opinion, requires a lot of polishing. Armies should take much more preparation, training and refining to ever have a shot at what our characters currently accomplish. And the player should be given much more insight in characters like Destinity’s Edge or Rox ’n Co. sooner than be expected to automatically care about their personal drama and the power of their feelings while the world around is literally being set aflame by giant world ending dragons. Specially when the character leading the group has met far more stable and reliable people in the past that s/he should have no reason not to call to instead of them in times of need.

Dr Ritter.1327:

They need to kill off all these lame characters from LS1 and give us some cool people to run with. I want to team up with a largos or something.

Having worked with one for part of the Living Story . . . I am not too impressed.

Hmm I think that NPC heroes add flavour and depth to the living story. They also give you a narrative outlook.
I think it would be great if another LS hero appeared next season, along with a couple more of villains with definite character. I saw Scarlett as a character without depth, and in comparison Canach was better.

Another thing : often in the animated cut scenes I had the impression that my character was a mere bystander. The perfect example was with the introduction of the heroes to the zephyrite envoy. It would be much better if at times one of the main LS characters was engaging with the PC , making comments, giving encouragements, shamelessly criticizing, etc… I’d like to be amongst the henchmen.

Along the lines of the characters that people are talking about, that was one of my issues with LS S1. Not that the characters were bad—they were awesome!— but that they were totally different than the NPCs used when the game launched. There is a real disjointed feel to the game because of it. Even if Destiny’s Edge disbanded and had infighting among them, they still cared enough about the world to save it. They should still be visibly saving it now and they were all mysteriously away. A tale can be weaved as to why this was, but they should have been present for continuity.

I think something that should change going forward is adding new characters but keeping the focus on the characters we already have and really developing those characters past where they are now. If Destiny’s Edge comes back in some capacity, that would be great too. I mind Trahearne, but even he would be a welcome addition because he could tie the action together.

Like I said in my original post, the dragons need to be the focal point of the combat story going forward. They need to drive the action.

I am really hoping that this whole story has been written before we get to it. We didn’t really get a gratifying end to GW1 because iteration caused GW: Utopia to never be created. I would really like a complete and worthwhile story to be told in GW2.