Guild Wars 2

Man, I respect the time you took to put this together, but I disagree with pretty much every suggestion you make.

I’m glad the current Living World content is not about dragons. I can’t think of a more boring MMO cliche than dragon-slaying. It’s done. I’m glad the setting has enough diversity of life and lore that we can engage other, more interesting, conflicts.

Yeah, there is some meta conflict between Personal Story and Living World, but the problem is the PS, not the LW. Living World is a great concept that deserves to stay and become the focus of the game moving forward. Personal Story was a neat idea that was poorly implemented and needs to accept the back seat for the duration of the ride. Personal story should never have been about slaying Zhaitan. That was short-sighted.

PS should have limited it’s scope to the area where the character starts their journey, with perhaps some brief forays out into the wider world. The Human PS should have been about Queen Jenna’s tenuous grasp of power in Divinity’s Reach. The Sylvari PS should have been about dealing with the Nightmare Court and Caithe’s ties to their leadership. The Norn PS should have been about… Norn stuff… ale or something… That way PS could have developed the NPCs and lore of the respective races and left Zhaitan for the first “dragon campaign” to kick off the start of the Living World content. That’s the fix it needs. That’s the fix that works.

What we do not need is any scheme that tries to cram the Living World into the Personal Story so that you can play all the content whenever you get around to it. That is not a Living World.

If you are terribly worried about the conflict between Personal Story and Living World, then focus on fixing Personal Story so that Living World can continue to be the amazing and unique experience that it is.

Anet should hire the TC as a Living Story coordinator and writer.

jsduke.6537:

Man, I respect the time you took to put this together, but I disagree with pretty much every suggestion you make.

I’m glad the current Living World content is not about dragons. I can’t think of a more boring MMO cliche than dragon-slaying. It’s done. I’m glad the setting has enough diversity of life and lore that we can engage other, more interesting, conflicts.

Yeah, there is some meta conflict between Personal Story and Living World, but the problem is the PS, not the LW. Living World is a great concept that deserves to stay and become the focus of the game moving forward. Personal Story was a neat idea that was poorly implemented and needs to accept the back seat for the duration of the ride. Personal story should never have been about slaying Zhaitan. That was short-sighted.

PS should have limited it’s scope to the area where the character starts their journey, with perhaps some brief forays out into the wider world. The Human PS should have been about Queen Jenna’s tenuous grasp of power in Divinity’s Reach. The Sylvari PS should have been about dealing with the Nightmare Court and Caithe’s ties to their leadership. The Norn PS should have been about… Norn stuff… ale or something… That way PS could have developed the NPCs and lore of the respective races and left Zhaitan for the first “dragon campaign” to kick off the start of the Living World content. That’s the fix it needs. That’s the fix that works.

What we do not need is any scheme that tries to cram the Living World into the Personal Story so that you can play all the content whenever you get around to it. That is not a Living World.

If you are terribly worried about the conflict between Personal Story and Living World, then focus on fixing Personal Story so that Living World can continue to be the amazing and unique experience that it is.

So, whats so awesomke about current LS?? Please tell me becouse I have a hard time having fun with this crappy LS atm. Its boring, made for 10 year old children.

Vetrie.7804:

So, whats so awesomke about current LS?? Please tell me becouse I have a hard time having fun with this crappy LS atm. Its boring, made for 10 year old children.

No. Just no. While I am in awe of the OP’s constructive suggestions, these kind of comments (10 year old etc) are out of place. Keep it constructive, don’t degrade the awesomeness of this thread with unwarranted vile which adds nothing.

I really hope a dev will pop his/her head here, even if it’s just to compliment the OP on the sheer work that went into this and on the constructive attitude that is neigh unparalleled on this or any MMO forum.

jsduke.6537:

Man, I respect the time you took to put this together, but I disagree with pretty much every suggestion you make.

And, respectfully, I disagree that the Living Story is great. I also disagree that we should be focusing on matters other than the Dragons at the moment. Take a look at the logo for a moment. Consider what the plot of the game was at launch, and the entire premise behind many of the zones in the game. The theme is the invasion of the dragons and their minions. The Asura had to deal with them (Destroyers), the Norn had to deal with them (Jormag, Sons of Svanir), the humans had to deal with them (Orr), the Charr had to deal with them(Branded). The Sylvari may or may not be related to them by birth, but they still have Orrians in their backyard regardless.

I don’t think it’s a mark of good writing to simply brush by this entire basis of the story to inject an entirely new and thus far unrelated threat as being at the forefront of the story. I think the unrelated part is what is really bothersome about the LS: If Scarlet was being motivated by the chaos, or the unbound magic, of dragons and their conflicts, that might be interesting. She still could be, of course, since it’s been hinted in her origin story that she has a much broader perspective on the mechanics of this universe. If Southsun and the Consortium were a result of that same chaos, that might be interesting.

Instead, we saw a continent of stories, and instead are focusing on these unrelated islands of plot. Obviously, there’s room for that sort of thing, but when they become the main focus of the story for months on end (it has been more than half a year at this point, hasn’t it?) then it may be time to reconsider a few things.

Also, and just speaking from my own personal view on the Living Story, I’m finding it to be pretty lackluster. If I were this far into an episodic show, and all we got were more teasers for a villain that was unrelated to the initial premise, I’d have to assume the writers had a concept with no clear vision of how to actually tie it to the premise of the show, and were instead attempting to stretch it out as much as possible to make money off of the “mystery” instead of the actual quality of the storytelling.

With that in mind, it’s entirely possible that they can and perhaps will turn the Living Story around. As it is, I feel it is a vehicle for the cash shop, and little else.

10/10 this is an amazing idea, I would love to see it worked on or implemented because you’re absolutely right. I’ve lost interest in the living world and honestly end up doing the first half of the months story and not caring about the second half because it trails off. The Tower of Nightmares, cool Idea permanent damage to the landscape of Kessex, I like it. However it’s not as engrosing as the personal story could be. And it’s kitten well not as threatening as the other (atleast) 4 Elder Dragons that are still alive.

I really do hope you get some attention from ANet on this I’d like to see their thoughts and maybe if they’ll implement it themselves.

Obligatory Arena Net, hire this man!

jsduke.6537:

Man, I respect the time you took to put this together, but I disagree with pretty much every suggestion you make.

I’m glad the current Living World content is not about dragons. I can’t think of a more boring MMO cliche than dragon-slaying. It’s done. I’m glad the setting has enough diversity of life and lore that we can engage other, more interesting, conflicts.

Yeah, there is some meta conflict between Personal Story and Living World, but the problem is the PS, not the LW. Living World is a great concept that deserves to stay and become the focus of the game moving forward. Personal Story was a neat idea that was poorly implemented and needs to accept the back seat for the duration of the ride. Personal story should never have been about slaying Zhaitan. That was short-sighted.

PS should have limited it’s scope to the area where the character starts their journey, with perhaps some brief forays out into the wider world. The Human PS should have been about Queen Jenna’s tenuous grasp of power in Divinity’s Reach. The Sylvari PS should have been about dealing with the Nightmare Court and Caithe’s ties to their leadership. The Norn PS should have been about… Norn stuff… ale or something… That way PS could have developed the NPCs and lore of the respective races and left Zhaitan for the first “dragon campaign” to kick off the start of the Living World content. That’s the fix it needs. That’s the fix that works.

What we do not need is any scheme that tries to cram the Living World into the Personal Story so that you can play all the content whenever you get around to it. That is not a Living World.

If you are terribly worried about the conflict between Personal Story and Living World, then focus on fixing Personal Story so that Living World can continue to be the amazing and unique experience that it is.

I don’t think you grasped what the OP was saying…. He wasn’t saying to get rid of the LS, he was recommending a change to the PERSONAL STORY so that the developers did not have to worry about conflicts between the PS and the LS.

After which he recommended a format on how the LS will roll out from this point forward. A five or six month campaign dedicated to slaying a dragon and exploring a new zone. Then the remainder of the year is festivals, minor/major lore and new game mechanics.

Almost all of what he proposed is in line with what you were saying, except for the dragon slaying part. And as cliche as killing dragons may sound, these dragons are the biggest threat to Tyria. Once we get rid of them then we maybe can see a more unique threat and experience then what we have seen or read in other RPGs.

Wow. Simply wow!

This must be the best idea I’ve ever read in these forums. I totally support it and I hope someone from ArenaNet see this ^^

Sir, your adaption of how the final story mission should have ended is borderline GENIUS.

Markadis.9012:

I don’t think you grasped what the OP was saying…. He wasn’t saying to get rid of the LS, he was recommending a change to the PERSONAL STORY so that the developers did not have to worry about conflicts between the PS and the LS.

After which he recommended a format on how the LS will roll out from this point forward. A five or six month campaign dedicated to slaying a dragon and exploring a new zone. Then the remainder of the year is festivals, minor/major lore and new game mechanics.

Almost all of what he proposed is in line with what you were saying, except for the dragon slaying part. And as cliche as killing dragons may sound, these dragons are the biggest threat to Tyria. Once we get rid of them then we maybe can see a more unique threat and experience then what we have seen or read in other RPGs.

The Timecapsule idea as presented here shows the Living World content getting tucked into the Personal Story. Which does remove Living World as a game element because it’s no longer living at that point. It turns a dyamic world that changes over time into a static world that just sits there until you get around to poking at it.

Have you ever even PLAYED the first game at all?

jsduke.6537:

Man, I respect the time you took to put this together, but I disagree with pretty much every suggestion you make.

I’m glad the current Living World content is not about dragons. I can’t think of a more boring MMO cliche than dragon-slaying. It’s done. I’m glad the setting has enough diversity of life and lore that we can engage other, more interesting, conflicts.

Yeah, there is some meta conflict between Personal Story and Living World, but the problem is the PS, not the LW. Living World is a great concept that deserves to stay and become the focus of the game moving forward. Personal Story was a neat idea that was poorly implemented and needs to accept the back seat for the duration of the ride. Personal story should never have been about slaying Zhaitan. That was short-sighted.

PS should have limited it’s scope to the area where the character starts their journey, with perhaps some brief forays out into the wider world. The Human PS should have been about Queen Jenna’s tenuous grasp of power in Divinity’s Reach. The Sylvari PS should have been about dealing with the Nightmare Court and Caithe’s ties to their leadership. The Norn PS should have been about… Norn stuff… ale or something… That way PS could have developed the NPCs and lore of the respective races and left Zhaitan for the first “dragon campaign” to kick off the start of the Living World content. That’s the fix it needs. That’s the fix that works.

What we do not need is any scheme that tries to cram the Living World into the Personal Story so that you can play all the content whenever you get around to it. That is not a Living World.

If you are terribly worried about the conflict between Personal Story and Living World, then focus on fixing Personal Story so that Living World can continue to be the amazing and unique experience that it is.

jsduke.6537:

Man, I respect the time you took to put this together, but I disagree with pretty much every suggestion you make.

I’m glad the current Living World content is not about dragons. I can’t think of a more boring MMO cliche than dragon-slaying. It’s done. I’m glad the setting has enough diversity of life and lore that we can engage other, more interesting, conflicts.

Yeah, there is some meta conflict between Personal Story and Living World, but the problem is the PS, not the LW. Living World is a great concept that deserves to stay and become the focus of the game moving forward. Personal Story was a neat idea that was poorly implemented and needs to accept the back seat for the duration of the ride. Personal story should never have been about slaying Zhaitan. That was short-sighted.

PS should have limited it’s scope to the area where the character starts their journey, with perhaps some brief forays out into the wider world. The Human PS should have been about Queen Jenna’s tenuous grasp of power in Divinity’s Reach. The Sylvari PS should have been about dealing with the Nightmare Court and Caithe’s ties to their leadership. The Norn PS should have been about… Norn stuff… ale or something… That way PS could have developed the NPCs and lore of the respective races and left Zhaitan for the first “dragon campaign” to kick off the start of the Living World content. That’s the fix it needs. That’s the fix that works.

What we do not need is any scheme that tries to cram the Living World into the Personal Story so that you can play all the content whenever you get around to it. That is not a Living World.

If you are terribly worried about the conflict between Personal Story and Living World, then focus on fixing Personal Story so that Living World can continue to be the amazing and unique experience that it is.

I have to disagree, have you played the first game at all? The storyline actually made sense, we weren’t fighting a character whose personality is boarderline mary sue, second the lore made characters feel like they were making a difference as they moved on. How much you want to bet that after we finish with the tower Kessex Hills will be back to normal, like nothing ever happened. Much like there other living storys. Living World was a great idea, I loved it, but nothing seems living when everything becomes temporary.

As for the actual story writing for this, its scatter brained. We cant pull connections and its been a year by now. Scarlet has more power, or just about that of any Elder Dragon which rivaled even the power of the Gods. Scarlet isn’t a God, she’s a plant, and a Mary Sue one at that.

No, I never played the first game. I wish that I had, because it sounds pretty amazing.

I have posted my criticisms of the Scarlet arc in other threads, I’m not going to go into all of that here. I’m just going to say that I’m not impressed with the current Living Story, either, and it needs to improve going forward.

But just because I don’t like this particular story doesn’t mean that Living World is a bad idea. Living World and Living Story are two different things. Living Story is just a part of Living World, and Scarlet is not going to be around forever. She has definitely overstayed her welcome in my opinion, and I’ll be glad when they wrap up her arc and move on to other things.

Can dragons be a part of those other things? Sure.

Should dragons be the focus of all Living Story content going forward? God I hope not.

Valentine, I doubt very much that Kessex Hills will revert to the same old zone it was before the Tower went up. Much like previous Living Story content updates, significant parts of the story stay in the world. Like the Aetherblade JP, the new TA path, Tequatl, and the Queen’s Pavilion.

As for storytelling, I talked a lot about storytelling and the current Living Story in my post here:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Collaborative-Development-Topic-Living-World/page/45#post3251688

You cannot destroy the pact.

That just won’t do. The Pact is a result of a lot of work, and it has been proven to work with the defeat of Zhaitan.

Each of the orders and enforcement or military organizations within the races (Lionguard, Wolfborn, Peacemakers, Wardens, Seraph, Shinning Blade, Evon Vanguard, the Legions, Sentinels…) still have their own tasks and problems to deal with, but the Pact has proven invaluable against the greatest threat: The dragons.

No way they’ll break it.

And you can’t just “kill” the pact by killing some of their members. Kill Trahearne, and a new leader would be chosen to replace him. Kill the members stationed on Orr, and others would be recalled from all over the world.

At this point, to break he pact, you would have to wipe Tyria of all allied races, both the greater and lesser races, until there’s no more people that would fight together against the dragons. Until then, the Pact stands.

If you want to turn the Living Story back to GW lore, all you need is to put little puppet strings in Scarlet, and show who was pulling those strings, and make it an enemy of old. Once the cat is out of he bag, they no longer need her and forsake her. She could either die or just become purposeless, and trying to break havoc here and there, with her invasions and antics. Becoming just the Team Rocket-like nuisance she’s better suited for.

For example, all of this could have been staged by Mursaat, who were using Scarlet to find a better way back into Tyria than using bodies as a conduit (we’ll learn that they kidnapping D’Alessio would be to use him as a host for a mursaat leader).

Or by Demons, who were homeless after being kicked from the real of Torment after it became Kormir’s realm after Mallyx was defeated, and were wondering the mists for some time, until they started to gather and organize themselves again under the banner of Menzies or Dhuum, or some other new entity. You could even bring back Razah’s heritage, with a bunch of humanoid mist entities that descend from the ones like Razah that Razah himself found traveling the mists, that have been fighting those demons for some time.

The possibilities to turn Living Story back to a main GW lore theme are endless. But destroying the pact is simply out of the question.

As for unity, Living Story is designed so you don’t have to do personal story first, and can simply jump in. Merging it with the personal story won’t do, because then you’ll have to complete the personal story first.

Living story should not be about the dragons either, that should be kept in dungeons and personal story. Living story could introduce a new map in which personal story happens aimed against the next dragon, but thats mostly it.

Yeah, it’ kind of annoying having those limitations, but there’s nothing that can be done against it if they want to keep living story “living”.

I would not mind if there was some sort of “Historian” NPC you can talk to to replay living story chapters, though. So players that arrive late to the party can play in there and anyone who wants to can relive those missions, not just merely read about it or watch some recap cutscene.

Very well thought-out and written, and I have to say I agree with pretty much all of it.

I really like your idea for the final fight with Zhaitan as well.

One problem: if Fort Trinity gets destroyed in the final fight, and the Pact gets scattered, what does that mean for the open world?
Fort Trinity is an actual place on the map, and before the final fight, it should exist, and act as a base of operations for events around Orr, and so on. So clearly, that part of the map should look different for someone who has completed the story and someone who has not, but that’s just impossible to implement. The story tries carefully to avoid this sort of problem, but with your scenario it’s unavoidable.

I’m sure someone’s brought this up already, but I didn’t read through all of the comments.
Otherwise, bravo!

LOL
if ANet does not come up with something better than this… the storywriters got work to do now so they prove they’re better than some players.

I really loved this idea. It was a long read, but well worth it as you have some really solid ideas.

I think shattering the pact in the remake of the final personal story step (Arah story mode) would be fantastic and really resolve a lot of the issues progressing with story from here. They could just say the remnants of the Pact decide to remain in Orr, fighting off the remains of Zhaitan’s army and removing the need to update any of the event dialogues.

Image #4: Your example of living story updates for the year was just amazing. I loved all of them (Especially Mad King. lol can’t spell necromancer without romance, haha).

The only thing I would disagree with at all is really the need for a ‘personal’ story instance. I think if done right the living story could be the personal story and the continuation of personal instances would become unnecessary. They take a lot of development time and I’d rather they focus on living world content personally. It would also prevent the same ‘issue’ from occurring where the personal instances are telling a different story than the living world story.

flettir.6349:

Fort Trinity is an actual place on the map, and before the final fight, it should exist, and act as a base of operations for events around Orr, and so on. So clearly, that part of the map should look different for someone who has completed the story and someone who has not…

This is true, but it’s an easy work around. Just keep the Arah story instance to the location it’s at now instead of destroying Fort Trinity. Zhaitan still pretty much wipes out a lot of the pact but when he’s destroyed the remaining forces decide to stay in Orr and fight the lingering corruption. Fort Trinity stands as a memorial to those who died and a beacon of hope to the rest of Tyria, proof that working together the races are capable of taking down the Elder Dragons.

Then, continue with where the OP left off: the remnants of the Pact are in Orr and thought they did ultimately kill Zhaitan their losses were too severe. The races of Tyria have to defend for themselves and we continue where the OP suggested by having the races bickering over what to do next, choosing a target, etc.

I like the way you’ve fleshed everything out over a year and gave the development of the world a sense of direction and scheduling, something which the story as of late has lacked. Knowing that you’re going up against the forces of a dragon with full intent of taking them down gives you a sense of purpose. Fighting rag-tag enemies with seemingly no connection or explanation of why each of them sprung up gives no purpose at all. It didn’t even make for a good surprise when it was revealed that one person was behind it all, because nobody knew who that person was or why they should be seen as a threat, particularly when every faction they put together previously had been promptly stamped out.

I think panning out the story across the year the way you have would give a developer a proper sense of when to focus on story-driven content and when to focus on other things like mechanics or loot.

Also,

>Polymock
>August 2016
>implying ever

Anet, give this man a job!
This is exactly what I was hoping for, instead we get scarlet. I literally threw my hands in the air when I saw her appear in the fractal story.
But great job on the write up, its very inspiring. I got excited reading the Zhiatan fight, I’d love to do that!

Amazing work compiling this, and like everyone else here I would play your revision for years to come. Awesome ideas and ways to move forward with the story. You phrase yourself very well!

Great work, Shriketalon! I also love the constructive feedback and great discussion that y’all contributed to.

I must say, this is one of the most refreshing threads I’ve had the pleasure of reading in a long time. Truly a breather from all the “WE H@TE SCARLETT!!1!” topics with little to no thought to what will follow after that.
I really hope some of the devs can take a look at Shriketalon’s writings and how these are received by the community. So consider this a +1

Bump!

This needs to be seen, and it would be cool to see a comment from anyone at Anet.

So, I quit this game back in December/January and have checked back now and then to see if anything has been added or changed to the game to interest me in coming back. So far however none of the living story updates sparked my interest enough to bother.

I also want to mention that I have been pretty harsh when talking about this game to others. When people ask me about the game I generally tell them that the game is extremely fun leveling to 80 the first time, but quickly loses the spark after the exploration has been played out. From lackluster Living Story arcs, to poor dungeon mechanics, and lack of meaningful/challenging content, stagnation of gameplay elements, etc. I had basically given up hope that the game would ever be interesting enough to pick up again.

I state the above to drive home the effect Shriketalon’s suggestions made on me. If GW2 was the game described by Shriketalon (or contained story lines of equal caliber), I would start playing this game again in a heartbeat. Even if the gameplay elements that I am unsatisfied with were never fixed, I would at least want to log in to experience these story arcs. I would even play this game while playing other MMO’s that are coming out next year. In fact I almost re installed the game on the spot, the richness of lore that the OP describes almost cast the game in an entirely new light and livens up the tired story line all by itself.

The framework of this game has so much potential, it has been hard to watch as it has been squandered all year long. I really hope Arenanet takes notice and breathes some new life into this game.

did anyone figure out a way to move this to the developer/player collaboration thread?

KeybladeMaster.3148:

did anyone figure out a way to move this to the developer/player collaboration thread?

As I mentioned on Page 2, Shriketalon already commented on it there and included individual year images. Some other players have also commented on it and praised its epicness in that thread.

• https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Collaborative-Development-Topic-Living-World/3176135

unshamed bump. -O-O-

I love OP’s ideas so much because they tie into the lore mysteries that have kept me in love with the GW world. I don’t object to Scarlet so much as I object to the old lore being dropped like it’s hot and her being shoved in as some sort of calorie-dense but low-on-nutrition substitute. I want to know my character is actually researching things, is actually working hard to uncover things and actively make connections instead of just being called upon every two weeks by another NPC to play at being their silent sidekick while they do all that stuff. Where are the gods and why did the leave? Has no one tried to communicate with them? What’s up with pale tree 2.0? The bloodstones? Elona and the Sunspears?

OP’s first paragraph just really spoke to me, then they pulled out that magnificent chart at the end and… VigorousApplause.gif

Bump for greater justice.

The OP’s post is so mindblowingly constructive I would have at least expected some form of official feedback for his days and days of work on this. Some form of recognition is in order.

My apologies for my long absence from the thread. Visiting relatives and a return to work and all that. Though it has given me the chance to do some writing…

jsduke.6537:

PS should have limited it’s scope to the area where the character starts their journey, with perhaps some brief forays out into the wider world. The Human PS should have been about Queen Jenna’s tenuous grasp of power in Divinity’s Reach. The Sylvari PS should have been about dealing with the Nightmare Court and Caithe’s ties to their leadership. The Norn PS should have been about… Norn stuff… ale or something… That way PS could have developed the NPCs and lore of the respective races and left Zhaitan for the first “dragon campaign” to kick off the start of the Living World content. That’s the fix it needs. That’s the fix that works.

As several others have already pointed out, the concept of merging the Personal and Living Stories was not meant to diminish the Personal, only enliven the Living. By returning to the original premise of Guild Wars 2, the game can give the Living Story a meaningful exploration of the world and all its wonders.

But I would also like you to consider that my plan can also make room for what you describe. It would be quite easy to have a Personal Story September of something of that effect, where one month per year is devoted to adding an excellently told, meaningful story specifically about the player. For example, one year may devote an entire month to presenting everyone with a good story based on their race, while another could be based on their Order or Profession.

In this way, we get the best of both worlds. Everyone can band together for campaigns to save the world, but also develop personal ties to NPCs and experience meaningful choices about who they are as individual heroes.

PopeUrban.2578:

I’m not convinced of the longevity of the specifics of plot, but I agree on two core points of all this:.

This is a fair concern. My posts so far have been very focused on the dragons, since they are an immediate threat that will continue to plague all of Tyria until they go away. There are plenty of other stories to tell after they are slain, of course, though I haven’t demonstrated them. But I suppose I will have to do a bit better to prove that and demonstrate what sort of storytelling Tyria can unveil once the dragons are slain.

Qawsada.4251:

One suggestion, you would really put the other three years you suggested in your OP. Those are extremely wonderful and it shouldn’t be buried in the forum.

An excellent idea, will do that as soon as possible. Though there will soon be a little more than three years…

I’ll be back soon.

Please take this as encouragement, but also thoughtful review.

You know the maxim ‘success is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration’?

A lot of this is 1% work. Top level goals are exciting, but they’re also comparatively easy. My own experience is that really good ideas carry closer to a 3% : 97% ratio and while I think most of these are really good ideas, they still prompt at least 30 times as much work to make them happen as they take to come up with.

I’d be a LOT more interested in seeing the schedule you have now fleshed out in more detail than seeing another year or two of top-level concept work.

I like the idea, but the problem is that I don’t like the living story and I don’t want to feel tied to it.

Nike.2631:

Please take this as encouragement, but also thoughtful review.

You know the maxim ‘success is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration’?

A lot of this is 1% work. Top level goals are exciting, but they’re also comparatively easy. My own experience is that really good ideas carry closer to a 3% : 97% ratio and while I think most of these are really good ideas, they still prompt at least 30 times as much work to make them happen as they take to come up with..

Believe me, I agree with you 100%. Implementation trumps inspiration every time. Anyone can dream of something beautiful, but it is the skill to create that beauty and share it with others that really matters. Nothing you see here will miraculously fix the Living Story. Only the skilled hands of talented craftsman can make that happen.

But that’s not my goal here. My aim is something more specific. I’m not here to do a big post saying “drop what you’re doing and hire me to tell you what to do”, because that would be extremely arrogant and absurdly silly. Instead, I’m trying to prove a point. When they started the Living Story, they decided that it wouldn’t touch any of the Personal Story events or characters, wouldn’t interact with the dragon slaying timeline, would draw a big box around their current material marked “Nothing Changes Here”. My point is that this decision had good intentions, but it was a colossal disaster. It is the reason we can’t have nice things.

My goal is not to claim that my meager capabilities are better than Anet’s storytellers. It is to remind those storytellers that the world of Tyria evokes joy in its playerbase, that their love of Guild Wars is based upon its magnificent history and wondrous mysteries. It is to prove that Tyria is better than this thing we slog through today, that the writers of Anet have a beautiful and vibrant world that already lives and breathes and yearns to dance upon the storyteller’s parchment. My goal is to use their lore and their world building to create a reminder that there are still god realms and gargoyles, undead empires and druid mysteries, lost continents and new alliances, places on the map labelled Here There Be Dragons!

I don’t want them to tell my story. My story would be absurd. I want them to keep telling the wonderful stories I have been enjoying since the last day dawned upon the kingdom of Ascalon and a naive little monk set out to save the kingdom, the story of a world called Tyria.
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And speaking of Tyria…

The following are more campaign possibilities to demonstrate the system’s longevity. It isn’t organized into specific years, but instead presents four possible standard campaigns to fit withing the normal season. The second section is a demonstration about how the season concept can be altered to fit different stories, allowing interludes, transition, or escalation of a conflict that avoids solving a given problem in a mere five months. It isn’t a fleshed out schedule, but I could go over the previous ones and break down specific details of what they could mechanically implement if you’d like.

Warning: vast amounts of conjecture ahead.

A bump for an EXTREMELY important post!
I really want to provide helpful criticism or just some sort of general construction that could help improve this idea, but I can’t. I can’t because it’s amazing already and I’m overwhelmed! I’ve never felt so excited from reading about something that is only an idea. And yet…I’m also so disappointed that I could, quite literally, cry because this isn’t already the plan for how GW2 is to continue its story.

I am desperately hoping and praying that something good comes out of your suggestion, that it is read and carefully thought about and discussed and taken into consideration, because it’s full of good ideas. You touch up on old lore, ensuring that the core themes of gw2 are not left untouched. There’s plenty of room for character growth—YOUR character’s growth, even!—and you even brush up on letting your character move on past just the orders storylines and working towards things like the Seraph and fighting the Nightmare and just. wow.

Really good job all around. I checked out a few other posts of yours and you really know what you’re talking about. Please continue to do so!!!

Shriketalon.1937:

Greetings and salutations.

I come to you today with a comment about the Living Story’s direction, though I know those are in abundance these days. What I’d like to do is hopefully a bit different. I would like to describe what the game would need to do in order to smoothly transition back to the war against the dragons. At present, that is impossible due to an incompatibility between players starting the Personal Story and those who have finished it, and conundrum which can be solved in a single sentence.

To make the Living Story flourish, the Pact must be destroyed.

…Bit of an attention getter, I hope. Allow me to spell on the argument; why the personal story has impersonal problems, what the living story is currently doing wrong, how to fix the two to the benefit of both, and what the results could be for an entire year’s worth of content. I can be a bit overly verbose, so I’ve condensed them into four JPG files for easier reading. Feel free to skip through it if it drags on, but please scroll through the NextYear file to consider what the Living Story could become.

Here we go. The Time Capsule method.

Edit: I’ve been adding to this post slowly throughout the thread, including several new campaign possibilities. For the sake of organization, I’ve added them on to this post. If this is your first time reading this, please beware, the last three images will get extremely verbose. Bring a glass of tea.

I remember the last time you posted this, I agreed with it and I still agree, it does look great and something that many people would be exited to see. I think the LS and PS can exist, although I have my own changes I would like to see happen to them.

The dragon should be a part of the living story. With the talked about ability to revisit old events (Anet in favor of) and making the dragon fight permanent, it should work fine.

The personal story should be about personal character development. Say I wanted to be a Priestess of Lyssa, would that be possible? Start off with a small number of branches that individualize the characters in their own story. When a satisfying number is reached add expansions on the different stories. This is how the personal story should feel (at least to me). This is just an example, the point is it should be about the players character (as it was lvl 3-20) not about a dragon. A good personal that expands based on the choices we make (as some of it already does mid story) would be great. Talbyt was a great example of PS that people loved and missed when he was gone. (messed his named up sorry)

It would be good to keep both if Anet is proactive in building on the PS as well as the LS. When a player is done or not interested in the one or the other they still would have something to do, although for this to happen it would mean a slow down in releases. I did hear something about Anet doing bigger releases over a longer block of time, (not every two weeks) over this next year.

If what the OP suggested happened and those plots were the 2 week LS cycle I would be very happy.

Great post; I really hope the guys at ArenaNet read this and take a tiny bit of this advice in consideration for their upcoming story.