Guild Wars 2

Greetings and Salutations.

As Season 2 comes to a close, it is a good time to take stock of where the Living World currently stands. It is quite pleasing to see that things are getting better. The world is becoming more vibrant and interesting, the story is blending history and lore into its plot threads quite nicely, and the future is shaping up to be an extremely interesting place. The cinematic finale and foundation for Heart of Thorns was especially uplifting, and the writing team should feel proud of the current state all things Tyrian.

But there are still some…quirks…which need to be ironed out. Season 2 is trying a very different approach to Season 1 in terms of permanent content while simultaneously forging new ground in the draconic war, and sometimes things don’t turn out quite as one might hope. Hopefully, there is some sliver of wisdom here that may help future stories.

I hope you enjoy Eight Lessons From Eight Releases of Season 2…

TL:DR?

1) Be careful about biting off more than you can chew. Unpolished and lackluster content can turn a good idea into a bad implementation.

2) Don’t use cheap cliffhangers. Seriously.

3) Character deaths lose their dramatic weight if we all know they’re going to die.

4) There’s a difference between building a story hook and leaving a plot thread dangling.

5) Be careful when writing magic. Avoid technobabble and obvious plot devices.

6) Pacing is absolutely critical to building dramatic tension. Don’t let it drop.

7) Cast characters that are relevant to the plot for better storytelling.

8) The storytelling elements need to mix with the multiplayer experience in order to enrich the game in the future. You need to combine the MMO and the RPG to allow the game to grow.

I hope that helps, in some small way. The storytelling is definitely improving, and the writing team should be quite pleased at their current progress. There are still plenty of aspects which require polish and improvement, but the future of the Living World and the upcoming Hearts of Thorns are starting out on the right foot.

Personally, I enjoyed Season One much, much more than Season Two.

But, that’s just me…likely part of a small minority.

So glad you didn’t use “let it go” from Frozen.

I agree with you 100% but I do think the story telling is getting better.

Off topic…I should stop using my phone to make posts….

I agreel, especially on point 8.
The storytelling in season 1 was definitely worse than in season 2, but season 1 offered a way more varied gameplay with things like tower of nightmares, battle for lions arch and 2 new dungeons. In season 2 we mainly got two metaevent maps and tons of story instances. And while those were quite good i never thought this to be the strong point of guildwars 2.

The biggest problem with season 2, imo, is that our characters were basically mute statues throughout.

I realize from a practical perspective that they’d have to pay to bring back all ten voice actors and that making a cutscene that doesn’t bug out if you’re a charr or an asura is probably very difficult, but I wish our characters could actually talk and maybe do things in those new cutscenes.

Shriketalon.1937:

3) Character deaths lose their dramatic weight if we all know they’re going to die.

personalstory.txt

I always enjoy reading your analyses and proposals. Hopefully the writers take this in the loving spirit of constructive feedback in which it is offered, because you have a lot of excellent insight.

What makes S1 better than S2 is the gameplay. It made it more dynamic to play continuously in a multiplayer environment and was fun actually. xD

What made S2 better than S1 was the storyline. It still needed improvement but I keep looking forward for the upcoming releases of more LS content.

Hopefully by S3, it will be a beautiful combination of the great gameplay from S1 and the improving storytelling content of S2. I keep looking forward to it.

Good points, although with regards to Points 7 and 8…

7. Maybe it’s just me, but I LIKE hanging out with the Biconics much more than, say, the Order mentors or Destiny’s Edge. Maybe it’s because I actually got more time to see the Biconics grow and interact with each other, but I never really connected with any of the Personal Story NPCs. Usually you’d get to know them for the duration of the level arc, and then they’d disappear and you’d never see them again outside of brief cameos.

I do agree that there are a lot of instances where the NPCs take center stage in scenes that don’t really advance the main story (key case in point, Belinda’s spirit katana), but I’d much rather have the Biconics with me rather than the other NPCs. The Biconics feel like MY adventuring party. The others are just professional acquaintances.

8. I caution against discarding the single player instance approach. In my opinion, single player instances are much, MUCH better for immersion and storytelling than open world or even dungeon stuff. As soon as you start introducing other players into the mix, things start pulling you out of the story. You get players bellowing instructions at you to “gather ammo, protect carrier, STOP BEING NOOB!!!11!”, followed by vitriol and toxicity if things go south. You can’t really take the time to stop and see the sights because the other players in your party won’t let you; they’ve run off ahead or are impatiently waiting for you to finish watching cutscenes. For example, when I first played Hidden Arcana, I spent almost an hour in there just reading all the books. Do you think a random group of 4 other players would have been tolerant of me doing that?

The attempt to integrate open world stuff into the Living Story ended disastrously as shown by the events in Iron Marches and Frostgorge Sound. It was an experiment that didn’t work, and I think it says a lot about trying to merge storytelling with content designed for mass amounts of players.

The first 6 are good points. The last ones, though… yah, I don’t agree with those.

Like Zaxares, I like the biconics. I enjoy their interactions, the character building each one gets, and so on. Yes, you do have a point that they aren’t of grand importance to every event, but I actually like that about them as well. It gives you a nice contrast to see not only the big important Pact leaders staging grand assaults, but also the smaller people who just want to help in whatever way they can. I think having some side characters in there helps balance the overall experience, and having them tied to you specifically makes for a nice team dynamic.

And boy oh boy do I ever disagree on point #8. Integration of story and multiplayer aspects is good when applicable, but not when it involves locking the core storyline behind them. Saying “well, if you want to see where the story goes then go do fractals, join a guild, ect” is actually locking the storyline behind those things. Requiring you to partake in those aspects or miss out. And that’s a bad thing, IMO.

There can be multiplayer aspects that happen alongside the storyline and that tie into it, for sure. Those are nice. But I think they’re doing fine on that front anyway. During the part of the story where you first got into the labyrinth, then they opened the labyrinth up for the open world multiplayer aspect as well. The Pact base gets attacked, showing that Mordremoth is more active in the area, and at the same time the Vinewrath event opens up. Those are events that tie in to the LS release without locking story behind them. That’s a good way to integrate them, not literally holding the story hostage while saying “You’ll do fractals and like it, darnit!”.

My problem with season 2 is a complete lack of agency, for the player character and the player. I think Season 2 failed and is worse than the personal story and even season 1.

Season one, no matter how bad you believe it was actually has proper objectives and resolutions throughout the story. Destroy the molten facility, disrupt the aether blades (multiple times), destroy the tower of nightmares, kill scarlet. These are all things you are introduced to, that you were given the context and drives what you are doing in the game. It gave the player agency.

In season two there are ‘conclusions’. You gain more support to fight Mordremoth, you kill a few powerful minions (bosses), and you kill the shadow of the dragon. You also discover a revelation about sylvari.
Rallying support, and the Sylvari revelation is not really a resolution, they are building blocks for future content. A small step on the way to something supposedly bigger.

They Sylvari revelation isn’t even something that was on the radar, action wise for you character. It wasn’t something the player was looking into or taking actions towards. You were using the memory seeds to find the egg, not to investigate Sylvari history. That is pretty much how the whole season flowed, you are doing one thing, but get interrupted by something even more important.

Killing the minions and shadow are the closest thing that we get to a accomplishing something meaningful, but they are not developed. Instead of writing a compelling narrative for the shadow of the dragon and give it importance so that the player character can drive the narrative of defeating it, it is just shoved to the side so that anet can go, hey look, glint, forgotten, sylvari and mordremoth, hey look! “Heart of Thorns”. LOOK, Anet… The shadow of the dragon is your season finale boss… we use an item of extraordinary value and significance to kill it… but as far as we know, it is just on champion in hundreds that are ready to replace it.

Most of the minions only show up to be killed, with the shadow showing up once to say hi, and once more to die. We never set out to kill these things, we barely understand if they are anything special. They aren’t even connected to the story in any way, they are just randomly appearing obstacles. The player character just stumbles on them, and their entire purpose is to provide some sort of gameplay as a boss battle.

In season 2 there is no context or agency. We don’t really ever know why we are doing anything. You feel like you are being LEAD to do things, being told to do things. You feel like the player character is reactionary and dependent on other characters to drive the story instead of the player character. It is one thing to be unable to voice the player character, it is another thing to make the player character a complete bystander by having their actions be dictated by someone else. In the end of season 2 we are wildly chasing after some stupid egg, because we are told it is important, and that we must have it, but we barely know why it is important and how it helps.

All of this leads to a whole host of problems. Everything is a cliffhanger, because we never have anything course of action to stand on. The most important character, the player character, is turned into a bystander by not having any sense of self motivation to drive action. There is nothing to pace or make cohesive because there is nothing to unify any of the actions. And worst yet, the story and gameplay separate and become distinct parts.

Some people might call season 1s story terrible, but it was a had a complete story arc about meeting, fighting, and killing scarlet. Season 2 may be miles better at building and using lore, characters, and the world, but season 2 is not a complete story. It lacks the build up to a final battle and conclusion. Season 1 closed with Lions Arch is being attacked and we help end it in a dramatic boss battle conclusion. Season 2 closes with, why are we chasing an egg? and, here is a very significant revelation, but that is for the future.

I consider the player character’s, agency and proactiveness in a story to be paramount in a video game. It bring the player into the narrative and is what makes videogames distinct as a medium. It the foundation. Season 2s writing may do a lot of other narrative things better, but it fails on what makes a good videogame.
From this perspective I would rate.
Personal Story B-
Season 1 C
Season 2 D-
Too many times, season 2 just cuts the player out of narrative action. We are there just to do what we are told and beat on the occasional bosses. As a videogame narrative, this is too much of a failure to overlook and even being to consider the quality of other elements.

It is going in the wrong direction, lets Hope Hearth of Thorns, uses everything invested in Season 2 to bring things back around.

Yay more Shriketalon.1937 and is informative but entertaining graphics.

Shriketalon.1937:

1) Be careful about biting off more than you can chew. Unpolished and lackluster content can turn a good idea into a bad implementation.

Well I agree with you, that some of the quests we were sent on (such as collecting the crown) was a bit… well not epic. But I think ANet did start noticing this themselves, particularly in Season 2 Part 2 were we’re sent on an entire long journey through interesting environment just to find a single egg.
Although I would love it if someone at ANet had a bit of extra time on their hands to add something epic to say the crown collection quest (unrealistic I know).

Shriketalon.1937:

2) Don’t use cheap cliffhangers. Seriously.

Agree but I think the cliffhangers were more a product of content segmentation into the episodic format.

Shriketalon.1937:

3) Character deaths lose their dramatic weight if we all know they’re going to die.

Actually I didn’t see the Master of Peace’s death coming… although Belinda they might as well have put a count down timer over her head.

Shriketalon.1937:

4) There’s a difference between building a story hook and leaving a plot thread dangling.

Seems to be the only difference between a story hook and plot thread seems to be whether or not ANet actually does something with it. This seems more like a matter of time sort of situation.

Shriketalon.1937:

5) Be careful when writing magic. Avoid technobabble and obvious plot devices.

Agreed. ANet has a bad job of not explaining how magic works or why a magic thing is magically doing something.

Shriketalon.1937:

6) Pacing is absolutely critical to building dramatic tension. Don’t let it drop.

Agreed again. I do feel that we’re abusing instant travel via waypoints a bit too much in the narrative. The world loses a sense of size if we’re able to hop back and forth between large wide areas, just to do one or 2 things. I don’t mind going to the Priory, I just feel like I could have completed all by business in one visit instead of having to go back again. But I think this relates back to the story structure. It would be very boring to have an entire episode where we only walk through the Priory archive doing magic rituals.

Shriketalon.1937:

7) Cast characters that are relevant to the plot for better storytelling.

I honestly don’t mind the biconics. I just feel that there isn’t enough time given to flesh them out and build more personality. The problem with plot relevant characters is that we’d possibly end up with too many characters coming and going leaving us with no solid cast of characters.

Shriketalon.1937:

8) The storytelling elements need to mix with the multiplayer experience in order to enrich the game in the future. You need to combine the MMO and the RPG to allow the game to grow.

I don’t mind the ability to solo story instances. I do feel that a lot of development went into solo instances (I’d loved to see fractal version of these solo instances, or see a new dungeon or two), but I wouldn’t say that ANet should stop with the solo story instances.

Shriketalon.1937:

8) The storytelling elements need to mix with the multiplayer experience in order to enrich the game in the future. You need to combine the MMO and the RPG to allow the game to grow.

I seem to recall two new open world maps with strongly-emphasised cooperative mechanics.

Shriketalon.1937:

1) Be careful about biting off more than you can chew. Unpolished and lackluster content can turn a good idea into a bad implementation.

You know, I think this is what really makes the plot of season 2 worse than season 1 to me.

Season 1, for all its implausibilities and absurd minion pairings, has an overall theme – Scarlet and her minions prepare for, then carry out, an invasion of a major city for the purpose of awakening an elder dragon.

Season 2 doesn’t really have a theme beyond loosely fighting Mordremoth. A Zephyrite bigwig has a macguffin Mordy wants for reasons not yet explained, random places get overrun by killer kudzu, we investigate Scarlet’s past, a technical problem arises so Taimi can solve it, we do random sidequests so faction leaders will come to our summit which is coincidentally attacked by a Mordrem right after the leaders are finished saying they don’t think Mordremoth is a priority, we investigate Caithe’s past, and oh BTW Sylvari are dragon minions.

In terms of “what will I remember a year from now” – I’ll probably still remember that Scarlet assembled a bunch of different minions and invaded Lion’s Arch, and I’ll definitely remember the revelation that Sylvari are dragon minions, but everything in between? I’ve forgotten half that disjointed mess already.

Baolun.8316:

Shriketalon.1937:

1) Be careful about biting off more than you can chew. Unpolished and lackluster content can turn a good idea into a bad implementation.

You know, I think this is what really makes the plot of season 2 worse than season 1 to me.

Season 1, for all its implausibilities and absurd minion pairings, has an overall theme – Scarlet and her minions prepare for, then carry out, an invasion of a major city for the purpose of awakening an elder dragon.

Season 2 doesn’t really have a theme beyond loosely fighting Mordremoth. A Zephyrite bigwig has a macguffin Mordy wants for reasons not yet explained, random places get overrun by killer kudzu, we investigate Scarlet’s past, a technical problem arises so Taimi can solve it, we do random sidequests so faction leaders will come to our summit which is coincidentally attacked by a Mordrem right after the leaders are finished saying they don’t think Mordremoth is a priority, we investigate Caithe’s past, and oh BTW Sylvari are dragon minions.

In terms of “what will I remember a year from now” – I’ll probably still remember that Scarlet assembled a bunch of different minions and invaded Lion’s Arch, and I’ll definitely remember the revelation that Sylvari are dragon minions, but everything in between? I’ve forgotten half that disjointed mess already.

To be honest. They basicly confirmed with the Heart of Thorns Trailer that S2 was nothing more than a set up for that.

Given how the whole thing only introduced many plot threads and bearly followed up, or finished most of them, it is certainly nothing memorable.
For me it is not The Point of no Return , but Set Up for the Heart of Thorns .

If I had to say anything, the only “plot” mentionable, were the Zephirte incident, however that was dropped too long over the whole season and then ended apruptly, turning into Caithe`s goosechase.

Even the Bossfight at the end was not very satisfying, since he only popped up one time before. We fought no antagonist, just something we knew was a tool for someone bigger (also given our experience with other, similiar beings, there will just be a new one, or several of them roaming the skies in the near future).

The story jumped from one plotpoint to the next and in the end was missing something essential to feel satisfying: An Antagonist .

It`s kinda sad honestly. The beginning was actually quite promising: Go into Dry Top and find out what The Roar was supposed to be.
After that however everything went appart. Every mystery was forgotten or lost value. Leaving me hard to care about anything.
The second half introduced the whole cliffhanger / sudden cuts to the narrative flow, which didn`t really help either.

If that was a TV show, i wouldn`t be interested anymore and drop it.
Luckily there is still the game aspect to it.
However storywise, the season was not satisfying and did not left me for more.
I would rather watch a complete movie instead.

btw. They said on the Points of Interests that it would flow much better if we wouldn`t play it in episodes, but in one go after another.
Well, i call bullkitten there, because that is not how it is delivered. People rate it based on how it presented and if you say: “This is one episode”, they will rate it in that matter. That is the package you called “episode”.

It is something TV-Shows perfected over several years. Being able to create self contained stories in single episodes or seasons, even if they are part of a bigger one.
Of course it is another medium and translating it to a game is difficult, however in that case I would rather have them cut it down, instead of blowing it up like they do right now.

I just gotta ask, of any term in the english language, why are they called the biconics?

PseudoNewb.5468:

!Snip~
In the end of season 2 we are wildly chasing after some stupid egg, because we are told it is important, and that we must have it, but we barely know why it is important and how it helps.

~Snip~

I disagree with you here, if you don’t know the importance of the egg and how it will help, then perhaps you need to replay some of the episodes, talk to the main NPC at the end…as a matter of fact, if you didn’t read all of the literature in that area, perhaps you should. I’m not going to tell you the importance of the egg and how it can help. That is already practically revealed by the end of S2.

Larynx.2453:

I just gotta ask, of any term in the english language, why are they called the biconics?

Well Destiny’s Edge (that world be Rytlock, Logan and the rest) were referred to in-house by Anet as being the iconics. When they created Destiny’s Edge 2.0 (that would by Majory and the rest) they were referred to in-house at ANet as be B-Iconics (and no no its not B-Iconics as in B-Team, we’ve already had that discussion. Its B as in A group and B group) to differentiate them from the Iconics. So players started calling them biconics.

Any one of season 2’s stories was ok to great by themselves, but the entire set felt disjointed.

I had fun playing it for the most part, so it was a lot better than season one to me.

The worst part of the whole LS are those five nimrods we’re forced to like that I would have sent packing the first time we crossed paths. Rox may be the only exception – there is a tiny spark of potential in that character.

If anything i’ve been disappointed by season 2. Yes I think that season 1 was much more entertaining and made the living world much more lively then the 2nd season.

I know that the living story of season 2 has been set on a more permanent content but… seriously what happened to the world? In season 1 we had worldwide event, land changes, redrawn maps, we had clues and hint to thought about. While season 2 set 2 lame farming map on which event have been overused for 4 chapter each.

Trying to understand and whistand the schem of scarlett was way more entertaining then staying for month on the same map while waiting for the next chapter to change a tiny bit of things. Come on! LA and kessex had been destroyed! We had to fight scarlet’s minions while she was studying our world to leaving strange things here and there. We had to save our kind. In this regards season 2 was plain boring. You know? Actually their are npc that have been repairing LA for a year now… They must be very lazy because almost nothing change since they start working.

TLDR, but I did prefer the massive world events of season one and how they could be more easily tied with the storyline and aid in portraying the ongoing war, than the solo instances. They did make the world feel more alive, and much much more epic – yes, I’m talking about you, Invasions, Tower of Nightmares, Twisted Marionette and Lion’s Arch – and still it made use of instances such as Scarlet’s lair, or the end of the Breachmaker.

Bring back that feeling anyday over solo instances.

(And bring back Scarlet)

Zaxares.5419:

I do agree that there are a lot of instances where the NPCs take center stage in scenes that don’t really advance the main story (key case in point, Belinda’s spirit katana), but I’d much rather have the Biconics with me rather than the other NPCs.

It’s the exact opposite that bugs me, the Biconics taking center stage in scenes that DO advance the plot yet have nothing to do with them.

When Aerin is revealed to be one of the Soundless who went insane, we have five NPCs sitting around saying “does anyone know who the Soundless are?” When we had to rally the races of Tyria, the Biconics huddled together planning how they could ask their moms and senpais for help while our silent protagonist cried in a corner for bygone glory. When the Master of Peace died, we didn’t have a single party member who cared in the slightest. When the big reveal for the whole season hit…it didn’t matter for anyone in our party, since not only were they not sylvari, they didn’t even have close sylvari friends. Without a cast that are actually invested in the plot through their own character arcs, the story can’t deliver the same emotional punch as a really well outlined heroic epic.

To explain it another way, imagine for a moment, Season 6. The Blitzkrieg on Kralkatorric.

The lightning war with the crystal dragon is a pure Ascalonian story. The Brand is energized with power after the death of Zhaitan and Mordremoth, leading to a surge in dragon minions. With the Pact destroyed, it’s up to the Charr legions and the Ebon Vanguard to save their people from annihilation. We’re talking all-out, heavy metal warfare, with the entire Charr war machine wheeling out all the firepower they’ve got, and the humans pulling every trick, every artifact, every ounce of historical power they’ve got.

Massive tanks? Check. Hundred-strong units of soldiers? Check. Subverting the foefire as a weapon against the Brand? Check. Striking a horrible deal with Palawa Joko and his army of awakened undead on the far side of the Branded army for a pincer movement? Check (don’t worry, he totally won’t betray us, he’s trustworthy). At the end of a long campaign, it all culminates in a final showdown at the Tomb of Primeval Kings for Destiny’s Edge Vs. The Elder Dragon Kralkatorric, Round 2: Electric Boogaloo.

Who would you cast for this story, given the following choices…

A: Charr and Ascalonian humans. One charr from each legion with different perspectives on war and duty, thus allowing the story to show each of the three sides at their best and at odds with one another. Several humans from Ascalon fighting for the homeland they hold dear, at odds with their feline neighbors who are temporary allies at best, butchers of their kin at worst. To add to that ensemble, at least one foreign human (bonus points if she’s Elonian, thus contrasting with Palawa Joko and setting up that prophecy about leading the return) and one outcast charr (such as a shaman or sorceror to counter some of the more supernaturally psychotic Branded strategies). This group provides the best set of characters to explore all aspects of Ascalon, including the Charr/human conflict, the perspectives of the two races, the importance of duty and heritage, etc, etc, etc. Their friends will die. Their homes will burn. Their lands will be ravaged by war, but they will stand against the draconic horde to safeguard everything they hold dear.

Or…

B: The Biconics. Rox gets called back by a friend to go fight, and the other four tag along. Five out of six of them (assuming Canach has joined) have absolutely no connection to Ascalon, no idea about its lore, no friends or compatriots in the area, and no significant skills that set them apart and above other soldiers. During the course of the war, they tag along and get into trouble, counting on you to bail them out. Marjory binds ghosts into her sword. Kasmeer’s unexplained powers give her random visions. Taimi solves all the magical problems with asuran gadgets and technobabble. Braham does nothing, and Canach questions his life decisions. They banter their way through the lightning war, and at the end of it all, cheer because they were along for the ride that took down Kralkatorric.

Which of these sounds like the foundation for better storytelling, more dramatic scenes, and greater character growth? One should cast characters who matter to the plot because it means the plot matters to them. They care, and therefore they can have a character arc and meaningful growth. They are involved, therefore they can contribute towards moving the plot along with their unique skills. They matter, so they resonate with the story that’s being told.

I really like your analyses on these. The only thing I’d disagree with is your last point. While some more variety would be nice, some of your suggestions would potentially mean that huge chunks of the playerbase would be arbitrarily gated from the story because of their varying playstyles.

I really want to talk about your seventh point though, because it’s central to what has been my biggest issue with Guild Wars 2 since the beginning. Guild Wars 1 didn’t have any kind of masterful storytelling, but I paid attention because it was really good at worldbuilding. Cantha and Elona really felt like distinct areas with their own distinct nations and cultures. Guild Wars 1 only had one playable race, and humans might as well have been the only sentient race in the story, and you wouldn’t have noticed because of how much time they spent on making each nation unique.

Then Guild Wars 2 comes along and replaces that all with a set of fantasy races with generic stereotypes. Humans are the “diminished but plucky” race. Char are the “proud warrior” race. Asura are the “tiny smart guy” race. Norn are the “big norse legend” race. Sylvari are the “mysterious sylvan” race. There’s no culture anymore, just clashing stereotypes. It’s to the point that Guild Wars 2 has implied that tengu from around the world decided that racial unity is enough to completely ignore cultural and historical divergence and just move in together.

The hero groups we’ve interacted with seem to be the same problem. I want it to be more like Guild Wars 1, where there isn’t a checklist, and the primary connecting thread being the player’s perspective. That’s not to say that there can’t be some variety, but that variety needs to revolve around what’s relevant, and what’s appropriate to the history and culture of what we’re dealing with.

Not to sound completely negative, I actually feel like the sylvari revelation is a huge step in the right direction. I’ve always liked the sylvari aesthetics and design, and a sylvari has been my main since day one, but the race was the biggest symbol of this issue to me at launch. They were new, even from an in-universe perspective. They had no history, and no deep culture to draw upon. They were just a fantasy cliché. With the new revelation, they finally feel like part of the world.

I agree with the points except for point 8.

Guild wars 1 was a moderately if not exclusively single-player game, the entire franchise was built on the point of solo viability, taking that away would be an extremely risky thing since you remove the entire point of the individual from the medium of the purpose.

What is a hero if the heroes destiny is everyone’s? Granted, your story is everyone’s story anyway but at least the illusion of individuality was there in Season 2.

Essentially, I believe this:

1. The Biconics need a break and need to be retired from the story for a while, they need to go their own separate ways and live individual lives than being the super-pals team.

2. We dont need any more “teams” we need individuals, noteworthy people that have meaningful progression relevant to the events and story-lines of current plot progression rather than random guys that are there for reasons sake.

Now, this does seem to be a thing with HoT, since Rytlock appears to be going his own direction in HoT rather than being apart of DE, which is frankly a major +10 from me because that means that Rytlock will be a focal character of the story, but also have relevance in driving it forwards.

This to me is what you need, its what GW1 had, when you go back to GW1 and look at Prophecies you dont see that many iconic names worth remembering. Its not until after Rurik died that you really have any worthwhile chars that will be remembered for times to come.

The Shining Blade felt like a group, a group you were apart of, fighting for the freedom of Kryta, for your own peoples survival as Ascalonian Refugee’s.

The story in season 2 did A LOT better than Season 1 and shone in a massive way by comparison.

However, it did have glaring flaws.

Belinda’s death was FAR too early in this season, and should have happened at least episode 7 when it might have worked better. She should have been around more frequently too, going with us into the Silverwastes.

What would have worked for me is if Belinda had died instead of the Master of Sun, maybe run in there and taken the bullet, dying in Jory’s arms or something.

There would have been a bit more impact, a bit more pain and torment, knowing she had a more meaningful demise than just, Red Shirt Moment.

As for the master of peace? He shouldn’t have died at all, his death was utterly meaningless and he actually had potential to be a far more interesting char.

Death is an art, in storytelling, you need to time the moment right.

An example in this is a story I watched recently in anime form, where one of the main characters makes a valiant charge at one of the main antagonists.

He knows hes going to die, but he does it anyway, but not before giving his companion whom throughout the story had development and progression with him a fond send off.

He used his power, charged straight into battle and as spears and arrows slow him down, and chains bind him, he gets ever closer to reaching his goal.

He is finally stopped dead, just before he is in striking range of the antagonist. Who smugly tells him that he could never have beaten him, but admired his strength and his resolve, and believes he deserved a place in “his world”.

The character dies with an acceptance that he has failed. And his companion just watches in tears, as the antagonist approached.

The antagonist confronted him, questioning if he wanted to die as well, but the character simply told him that he was his servant, and he had to live, it was his wish.

Respecting this, the antagonist leaves, and the character is left to tell the tale of the fallen hero.

This, is how you do meaningful and painful character death right, you establish the value of the char, the relationship between them and other characters. You develop it not just over one episode but over “many” episodes of story, and as we grow attached to them, we become fond of them.

This is why Sieran’s death for me as a Priory Player had so much meaning. I didn’t have lot of time to know Sieran and before Battle for Claw Island, I had assumed she was going to be with me significantly longer than that. However, she did at least get enough time to show me who she was, what she wanted with her life, and her aspirations and screw-ups that made me laugh and made me sob heavily when she passed on.

Sierans death had meaning, Belinda’s was nothing to me.

Go back to the battle for claw island, and the orders, and remember how those chars died and take a moment to consider the value of death.

Death has to happen at the right time, and if its too soon, or too late, it can loose momentum, and purpose.

A char has a reason to exist, to expand the plot, to give the main char, the player, a reason to keep going.

And sometimes that means they have to die to assure the player char has a motivation to avenge them.

That does not mean it is always necessary to kill a char off.

Epic: 5/5 OP.

Generally I agree with the writing tips, but I don’t agree with all the specifics. A lot of it comes from your audience.

You postulate for example, that an author uses cliffhangers because they’re insecure about their plot. I think that that type of serial writing has a place and for some it’s an actual style choice.

Here’s the issue. There are a lot of people who read books and are readers and don’t need to be hit over the head with stuff in order to get drawn in. Readers appreciate nuance. But gamers aren’t all readers and many gamers don’t recognize nuance at all. They barely pay attention to what’s going on, unless it involves loot and killing. Sometimes you’re writing for a group of people who aren’t all readers and the lowest common denominator will reach the maximum number of people.

Years ago, I wrote a serial for a role playing game website, and I chose that format because the idea was to get those readers back to that page to see what happened next. My audience were looking for something fast paced, action-oriented. It’s by far my least favorite piece of writing, but it was effective and successful.

I do agree with most of your post, however.