Guild Wars 2

First, I am not leaving. I play every day and do most of the LS content.

I am in 3 guilds, 2 of which are dead. I have had friends in my 2 dead guilds start asking me about what is going on in GW2 because they heard about all the new content and where thinking about coming back. So I tell them about all the great updates we have had, but then I have to tell them, “sorry, it was temporary so you missed out”.
It’s a real downer. None of my friends has any interest in returning once they find out they missed so much content that they will most likely never see again. Telling them there is new content every 2 weeks makes no difference it seems.

Has anyone else experienced this with their friends? Opinions? Is LS really a reason not to return?

ShiningSquirrel.3751:

Has anyone else experienced this with their friends? Opinions? Is LS really a reason not to return?

My brother stopped playing solely because of the Living Story. He enjoys the game, but he works a crazy schedule. Between his job and his familial obligations, he had very limited time to play. When he did play (one day a week), he felt torn between trying to “keep up” with the Living Story or progressing his character. That pull in two directions caused him to sour on the game, and thus he quit. The shame of it is he’s the one who turned me onto the game in the first place.

That is the precise reason my first guild fell apart, and a contributor to the demise of my second guild. I’m the only single guy in my group of friends, and I find the LS pace too hectic to be enjoyable. For my friends, who sneak in a couple hours here and there when family obligations permit, they always find that the content they’ve heard about that sounded interesting enough to come back for is gone already, and while the content that’s available right now may be cool, the GOTTA FARM IT ALL ASAP attitude the active community has makes for a less than stellar play experience.

Its been mentioned before that players dont like missing out of content. They are “forced” into playing the LS or miss out, and thats not a good feeling for most. This results in burnout so you need to learn how to ignore it.

There’s actually more people playing now than at launch. Sorry your guild failed.

It’s all a perception problem. You don’t have to do a single bit of the living story ever. You can always jump into living story if you like what’s currently on offer. It doesn’t matter if you miss some achievements or dailies. This really is a case of looking at a 3/4 full cup and saying it is almost empty.

I dont care much about the AP, but there are sometimes limited skins given after you complete the meta. Every single one of those should be tradable in TP. The sunless wings is NOT tradable.

The living story content, usually anyway, takes a day or two. You have two weeks to do it. If you’re really stressed about it, follow the Dulfy guide and it’s usually pretty fast.

But more, they’ve been tailoring the living story lately to have various goals. For example…I didn’t bother as much with the Queen’s Gauntlet and stayed with the Jubilee achievment. At the end I got the meta for the Queens’ Gauntlet too, without even facing Liadri.

They’re making it so that most people CAN get the achievements.

Most recently they have dailies that count to the meta.

It’s easier now to get the meta than it’s ever been.

Generally the conversation goes like this:

Friend: "What have they added since I left in May?"
Me: "Well, nothing that you can do."
Friend: "What do you mean?"
Me: "Well, they added this, this, and this but they took it out of the game 2 weeks later. It’s part of their living story."
Friend: "Seriously?"
Me: "Yeah"
Friend: "That’s the stupidest kitten thing I’ve ever heard!"
Me: "Yeah, I know."

I have different conversations with friends.

What’s new in the game. The living story. This week we’re fighting T’quatl. It’s a pretty epic dragon battle. Next week, there’s a new dungeon path coming into the game.

It’s not about what’s gone, it’s about what’s coming. You’re always two weeks away from something new…and you never know what it’s going to be.

To me that’s a selling point.

they need a time machine.

the asurans could build one.

Vayne.8563:

I have different conversations with friends.

What’s new in the game. The living story. This week we’re fighting T’quatl. It’s a pretty epic dragon battle. Next week, there’s a new dungeon path coming into the game.

It’s not about what’s gone, it’s about what’s coming. You’re always two weeks away from something new…and you never know what it’s going to be.

To me that’s a selling point.

Lol there is no depth in this conversation at all. At least add a reply of some sort.

Vayne.8563:

I have different conversations with friends.

What’s new in the game. The living story. This week we’re fighting T’quatl. It’s a pretty epic dragon battle. Next week, there’s a new dungeon path coming into the game.

It’s not about what’s gone, it’s about what’s coming. You’re always two weeks away from something new…and you never know what it’s going to be.

To me that’s a selling point.

Fair enough point, that for you it sells the game. There are quite a few people who don’t see it this way. I don’t know the numbers nor do you, but it is fair to say that there are going to be people who dislike temporary content. I happen to be one of those players and obviously I am not alone in feeling that way as some of these recounting’s can attest to.

Peetee.9406:

Generally the conversation goes like this:

Friend: “What have they added since I left in May?”
Me: “Well, nothing that you can do.”
Friend: “What do you mean?”
Me: “Well, they added this, this, and this but they took it out of the game 2 weeks later. It’s part of their living story.”
Friend: “Seriously?”
Me: “Yeah”
Friend: “That’s the stupidest kitten thing I’ve ever heard!”
Me: “Yeah, I know.”

I’ve tried to talk to Colin about his faulty logic in LS and how it’s a terrible design but meh, they don’t listen.

Vayne.8563:

I have different conversations with friends.

What’s new in the game. The living story. This week we’re fighting T’quatl. It’s a pretty epic dragon battle. Next week, there’s a new dungeon path coming into the game.

It’s not about what’s gone, it’s about what’s coming. You’re always two weeks away from something new…and you never know what it’s going to be.

To me that’s a selling point.

Except we have always been fighting Tequatl. That’s nothing new. All they did was update the mechanics. It’s still the same dragon that we have been fighting since the game released. And adding a new path to an already existing dungeon isn’t really a great thing to sell the game on either. It’s once again, old content just being updated.

When people check the website here, there is tons of content patches listed on the release page. They look at it and go “Wow, that’s awesome. Anet has added all kinds of new content since the release of this game.”. Then they log in to find out that none of that content actually exists in the game and they can’t even go back to check any of it out cause it was all temporary. And the only stuff that was permanent was content we already had, just “revised” is all.

Now new players will log in with all this new content being tossed at them, that has story lines connected to old content that they can never experience, so they end up lost in what is going on. They have no idea of finding out what happened to lead up to these events unless they go to outside sources and read up about it. Which is an awful way to experience content.

I remember a few days ago I was talking to an old WoW buddy of mine about GW2. They saw some screens of my characters with all this awesome stuff from previous LS events and asked me about it. I told them that content doesn’t exist anymore and instead we have this new content that involves Scarlet coming up. He asked who that was, and I told them it was someone from an old LS event. He seemed interested at first until he realized that all that content was temporary and he can’t even go back to play it to find out how the events transpired.

That right there turned him away from the game. It’s like opening a book to the middle and starting from there instead of the beginning. You miss out on so much information that you are lost as to what is going on. No one wants that or enjoys that.

Lafiel.9372:

Vayne.8563:

I have different conversations with friends.

What’s new in the game. The living story. This week we’re fighting T’quatl. It’s a pretty epic dragon battle. Next week, there’s a new dungeon path coming into the game.

It’s not about what’s gone, it’s about what’s coming. You’re always two weeks away from something new…and you never know what it’s going to be.

To me that’s a selling point.

Lol there is no depth in this conversation at all. At least add a reply of some sort.

Well I could add in the “sounds cool” and “oh really” but they didn’t seem to add much to the scene.

ShadowPuppet.3746:

Vayne.8563:

I have different conversations with friends.

What’s new in the game. The living story. This week we’re fighting T’quatl. It’s a pretty epic dragon battle. Next week, there’s a new dungeon path coming into the game.

It’s not about what’s gone, it’s about what’s coming. You’re always two weeks away from something new…and you never know what it’s going to be.

To me that’s a selling point.

Fair enough point, that for you it sells the game. There are quite a few people who don’t see it this way. I don’t know the numbers nor do you, but it is fair to say that there are going to be people who dislike temporary content. I happen to be one of those players and obviously I am not alone in feeling that way as some of these recounting’s can attest to.

I guarantee you that if players weren’t logging in in increasingly larger numbers, Anet would not have added three teams to the living story team.

They didn’t look at the numbers, say this isn’t working and ramp it up.

Why was your friend trying to complete the living story content when he could not keep up? I am an adult, I work, etc. and when new content comes out I immediately ask myself “1.) is it fun? …2.) can I realistically complete it without pushing it?”. If the answer is no, I dont care and have fun the other way around. Because of this, I completed the boss week achievement and got my teq wings, or on the other hand, I completely ignored the actual teq. fight. Tried it 4x times, best what our server was able to do is 50% HP, so I dont care. It’s just basic assesment of time / fun factor / difficulty.

It’s time Anet stops this ‘temporary expansion pack’ bullkitten. The bigger the game the more fun. The less timed pressure the more fun.

ShiningSquirrel.3751:

None of my friends has any interest in returning

You’ve gotta love threads like these, they sound so dramatic.
Right up to the point where the problematic ‘thousands of non returning players’ they seem to suggest turns into one dude…and a couple of his mates.
I view most LS with the same disdainful eye as JPs – most of it isn’t relevant to me, I’m no AP ‘must have’ seeker by a long shot, but I’m not about to chuck it all in ‘just because’.

You have to keep in mind however that the only one that actually have any kind of numbers are ArenaNet.
And it is highly unlikely they would spend high amounts of money and resources on something that doesn’t increase (or worse, decrease) the amount of people playing. Thus I would say it is safe to assume that the living story does indeed increase the number of people playing.

I’m sure some of anet developers are sad as we all are. They wanted to make an epic mmo with esport but instead they are forced to create facebook games because metrics say so. Sadly.

The living story is a horrible design. I don’t even do it anymore, shallow characters, forgettable stories, content thats removed in 2 weeks. Its kitten ing me off now actually that I made a new character and cannot get the skins I want for him because they’re gone and the method to obtain is gone. Having to explain to people theres been a ton of content and stuff added, but that its all been removed since they last played gets tiresome. Watch them be frustrated they can’t get something or do something thats been removed. Watch other people say they not going to bother coming back since the new content is all time-gated…….which it is – do it in two weeks or else you never will.
People may leave and people may stop doing it, but Anet will keep doing it. Because the numbers say its a good design – because you have fanboys who love everything Anet does blindly as evidenced here and you have the addicts who must do all the content for the sake of it and must have those AP’s. Numbers are just numbers.
GW2 is quickly becoming just a placeholder for me, because unfortunately there’s nothing better out there right now. Its a selling point alright tho….a selling point for other upcoming games where the majority of your new content isn’t temporary and shallow. NUmbers is all they seem to care about. On the anniversary they bragged about how many updates and new content was pushed into the game……thats misleading to anyone new or players that have been away. They failed to add that 90% of that content has since been removed and gone.
I was looking for a game to replace my old MMO (where I spent almost 5 years) and had planned on GW2 being that. But the path they’ve been taking in conforming with other MMO’s and adding content thats just an AP farm with no real substance has made me start looking for something else to play. I’m far more looking forward to what someone may actually do in terms of innovation in a new game than whatever lame boss-of-the-week AP farm-fest Anet is adding on any given week.

And just telling someone they don’t have to do the living story is like telling them to play a stagnant game, since most of the updates or content is all Living Story.

MrRuin.9740:

The living story is a horrible design. I don’t even do it anymore, shallow characters, forgettable stories, content thats removed in 2 weeks.

You forgot the menial filler content (collecting kites, breaking pinatas, etc), lack of polish, (good to see Honor Guard standing around waiting for emissaries that are no longer in the game), and the lack of touch that made this game so great at release (I can’t remember the last time I heard my speak).

I think maybe we’re looking at this wrong. Why do we always want to live in the past?

When I talk to people about the game, yes I tell them about the great previous experiences I’ve had, but when asked ‘well what have they added’ instead of saying “well we had ‘x’” we should be saying, “they are doing small content updates every two weeks, to keep things exciting” and then explain how it works and the reasoning behind it. I get a much more positive reaction from people that way. It’s all about perspective and how you present it. Of course if you make it seem like a negative thing, people are going to walk away feeling negatively about it. If you don’t like the living world content, you shouldn’t be pitching it as a selling point of the game when someone asks you about it, instead you talk about the things you do like…

How about the 3 new fractals we’re expecting?
The new perm dungeon path for TA in the next update?
Halloween is right around the corner… (and we’ve known that it would return since forever)
The changes to Tequatl?
The additional bank tabs for horders? (Now don’t take offence, I’m one too)
For the people that want VP, the new ascended gear?

I could keep going, but I won’t. Yes, most of those are recent changes, but there have been smaller other things (jump puzzles, dynamic events, etc) previously. You get the idea though. Focus on the positives, not the negatives. It’ll do wonders for your stress levels.

The Living Story is the reason I haven’t returned to Guild Wars 2 myself. I check the forums every month or so, to see if they’ve fixed their mistakes with the Living Story, so that’s why I’m here today.

I’m not the sort of person who skips through quest text and only cares about mashing number keys until I get shinier loot. I care about the world, the lore, and the characters.

Unfortunately, Guild Wars 2’s story right now is broken. Once you make it through the content that was in at launch, there’s a whole bunch of plot that is missing because Arenanet removed it from the game. Other MMOs might have a temporary, non-seasonal event once every couple of years to celebrate an expansion launch or something. Guild Wars 2 seems to have those twice a month!

I would much rather play an MMO or offline game whose storyline is intact. Maybe the Living Story means “hooray, new fun times twice a month!” to some people. But to me, the Living Story is just a bunch of wiki articles that I’m not interested in reading.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

I think maybe we’re looking at this wrong. Why do we always want to live in the past?

When I talk to people about the game, yes I tell them about the great previous experiences I’ve had, but when asked ‘well what have they added’ instead of saying “well we had ‘x’” we should be saying, “they are doing small content updates every two weeks, to keep things exciting” and then explain how it works and the reasoning behind it. I get a much more positive reaction from people that way. It’s all about perspective and how you present it. Of course if you make it seem like a negative thing, people are going to walk away feeling negatively about it. If you don’t like the living world content, you shouldn’t be pitching it as a selling point of the game when someone asks you about it, instead you talk about the things you do like…

How about the 3 new fractals we’re expecting?
The new perm dungeon path for TA in the next update?
Halloween is right around the corner… (and we’ve known that it would return since forever)
The changes to Tequatl?
The additional bank tabs for horders? (Now don’t take offence, I’m one too)
For the people that want VP, the new ascended gear?

I could keep going, but I won’t. Yes, most of those are recent changes, but there have been smaller other things (jump puzzles, dynamic events, etc) previously. You get the idea though. Focus on the positives, not the negatives. It’ll do wonders for your stress levels.

Yeah most of those “positives” are actually negatives. The thing that does an even better job against stress is quitting and that’s what their current set up will get people to do.

Saying they have had a new peak in concurrent players is meaningless PR drivel as it does not mean they gotten more new players, sure it might be new players, but it might be people are putting in more hours.

The concept of the living story is good, the execution has been horrible and I don’t see that changing any time soon.

Karizee.8076:

There’s actually more people playing now than at launch. Sorry your guild failed.

vayne, is that you?

A content update every 2 weeks where I generally get 1 month to get it done (and sometimes it is permanent). I do not see that as a hectic schedule. The other thing is you can simply ignore content you do not like. For example I skipped Dragon Bash and this round of S A B. I simply didn’t like the content. That being said I felt no need to kitten about it. And sorry but that is what this is. Not all the content is going to appeal to you and you alone so get over it. This type of consistent content update is what many players of many MMOs would beg for.

Conner.4702:

Yeah most of those “positives” are actually negatives. The thing that does an even better job against stress is quitting and that’s what their current set up will get people to do.

Saying they have had a new peak in concurrent players is meaningless PR drivel as it does not mean they gotten more new players, sure it might be new players, but it might be people are putting in more hours.

The concept of the living story is good, the execution has been horrible and I don’t see that changing any time soon.

I don’t see them as negatives, but difference in play styles, priorities, and opinions I suppose.

I wasn’t touting the PR crud. Every company, every game has that. It’s simply part of running a business.

I will agree that the execution of the LS could have been better. I feel its getting better, but they still have a way to go. I would like to see more story development in each arc, and a more clearly defined means of presenting that story to the player (ie, clearer directions on getting to some of it). Something more than just a single opening or closing cut scene, and a little bit of character depth. However, I am well aware that Anet is not always the best at presenting their stories/lore, so I’m being patient since they’ve at least acknowledged this and claim to be working on it.

then they should never play MMOs. tbh, there are always events that gets take off one week or two.

SPECIALLY the ones without monthly fee.

PetricaKerempuh.7958:

Karizee.8076:

There’s actually more people playing now than at launch. Sorry your guild failed.

vayne, is that you?

Nope, I’d have said something completely different. I have seen so many guilds fail in so many MMOs over time, even the most popular MMOs. I’ve seen them fail in Guild Wars 1, I’ve seen them fail in WoW. My guess is most guilds fail in most MMOs, so the fact that your guild has probably is down to the normal stuff that makes guilds fail. Of course, I don’t know you at all, so I could be wrong.

Karizee is far more polite than I am. lol

Hey, the Metrics!

Yeah I’m sorry your friends/guilds don’t like this, but personally I enjoy the new content every 2 weeks. The summer metrics and concurrent playerbase show it’s working.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

I think maybe we’re looking at this wrong. Why do we always want to live in the past?

You can’t avoid it. People inevitably ask : how do I get (insert name here) skin? How I do I get (insert name here) backpiece? Where’s the content they claimed they added? Wheres the new dungeons? How did you get so many AP’s?

The answers are always : you can’t get it anymore, its gone and they’ve been removed. There’s new stuff coming yes, but you’re kitten out of luck if you want any past skins or titles or anything else that was a permanent remnant of past content.

its not all negative, I do tell people they’ve done some changes I like to world bosses, the changes to Tequatl and those improvements, but when the company claims they’ve added more content than anyone else in less time, people inevitably ask where the hell is this content? Its frustrating to me too as I start new characters and want past skins and want to run past dungeons with them. How was I supposed to know what skins I wanted for a character I might create 6 months down the road?
The biggest flaw of the Living Story is that it and the methods to obtain items from it (w/o cashshop) are all removed.

Vol.5241:

Yeah I’m sorry your friends/guilds don’t like this, but personally I enjoy the new content every 2 weeks. The summer metrics and concurrent playerbase show it’s working.

And these numbers are located where exactly? Anet (of course) report slow and steady growth in box sets sold, and remark that they are seeing this translate into “long-term players”, but as far as actual figures, they are few and far between.

Games like this survive because of the player longevity, not short-term churn rates.

And so far this game has gone from feeling like a stayer, to feeling very RIFT like in it’s rush to add content.

Vol.5241:

The summer metrics and concurrent playerbase show it’s working.

Not really. Numbers are just numbers. They don’t show how many people are truly enjoying it, how many are doing it because they are addicted or fanatic AP collectors, or how many don’t like it but are fanboys doing it anyway cause there’s nothing else to do.

You may be right, but you may be wrong. Numbers don’t tell anywhere near the whole story and you can’t claim it as fact.

MrRuin.9740:

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

I think maybe we’re looking at this wrong. Why do we always want to live in the past?

You can’t avoid it. People inevitably ask : how do I get (insert name here) skin? How I do I get (insert name here) backpiece? Where’s the content they claimed they added? Wheres the new dungeons? How did you get so many AP’s?

The answers are always : you can’t get it anymore, its gone and they’ve been removed. There’s new stuff coming yes, but you’re kitten out of luck if you want any past skins or titles or anything else that was a permanent remnant of past content.

its not all negative, I do tell people they’ve done some changes I like to world bosses, the changes to Tequatl and those improvements, but when the company claims they’ve added more content than anyone else in less time, people inevitably ask where the hell is this content? Its frustrating to me too as I start new characters and want past skins and want to run past dungeons with them. How was I supposed to know what skins I wanted for a character I might create 6 months down the road?
The biggest flaw of the Living Story is that it and the methods to obtain items from it (w/o cashshop) are all removed.

I’ve found that if I present the LS to people and explain the reasoning behind it, most people accept the logic and are less bummed about missing a skin or 3. But everyone will be different.

A lot of people that game are still tied to the antiquated idea that they must get everything, must achieve everything, and that everything must absolutely be static so they can do it whenever they please. LS does not follow this at all and people have a hard time accepting change….which is screwy, because its the only true constant in life.

Deimos Tel Arin.7391:

they need a time machine.

the asurans could build one.

Technically there is already one in the game, its called fractals of the mists!

and well MF and AR are coming there sometime this year so…

I really enjoy the living story, however I work 40 hours a week and am in college taking classes, so my playing time can be very limited. I think my scenario is a reality for a good chunk of players.

I used to want to complete everything but I’ve had to let go of that philosophy and adopt a new one. Instead of getting frustrated or stressed about missing content, I’ve decided to only play the content that I think will be interesting, and if it’s not, then I just don’t play it.

Right now I primarily play tPvP, but if I think the current LS update is interesting I will play it.

For example, I played all of the Crown Pavilion and Queens Speech content, and made sure to get all of the meta achievements and any other achievements I wanted such as Liadri or the gambit system achievements. However, then came the SAB update and I decided not to play this one at all. I didn’t find it interesting, nor did I find enough value in the rewards to play it. But now Tequatl is out and I’m dabbling in that a bit.

So really for me, the LS is something I’ve learned only to participate in if I think it’ll actually be fun for ME.

So unless you adopt a philosophy similar to this, then yes the Living Story could be a reason not to return, or play, since it can be frustrating.

Treadstone.2564:

The Living Story is the reason I haven’t returned to Guild Wars 2 myself. I check the forums every month or so, to see if they’ve fixed their mistakes with the Living Story, so that’s why I’m here today.

I’m not the sort of person who skips through quest text and only cares about mashing number keys until I get shinier loot. I care about the world, the lore, and the characters.

Unfortunately, Guild Wars 2’s story right now is broken. Once you make it through the content that was in at launch, there’s a whole bunch of plot that is missing because Arenanet removed it from the game. Other MMOs might have a temporary, non-seasonal event once every couple of years to celebrate an expansion launch or something. Guild Wars 2 seems to have those twice a month!

I would much rather play an MMO or offline game whose storyline is intact. Maybe the Living Story means “hooray, new fun times twice a month!” to some people. But to me, the Living Story is just a bunch of wiki articles that I’m not interested in reading.

Thats the price of having a dynamic evolving story. everything comes with a price…

In other MMOs content remains but it feels gimmicky..

NPC: Please go kill the bandits that are preventing the supply caravans from getting to town before everyone starves…

You go kill a bunch of bandits which all respawn a few seconds after you kill them.
you go back.

NPC: thanks for saving the town, we owe you our lives here is 10 gold

you take his money while trying to remember his name so something is left when he starves next week since the bandits are still blockading the trade route like before with the same numbers

In Gw2 the living story was perfect in terms of story progression. Molten alliance invaded norn and charr lands… we fought them, beat them back… Now Invasions have been permanently stopped. Cragstead was invaded, we managed to beat the molten alliance from there but the town was left in ruins. Refugees went to Southsun where they built a few outposts and infrastructure. That didnt work out then they moved to cragstead and now they’re rebuilding it. How can you keep all of that in the game? Cragstead went from occupied to in ruins to in the process of rebuilding. It evolved as the story evolved.

Of course you’re right… if you missed all of it the only way to know now what happened is read a bunch of wikis which is bad no doubt. Bobby Stein said multiple times they’re building an interface to enable players to better follow whats happening in the living story so hopefully that will be addressed in the future.

LS is not perfect but its a giant step in the right direction in my opinion.

On the topic of skins and missing skins…this is one of my favorite parts of the living story. In most games, everyone can get the same stuff so everyone has the same stuff. If you are the type of guy who must have that skin and only that skin, sure I can see why you’d be upset…but on the other hand, there’s always another skin around the corner. How many skins can you really use. I have too many already, for a lot of my stuff anyway.

There are enough skins in this game to find a look you want. And if you can get that special skin, more power to you. But this way, different people are actually wearing different stuff and as time goes on, that will get more and more obvious.

Two, three years from now, some of the old back pieces will be vintage and cool to have. But during that time, there’ll be tons of other skins to acquire. You can’t wear them ALL.

Vitus Dance.4509:

ShiningSquirrel.3751:

None of my friends has any interest in returning

You’ve gotta love threads like these, they sound so dramatic.
Right up to the point where the problematic ‘thousands of non returning players’ they seem to suggest turns into one dude…and a couple of his mates.
I view most LS with the same disdainful eye as JPs – most of it isn’t relevant to me, I’m no AP ‘must have’ seeker by a long shot, but I’m not about to chuck it all in ‘just because’.

Who said anything about thousands of players? Gotta love people like this who make up things just to hear themselves talk.

Vayne.8563:

The living story content, usually anyway, takes a day or two. You have two weeks to do it. If you’re really stressed about it, follow the Dulfy guide and it’s usually pretty fast.

But more, they’ve been tailoring the living story lately to have various goals. For example…I didn’t bother as much with the Queen’s Gauntlet and stayed with the Jubilee achievment. At the end I got the meta for the Queens’ Gauntlet too, without even facing Liadri.

They’re making it so that most people CAN get the achievements.

Most recently they have dailies that count to the meta.

It’s easier now to get the meta than it’s ever been.

They do have dailies that count to the meta now, but they don’t have enough achievements without those dailies to get the meta reward item. It is only easier to get the achievements if you sign in a few times during the week. For people that only get to play one day a week it means that it’s not only difficult to get, it’s impossible.

So… oftentimes people stop playing. Whether they stomp away in disgust or just wander away because of the “why bother” feeling doesn’t really matter. They’re still gone. It used to be that I could sign in once a week and play for six hours and still have a good sense of accomplishment. That isn’t possible anymore. The time gates on the living story achievements, the crafting, the gathering, gear attainment — those have all definitely driven my desire to play way down.

Aye.8392:

Vayne.8563:

The living story content, usually anyway, takes a day or two. You have two weeks to do it. If you’re really stressed about it, follow the Dulfy guide and it’s usually pretty fast.

But more, they’ve been tailoring the living story lately to have various goals. For example…I didn’t bother as much with the Queen’s Gauntlet and stayed with the Jubilee achievment. At the end I got the meta for the Queens’ Gauntlet too, without even facing Liadri.

They’re making it so that most people CAN get the achievements.

Most recently they have dailies that count to the meta.

It’s easier now to get the meta than it’s ever been.

They do have dailies that count to the meta now, but they don’t have enough achievements without those dailies to get the meta reward item. It is only easier to get the achievements if you sign in a few times during the week. For people that only get to play one day a week it means that it’s not only difficult to get, it’s impossible.

So… oftentimes people stop playing. Whether they stomp away in disgust or just wander away because of the “why bother” feeling doesn’t really matter. They’re still gone. It used to be that I could sign in once a week and play for six hours and still have a good sense of accomplishment. That isn’t possible anymore. The time gates on the living story achievements, the crafting, the gathering, gear attainment — those have all definitely driven my desire to play way down.

People stop playing…how many people? I’m pretty sure Anet has numbers (in fact I know they have, I talked to a dev in game recently and unless he was lying, they have numbers).

Concurrency is up. More players are returning. Some people will leave, but name an MMO that never loses anyone.

Without knowing the numbers, we can’t know what kind of problem this really is.

Lighter.5631:

then they should never play MMOs. tbh, there are always events that gets take off one week or two.

SPECIALLY the ones without monthly fee.

That is just simply not true.

I should point out that the guilds that have died in GW2 are alive and well in other games. They simply do not play GW2 any longer. The biggest complaints I have been getting boil down to 2 points, being unable to get an achievement or skin. So far no one has said anything to me about not being able to get APs at all.
I am currently a member of a very large guild that is thriving but have seen some of the same comments coming from some members there as well.

BTW, I am NOT complaining about the LS. I am enjoying the content myself. I simply wanted to know if anyone else is getting the same feedback as I am from their friends who used to play.

Vayne.8563:

People stop playing…how many people? I’m pretty sure Anet has numbers (in fact I know they have, I talked to a dev in game recently and unless he was lying, they have numbers).

Concurrency is up. More players are returning. Some people will leave, but name an MMO that never loses anyone.

Without knowing the numbers, we can’t know what kind of problem this really is.

You can’t question someone elses claim to playerbase going down because of lack of anyone outside the devs knowing and then claim fact that its going up and people are returning while lacking the same information.

MMO’s always have a turnaround rate of players. Neither of you know whether its up or down, or what the reasons for either case are, so neither can claim either case.

While it truly sucks that you had guilds fall, and that your friends were perturbed enough by missing out on stuff to… decide to miss out on more stuff, this thread is a textbook exercise in the many issues which arise from using anecdotal evidence to form a conclusion (namely the equation in your thread title).

To illustrate this a bit- I haven’t read the responses all yet, but I bet you’ll get some that say their guilds are still very healthy or that they have more people playing now. I could offer you the “evidence” that my guild has actually had its highest concurrency within the last two months… but this would be just as anecdotal as what you described in the first post. It doesn’t accurately represent or explain anything beyond our own experiences.

The important thing to keep in mind is that ArenaNet didn’t just arbitrarily decide to start a consistent two-week content release cycle by picking the idea out of a hat. They studied the wealth of actual player activity data that we will never have access to and made this call based on what people are really doing, not the apparent conclusions one might draw from even 100 anecdotal experiences. It does appear to be working for them.

ShiningSquirrel.3751:

Lighter.5631:

then they should never play MMOs. tbh, there are always events that gets take off one week or two.

SPECIALLY the ones without monthly fee.

That is just simply not true.

Agreed, not true. It it were true, ANet wouldn’t be continuously thumping their own chests and bragging about how they’re doing something that no one else is doing.

ANet continues to ignore the significant number of people on the forums who are unhappy with the pace of Living Story and are tired of having a new to-do list foisted on them every two weeks without any down time.

And yes, it’s true: we don’t have to do Living Story content. Duh. But our only option is to do it or miss it. And for me, that’s not an option, its a sleazy sales push.

“One time offer!”

“Act now!”

“Limited time only!”

Since ANet refuses to address these concerns, I refuse to log in and be counted as a metric they can use to claim Living Story is working. I have moved on to another game that has a more relaxed pace that is actually enjoyable. And yes, I still post feedback here. I paid the same amount everyone else did at launch (and more than some newer players) so I have every intention of continuing to provide my feedback.

And unlike some who are claiming that metrics they have never seen prove that they are “right”, I’d like to remind Living Story supporters that there is no “right” or “wrong” in this discussion. You either like Living Story or you don’t, and both positions are equally valid.

I hate it. And it has led me to choose not to log in at all anymore.

And that is also totally valid.