Guild Wars 2

i know anet has said no expansions that everything will be added thru LS but this isnt working very well. in 2 years thru living story they have only added 2 new zones and added some extra mini dungeons (fotm) and changed a few zones events and added some story only about half is repayable thou. at this rate we the players wont even see a content similar in size to what gw1 expansion factions gave us for another 5-10 years .
so here is what they need to do in LS if they so please.
new classes/new skills since they took the dual classes out that gw1 had the classes they have now seem stagnant and have gotten boring its time to mix it up
new zones and alot of them with content to fill(not like southsun when it came out) at least 2 a month. in gw1 you had this huge game with new interesting stuff to do all over the place. now you have a world where everyone thats played has gone over the stuff that there. yes the few changes to zone was good for a fue weeks but that only last so long. at the rate you are going you wont even make it to the crystal desert or the northern shiver peaks let alone cantha
new wvw maps that can rotate in with some new mechanics to spice things up. and for godsakes put some thought into the keeps there boring hard to defend and just uneventful. postern doors??? have the ability to defend from keep walls and be hit on keep/tower walls. make it a battle not oh doors at 25 lets jump out and run. it should be doors at 25 lets group up and push them out while a group or 2 comes in from behind with the A**jam while we hold them here. and also keeps/ towers need to have a reason to be defended.
new dungeons you have new story new dragons but no new full dungeons change that plz
im sure there is stuff i missed but its a good start. i dont think a expansion is unreasonable you anet had far fewer people working with you on gw1 and did a great job and now that you have 200-300 you are producing far less content i find this had to believe. truthfully all gw2 is now for me is log in farm log out once i get my legendary i see no reason to play after that time. lets hope this isnt the case and sorry for my bad english

I think this LS season is a prologue for a new expansion, anyway.

This whining for an “expansion” is getting on my nerves. There is absolutely no reason for a one-time “expansion” because the content is augmented continously.
If you cannot live without an “expansion” like in all those generic mmos out there (which would certainly cost something), then play one of those, but dont keep complaining about a game that has a new and better concept.

Claridiana.5230:

This whining for an “expansion” is getting on my nerves. There is absolutely no reason for a one-time “expansion” because the content is augmented continously.
If you cannot live without an “expansion” like in all those generic mmos out there (which would certainly cost something), then play one of those, but dont keep complaining about a game that has a new and better concept.

I second that.
Also, the LS is an experiment. ANet have been trying to work it out. Do you even know how hard it is to play around with a new, upgraded engine, doing new things? Are you aware of the amount of extra code used to get Dynamic Events instead of the traditional Questing system?
ANet are going for something different, something they’ve showed to get better at. And 2 years is nothing for such a project like this. LS/LW is the dream, and to make such a dream possible you need time, patience, and experience. They couldn’t do it internally, so they let it out to the players, to make it better through feedback. The first year was the perfect experiment, Tyria was the laboratory. Heck, I’ll even say we’re the lab rats, and I’m loving it. It’s been a hell of a ride, and one I don’t want to stop anytime soon. It’ll only get better.
If you’re a traditional gamer that can’t play MMO’s without proper full sized all-in-one-go expansions, maybe GW2 just isn’t for you(heh, that rhymed).
On a more serious note though, not all games are for everyone, abd even though GW2 tries to cater to most player bases it also has something petty unique – a vision. About MMO gaming in the future, about a content delivery model, and about a “living, breathing world”. If you don’t want to be a part of the journey, maybe you should wait 5-10 years until the product is perfected. I’ve been saying this for a long time, and in past posts, and I’ll say it again.
The 2011 Manifesto Video, showed a glympse of what ANet wants to do with GW2. Just because it didn’t go there right from launch, or one or two years in, doesn’t mean they’ve forgotten about it or scrapped it entirely. It just means they have the tools, they’re perfecting them, and they’re learning them. Season 1 to Season 2 was huge leap. Can you imagine Season 3, 4, 5? I can. The ride, the journey, will be awesome. The players were developers in that sense. And it’ll be quite amazing.
I don’t mind paying content, but paid content doesn’t exactly mean quality. If they packed a whole Season of LS into a boxed expansion, they’d still have spent them same time developing it, they’d still do the same things, the things learnt would be on a SLOWER BASE, because with the Ls they can just scrap a concept on the go and quickly change it before the update hits(Peter Fries confirmed this on the last episode of PoI), and in the end it wouldn’t be such a living breathing world after all. it would be a generic mmo, that doesn’t live, but expands every 6 months or so. I’ve had it with that. I’ve had it with generic. I’ve had it with “the formula works, so use it”, no, change it.
And after playing GW1, because I was tired of the generic mmo over and over again, I’ve come to learn that if anyone can do it, it’s ANet.

tldr; Read up, for the last time.

Well, LS may not be working very well for some, but it is for me. Personally I am glad that they are committed to this path.

The things I disagree with is the OP staring another expansion thread when there is are others that are ongoing on the subject.
If Claridiana doens’t like expansion (and talks down to others calling them whiners and go play another game) then don’t read them. Just a rude response!
And at Eragamer. The story is not an expansion in anyway shape or form. Yes it is content, (good and bad). An expansion is much different. Agreeing with someone that whines about whinners and tells them to go basically shut up and go play another game does not contibute to the discussion in anyway shape or form.

Hopefuuly thread is deleted or merged.

The difference between one big content expansion and gradual updates that each add small bites of content is psychological.

Once the Living Story 2 is completed, I fully expect it to contain everything a traditional “game expansion pack” would contain, i.e. a number of new zones, a new dungeon and world boss (or two), a complete story, and a revamp of some existing content (like Lion’s Arch). Maybe not new races or professions, but it’s not off the table either.

Living Story 1 (up to and including the April Feature Pack) tried to be everything a traditional expansion would be, but failed on a few counts (mostly due to lack of replayability and too much temporary content). However, they did state that they learned from that, and would focus more on permanent content – which they are doing in season 2.
Still, Living Story 1 did contain a few new dungeon instances (that were added to Fractals), revamped open world content (Tequatl, Southsun Cove), a new zone in Edge of the Mists, an expansion of 6 out of the 8 crafting disciplines, and a handful of minigames. Add to this 9 new (healing) skills and 40 new (grandmaster) traits and various new stat combos on equipment, as well as the wardrobe functionality.

When you try to list everything that was added to the game during Living Story 1 (as I’ve demonstrated), you will see that it is actually more-or-less on par with a traditional expansion. This is less visible when it only trickles into a game in small pieces every two weeks, however.

This is a psychological difference, not an actual difference.

Oh wait, there is an actual difference. Traditional expansions cost money to buy.

Cormac.3871:

Well, LS may not be working very well for some, but it is for me. Personally I am glad that they are committed to this path.

I completely agree with you about that, I enjoy the format of a living story rather than an expansion. The updates every 2 weeks keep me interested in the story and keep me guessing what is going to happen. If the whole of S2 was released in an expansion type update, I would grind through it all and do all of the achievements in a matter of days, leaving me nothing to do for a considerable amount of time.

Nope, it has been 2 years already and if there are any, we’d have heard it by now.
so yea, nope, we’ll NEVER have any expansions for GW2. Ever.

Agree with those saying “no” to an expansion. It isnt needed. They have a solid model for content release – hopefully they will stick to their guns on this topic.

The living world is far from a solid model of content release. It forces the developers to design content in a modular way such that it can be released in chunks – Dry Top is small, claustrophobic and linear because ArenaNet had to design it in such a way that it could be split into separate releases. So far the living world has delivered content at a snail’s pace in comparison to what an expansion would provide.

Luckily, the living world team is only 20 people. This allows ArenaNet to focus the bulk of their resources towards other, bigger projects. While they haven’t come out and said it, it’s clear they’re working on an expansion or something similar behind the scenes – because living world is a great method of stopgap content release, but it’s by no means enough to carry Guild Wars 2 forever.

The expansion already started. We saw an expansion of the number of available zones, events, recipes, skins etc.

Regardless if you want to deliver content via LW or traditional expansion pack somebody has to develop mentioned content and be willing to ship it. Currently I have the impression the LW team is left alone and is not supported by other teams. Therefore we only see the volume of content the LW team is able to develop with its limited resources. This would also explain the extended breaks we see and saw.

The same result we would see if the LW would work on a traditional expansion completely alone. The expansion would consists of season 2 plus one or two feature packs. It would even cost 30 € or more.

Claridiana.5230:

This whining for an “expansion” is getting on my nerves. There is absolutely no reason for a one-time “expansion” because the content is augmented continously.
If you cannot live without an “expansion” like in all those generic mmos out there (which would certainly cost something), then play one of those, but dont keep complaining about a game that has a new and better concept.

I totally agree. Let the LS fill out the map. We still have alot of area left to open and explore. Taking the story a little at a time is worth it.

We are at a halfway point with LS2 and some you believe we will see xpac like content through LS updates… thats cute lol.

Could it be true? I certainly hope so, but judging by the past 2 years… I think we just going to continually see new portions of a map for the story.., maybe some new events and ofc, 1 new world boss at best… that will be it.. anything more than that, I will be utterly shocked and surprised…

LS is not endgame content (not yet at least)… WvW/PvP still holds a massive amount of the player base and most of them could care less about a cheesy story update every 2 weeks unless it finally impacts WvW/PvP…which is won’t lol.

People aren’t rushing to play this game because it has Living story lol..more people are leaving though because anet seems to care more about LS than ANY other aspect of this game… that needs to change.. regardless of xpac or not, LS should not have this much focus and support..there are more important things to do in this game than playing story time for a few hours every 2 weeks…. This is an MMO, not an a single player RPG.

SkiTz.4590:

We are at a halfway point with LS2 and some you believe we will see xpac like content through LS updates… thats cute lol.

Could it be true? I certainly hope so, but judging by the past 2 years… I think we just going to continually see new portions of a map for the story.., maybe some new events and ofc, 1 new world boss at best… that will be it.. anything more than that, I will be utterly shocked and surprised…

LS is not endgame content (not yet at least)… WvW/PvP still holds a massive amount of the player base and most of them could care less about a cheesy story update every 2 weeks unless it finally impacts WvW/PvP…which is won’t lol.

People aren’t rushing to play this game because it has Living story lol..more people are leaving though because anet seems to care more about LS than ANY other aspect of this game… that needs to change.. regardless of xpac or not, LS should not have this much focus and support..there are more important things to do in this game than playing story time for a few hours every 2 weeks…. This is an MMO, not an a single player RPG.

This.And yeah Living Story is fine but its not enough to carry the whole game.

And i don’t understand the * Living Story vs Expansion * mentality.Why can’t we get an expansion like every 2 years while LS is still there ? I don’t think A.net spends their ALL resources to LS.So they can provide more content beside LS ; like new Spvp modes/maps , new dungeons , new goals/objective for WvW , new things to do , new legendaries etc.

There is already a thread on the front page of the LS forum about expansions. Is it too hard to use that one instead of creating a new one?

SkiTz.4590:

We are at a halfway point with LS2 and some you believe we will see xpac like content through LS updates… thats cute lol.

I very much doubt this is actually the halfway point for s2. The Feature Packs seem like they are going to be coming every four mouths or so, so we will probably be getting a “mid-season” break every 3-4 months to match.

I believe that expansions through living story is way better than boxed. Not everyone can afford box expansions when they are released so some players are left out. If they do it through living story not only are the expansions free but everyone experiences them at the same time. I think everyone believes we dont get the equivalent of an expansion because it happens a little at a time but after season 2 is done im sure everything we got will equal out as an expansion.

“When is the expansion coming out?”

Well, you see, at the conclusion of Season 2 there will be a new item in the Upgrades panel of the gemstore. It will be labeled “The Greatest Threat” and will be grayed out for anyone who logged on at least once during Season 2, for it is buying all of Season 2 in one nice little bundle. There will also be “The Best Sylvari Ever” placed there for the same price which will be, you guessed it, Season 1.

There’s your expansion packs. Have fun!

I’m still hoping that Trahearne will start on his Krakky attack plans after Mordremoth LS is dealt with like he mentioned at the summit, which will take us to the Crystal Desert.

SkiTz.4590:

We are at a halfway point with LS2 and some you believe we will see xpac like content through LS updates… thats cute lol.

Could it be true? I certainly hope so, but judging by the past 2 years… I think we just going to continually see new portions of a map for the story.., maybe some new events and ofc, 1 new world boss at best… that will be it.. anything more than that, I will be utterly shocked and surprised…

LS is not endgame content (not yet at least)… WvW/PvP still holds a massive amount of the player base and most of them could care less about a cheesy story update every 2 weeks unless it finally impacts WvW/PvP…which is won’t lol.

People aren’t rushing to play this game because it has Living story lol..more people are leaving though because anet seems to care more about LS than ANY other aspect of this game… that needs to change.. regardless of xpac or not, LS should not have this much focus and support..there are more important things to do in this game than playing story time for a few hours every 2 weeks…. This is an MMO, not an a single player RPG.

If you want an xpac, go play a game that does that ( WoW has one coming up soon)
If you want nothing but PvP buy an XBox ( Isn’t that what CoD is for?)
/insert sarcasm

While I understand your trying to get your point across, I believe you can use better means. I know I don’t like to be addressed like this, for any reason. I feel it’s rude and condescending and we as a community are supposed to listen to and share with and make points about our and others opinions- not bash and tromp on others in our community for having diverse thoughts.
If you’re here only to PvP, that’s one aspect of the game. Same for those who participate in the LS content.
I don’t feel there’s any need to for the outright rudeness displayed here about it.

You’re right. This isn’t a single player RPG. Nor is it only a PvP game. It is an MMO that is based on a world (Tyria) that has it’s developing Living Story. It happens to have a PvP/WvW element in it. It was not centered on that element, or the entire world would be embroiled in a no-opt PvP zone that anyone would be subject to. PvPers may choose to not participate in LS as PvE/LS players may chose not participate in PvP at will. Bashing on someone about this fact is pointless.

About the OP:
The original LS concept being released in time gated chunks over short amounts to me feels like a better way of doing things. After playing WoW for 9yrs I have come to enjoy the newness of what the next couple of weeks will bring versus the onslaught of enormous grinds that lay ahead. The never ending list of “now I have the next 6mos of grind x to make y” and once I have that done… Nothing for a year and a half till the next xpac rolls out.

Cormac.3871:

The updates every 2 weeks keep me interested in the story and keep me guessing what is going to happen.

Really? I find the story uninspired and predictable. No surprise then I’m much more interested in content with actual replay value.

At best, the scope of the story part of the living story has been a bridge between the Zhaitan story as experienced in the Personal Story and the next Dragon story arc.

Unless the Mordremoth story goes into a Season 3, I don’t see it concluding by the end of Season 2. Especially if we are going to be getting a region as opposed to 1 zone that just opens little by little as we have seen with Dry Top.

So I could theoretically see an expansion being the next major story (maybe Mordremoth and Kralk?), but also more regions of Tyria opening up (rest of the Maguuma Wastes, Crystal Desert?), more gameplay additions, etc.

I get the concept of LS and the idea that it replaces an expansion, but let’s analyze why LS has so far not delivered on that concept and why people are therefore wanting an expansion, myself included.

1. Season 1 is 95% temporary content that cannot be played or experienced again. So really you have little to show for all the work that went into it. About all that is permanent on the story side is the destruction of LA.

2. The story of Season 2 is fantastic and I applaud ANET for the improvement on this front. Season 2 so far is what I envisioned the story part of LS to be as opposed to the shallow zergfest that was Season 1 (not to say there weren’t fun times to be had in S1, just comparing the two). However…

3. The pacing of the story is killing me. The idea that I get 20-30 minutes of story then have to wait 2 weeks, or in the case of this finale, over a month is ludicrous.

So, this is just my opinion as a person who enjoys the rich deep lore and story that began with Guild Wars 1. I would play GW2 so much more than I currently do if it had more than at best 2 hours more story content that I can right now play then it did on release.

As an aside, I recognize additions like EotM, FotM, etc. and I immensely enjoy them and say kudos to ANET for adding those. My gripes are primarily story and map content related. On that front its largely the same exact game it was 2 years ago with the addition of 2 maps (1 that you have no reason to ever go to), a new dungeon path, and 2 hours of story you can actually play and replay.

One thing that I miss from Season 1 is NPCs moving about the open world. I understand why they are reluctant to have the major NPCs not being present, but having other NPCs who are talking about what’s currently going on would have been fun. I know the three Durmand Priory members in Dry Top have moved each time a major map update was released, but you’d have to wait around for their ambient dialogue to hear what I’m looking for.

Stramatus.5219:

~snip~
1. Season 1 is 95% temporary content that cannot be played or experienced again. So really you have little to show for all the work that went into it. About all that is permanent on the story side is the destruction of LA.

Guild Wars Site
Also, because Season 1 of Living World was not built with the Journal in mind, it will not be available in the story Journal on initial launch when Season 2 begins. We do hope to add Season 1 to the Journal in the future.
There’s hope!

Jornophelanthas.1475:

This is a psychological difference, not an actual difference.

Oh wait, there is an actual difference. Traditional expansions cost money to buy.

Yeah, there’s also another actual difference. Factions doubled the size of GW1’s world in one year. LS has given us two smallish maps in two years.

Sure, you can say “an expansion would give new skills and new maps, but so does the LS”, but you can’t just ignore the quantity of those maps and skills. LS isn’t even remotely comparable to an expansion quantity wise.

In general I am against any sort of expansion.
Lets face it:
Expansion are the reason for any major MMO death.
Name me a single MMO that did not turn to kitten after its first or second expansion.
Lineage II may be among the only ones that made it to expantion 5 or 6 until it got really bad. (I havent played GW1 but I heard the expansions were not that bad)

Its probably very hard to destroy GW2 through an expansion, because raising the level cap (Worst thing you can do in any mmo, ever, after release) wont do much harm here. The leveling is easy compared to other games.

Implementing new gear, as in higher tier being among the worst things you can do to an MMO, too. This is actually something that could happen.
I was sceptical with the introducion of acended gear, but is fine. Its not easy to get, but not really something you need to grind months for either.
I am glad the devs mentioned not to add any new tiers after that. I hope they stick to it. To be fair, somthing like ascneded gear was actually needed. Exotic gear can be bought 4 days after aquiring the game.

Now, what else could happen? New zones, bosses and dungeons ? sure thing. More pvp maps, wvw areas or features for those ? Anytime.
I wouldnt really call this a content update aka expansion though. Its just more things to do in the current state of tha game. And something like this can be easily introduced through living story. Arena net just has to introduce them more frequently. thats all.

So please be cautious with your wishes. Remind yourself that expansions in general are a bad move, gameplay wise. They are a great move to earn the company some money, true, but A-net got their own ways of keeping the cash flow up. We dont need any kind of expansion to ruin the experience for players. Especially for those that dont have much time to play.

Honestly, what finally convinced me to play this game was not the gameplay, or the no-subrciption-fee feature. Its because they promised NO expansion.

I want an expansion, if anything it will give me stuff to go do instead of suffer more `Living World´ tripe.

I like that we get free content, but that does not mean I have to like what the content actually is. Pointless, unskippable biconic teen melodrama.

dekou.6012:

Jornophelanthas.1475:

This is a psychological difference, not an actual difference.

Oh wait, there is an actual difference. Traditional expansions cost money to buy.

Yeah, there’s also another actual difference. Factions doubled the size of GW1’s world in one year. LS has given us two smallish maps in two years.

Sure, you can say “an expansion would give new skills and new maps, but so does the LS”, but you can’t just ignore the quantity of those maps and skills. LS isn’t even remotely comparable to an expansion quantity wise.

Also, expansions tend to have vast in-game rewards in terms of armour skins, weapons skins etc. With the living world the vast majority of new armour and weapon skins have been put in the gem store or the Black Lion ticket system.

@dekou:
I believe that ArenaNet has consciously decided to tone down the number of new zones to be added to the game. Possible reasons?

1. They want players to keep populating existing zones, to prevent “dead areas” in the game as much as possible. This is good for the game’s longevity.(Guild missions, Scarlet invasions and especially Ascended crafting with its tier 2-4 material requirements all achieved this.)

2. Southsun Cove was not received well. Players complained about the empty feel of the place, the lack of interesting events and the annoying monsters. This resulted in a redesign of the area.

3. During the first year of the game, much of the available game design resources was spent on creating repeatable festival content, to serve the game for years to come. Examples include The Mad King’s Realm, Toymaker Tixx’s Airship, Labyrinthine Cliffs, and the Crown Pavillion. Oh wait, those were all new zones, weren’t they?

4. As part of improving the game world – or at least in order to reflect continuous change – (parts of) existing zones were changed or added to. These include Deirdre’s Steps in Mount Maelstrom, the Bloody Prince’s tomb in the Black Citadel, the Marionnette’s Landing in Lornar’s Pass, the 2nd Aetherblade Base in Gendarran Fields, the Twilight Aetherpath, and all of Lion’s Arch.

5. You are overstating your case. Look closely at Guild Wars: Factions. Cantha contains a significantly smaller playable area than the Guild Wars: Prophecies part of Tyria. Prophecies had 54 vanquishable areas and 25 missions, while Cantha had 33 vanquishable areas and 13 missions.
Elona (Guild Wars: Nightfall) was larger than Cantha, but smaller than Tyria. Eye of the North added the fewest number of zones. I’m not counting the dungeons, because those actually shared and reused significant sections of dungeon maps.

@Lasur Arkinshade:
In this respect, both the “new skins” part and the “pay money” part of a “traditional” expansion are already in the game. This strengthens my point that Living World Season 1 is mostly comparable to an expansion.
Also, do not discount the various cosmetic skins (mostly back items) that have been the rewards for completing a Living Story chapter in season 1.

i know its greedy but i think it would be very beneficial if they could manage both the living story and an expansion, there is no way the living story is going to be able to create enough hype to draw in new people, not like an expansion would. Then once they are here they could see for themselves what it is like.

Goatjugsoup.8637:

i know its greedy but i think it would be very beneficial if they could manage both the living story and an expansion, there is no way the living story is going to be able to create enough hype to draw in new people, not like an expansion would. Then once they are here they could see for themselves what it is like.

Why do you want hype? You can’t play hype.

I am finding the Living Story to be quite lackluster as well. An expansion should be implemented to give some life to this “Dying Story”.

Jornophelanthas.1475:

@dekou:
I believe that ArenaNet has consciously decided to tone down the number of new zones to be added to the game. Possible reasons?

1. They want players to keep populating existing zones, to prevent “dead areas” in the game as much as possible. This is good for the game’s longevity.(Guild missions, Scarlet invasions and especially Ascended crafting with its tier 2-4 material requirements all achieved this.)

This is the official reason, actually. I don’t think it’s a good reason, though, espesially not with GW2’s megaserver system and downleveling. At any rate, forcing players to do the same things over and over again tends not only to populate those activities, but to drive people away from the entire game.

2. Southsun Cove was not received well. Players complained about the empty feel of the place, the lack of interesting events and the annoying monsters. This resulted in a redesign of the area.

…and they failed a second time, but that’s entirely because Southsun was and still is a badly-designed area gameplay wise. The removal of so many events from it sure didn’t help. Now it’s Karka Gank Land almost all the time.

3. During the first year of the game, much of the available game design resources was spent on creating repeatable festival content, to serve the game for years to come. Examples include The Mad King’s Realm, Toymaker Tixx’s Airship, Labyrinthine Cliffs, and the Crown Pavillion. Oh wait, those were all new zones, weren’t they?

That’s actually time well spent in my opinion. The problem is that those temporary festival updates and SAB were the best content additions pre-LSS2.

4. As part of improving the game world – or at least in order to reflect continuous change – (parts of) existing zones were changed or added to. These include Deirdre’s Steps in Mount Maelstrom, the Bloody Prince’s tomb in the Black Citadel, the Marionnette’s Landing in Lornar’s Pass, the 2nd Aetherblade Base in Gendarran Fields, the Twilight Aetherpath, and all of Lion’s Arch.

In other words, one dungeon, two jumping puzzles and some changes in terrain. Destroying LA was a nice touch, but there’s nothing to do in the now-destroyed version of it. The most noticeable change were all the Toxic Alliance events, but they are usually ignored, so they’re more annoying than fun.

The end result is what matters and when I’m playing GW2 now it sure doesn’t feel significantly different from playing it a few years ago. Sometimes I get to circle around the Toxic Alliance or think how much better Kessex used to look, but that’s about it.

5. You are overstating your case. Look closely at Guild Wars: Factions. Cantha contains a significantly smaller playable area than the Guild Wars: Prophecies part of Tyria. Prophecies had 54 vanquishable areas and 25 missions, while Cantha had 33 vanquishable areas and 13 missions.
Elona (Guild Wars: Nightfall) was larger than Cantha, but smaller than Tyria. Eye of the North added the fewest number of zones. I’m not counting the dungeons, because those actually shared and reused significant sections of dungeon maps.

As you wrote, Cantha had 33 vanquishable (!) areas and 13 missions. So far, the permanent content of LS equals… well, less than 1/4 of that to be sure. PvE wise, Cantha also had two dungeons, by the way. For the PvP crowd, it had two new modes, one of which (AB) was very popular.

Oh, and let’s not forget about the two new professions and the rather extensive list of new skills. While adding so much character customization per campaign was arguably a mistake, it sure was better than GW2’s stale meta of “whack it until it’s dead”.

@Lasur Arkinshade:
In this respect, both the “new skins” part and the “pay money” part of a “traditional” expansion are already in the game. This strengthens my point that Living World Season 1 is mostly comparable to an expansion.

To some players, including me, getting items through cash shop isn’t satisfying at all. Not because we lack money, but because “I paid 10$ for my pants” is a very hollow achievement. Getting new items through challenging gameplay isn’t comparable to that at all.

If the first leg of LS2 is any indication, they’re absolutely delivering on the idea of “a new expansion every season” in the way players told them they wanted it. Permanent, and with a feel that matched the release content of solo story instances and fun explorable zones.

I think if they stick with the LS2 model they can continue on this path successfully for quite some time, trickling in zones a piece at a time every two weeks, occasionally devoting an update to non-world content like big PvP updates or full scale dungeons or world bosses (which may simply show up in existing zones) being worked on outside of the LW team schedule.

I mean, the next content update is a perfect example of how to do it right. Take the balance, QOL, and PvP features and release them when they’re ready, and push through the easier to balance and less technically challenging content and story patches on a quicker release schedule.

Your not going to get new levels, new races or professions without an expansion. The Living Story stuff is just lame, the events in season 2 don’t even scale, once the mobs are gone, so is any gameplay! You just don’t see design like that with an expansion. All the Living Story together so far wouldn’t make a good expansion.

Living Story Season 1 – a one trick pony.

Living Story Season 2 – a one trick pony x 2, you have to do the same content twice, LOL!

EragamerLG.2390:

The 2011 Manifesto Video, showed a glympse of what ANet wants to do with GW2. Just because it didn’t go there right from launch, or one or two years in, doesn’t mean they’ve forgotten about it or scrapped it entirely. It just means they have the tools, they’re perfecting them, and they’re learning them. Season 1 to Season 2 was huge leap. Can you imagine Season 3, 4, 5? I can. The ride, the journey, will be awesome. The players were developers in that sense. And it’ll be quite amazing.

I broadly agree with what you say, and I truly hope you’re absolutely spot on – but I want to inject just one note of wet-blanket reality into the picture: the video showed what ANet wantED to do with GW2, 3 years ago. People, and business needs and plans, change. Whatever ANet were planning on 3 years back, there’s no guarantee that they’ll stick to their plan in the future, or ever even attempt to deliver it.

By “People change”, I mean that companies, mostly, go on – but the individuals within it move to new positions, or flat-out leave the company and get replaced by others. And everyone that comes in new wants to make their mark on the product.

(And that’s especially true if they’re management – it’s a truism that any new manager, given a team that is working to absolutely perfect goals and in ways that can’t possibly be improved, will still have to change things – often quite substantially – so that their bosses can see they’re “doing their job”. Sad but true.)

Sola.7250:

Your not going to get new levels, new races or professions without an expansion.

Why not? If a zone like Dry Top can be introduced through Living Story, why not a zone like the Dominion of Winds, with playable Tengu? If ArenaNet is truly committed to the Living World way of delivering new content, then the things you suggest can also be deliverd in this way.
(Although I believe a new level cap, at least, is not going to happen. Because that’s the kind of vertical progression ArenaNet does not want.)

Sola.7250:

The Living Story stuff is just lame,

This is an opinion, not a fact. Other people may actually like the current Living Story.

Sola.7250:

the events in season 2 don’t even scale, once the mobs are gone, so is any gameplay!

The open world parts of Dragon’s Reach Part 1 appeared to be a hastily implemented, yes. But these events can still be upgraded if necessary. After all, they’re permanent.

Or were you talking about the story instances? Those are balanced for solo play (although you can bring a small group), and are not just meant to challenge your play skills, but also to tell a story.

Sola.7250:

You just don’t see design like that with an expansion. All the Living Story together so far wouldn’t make a good expansion.

Have you ever worked in the game industry, and on designing game expansions in particular? Neither have I. Then how come you can talk about it as if you’re an expert? Because you’re just guessing.
Take EVERYTHING that was added to the game between launch and the April 2014 feature update. Include the temporary content, like Scarlet’s Marionnette and the Escape from Lion’s Arch. Don’t forget Southsun Cove, the minigames, guild missions, the Queen’s Pavillion, the Mad King’s Domain, ascended crafting, champion loot bags, the Fractals, the new item stat combination (e.g. Dire, Sentinel, Celestial) and the new healing skills. Bundle it all together, wrap it in ribbons, and slap an “Expansion” label on it.
As a consumer, I don’t see a lot of difference, except that it was free. Of course, if you believe that free stuff can’t be as good as stuff that they would ask money for, then that’s your problem.

Sola.7250:

Living Story Season 1 – a one trick pony.

Living Story Season 2 – a one trick pony x 2, you have to do the same content twice, LOL!

Living Story Season 1: Too much temporary content, not enough permanent content. ArenaNet took that in, and are making amends in Season 2. I don’t see a lot of temporary content there.

Living Story Season 2: The format of redoing the content for bonus achievements is heavily inspired by the Missions in Guild Wars 1. Its intent is to increase the replayability of the story instances, much like how that worked in Guild Wars 1. Many players complained that Guild Wars 2 should be more like Guild Wars 1, and ArenaNet obliged.
Of course, there’s nobody forcing you to replay something you don’t like doing. Achievements (and achievement rewards) are just an encouragement, not an obligation.
And if you don’t like repetition, I guess you also don’t like playing Fractals, or Champion trains, or festival events, or Daily achievements, or leveling a second character, or visiting any zone for the second time.

“When Evon Gnashblade is finally elected to the captains council, the BLTP is replaced by player to player trading, flying quaggens become the means for travel, and Tyrias heros begin dueling in the streets of Divinties Reach”

Thus spake the oracle, and his words were thrown to the ground and trampled upon by the unbeliever.

“When the QQ dries its ever flowing tears, the white knights are honored through out the land, and the trolls are once again driven beneath the bridges amongst the length and breadth of the land, then shall we know an expansion. And it shall bring peace and unity to the land for a time, and half a time.”

Again the oracle spoke, and his words fell upon deaf ears.

“Then the land shall once again be filled with trolls, the QQ will rain down upon us in a deluge, and the cries of the entitled once more arise to the heavens. The people will cry out for the expansion to save them, as it did once before, but the expansion will not listen. For it was foretold that an expansion alone could not save them, yet it had gone unheeded by the masses.”

The oracle then fell silent, saddend that his words were lost in the maelstrom of QQ, the white knights had vanished like shadows in the night, and the trolls reigned freely in the land.

Flitzie.6082:

In general I am against any sort of expansion.
Lets face it:
Expansion are the reason for any major MMO death.
Name me a single MMO that did not turn to kitten after its first or second expansion.
Lineage II may be among the only ones that made it to expantion 5 or 6 until it got really bad. (I havent played GW1 but I heard the expansions were not that bad)

Its probably very hard to destroy GW2 through an expansion, because raising the level cap (Worst thing you can do in any mmo, ever, after release) wont do much harm here. The leveling is easy compared to other games.

Implementing new gear, as in higher tier being among the worst things you can do to an MMO, too. This is actually something that could happen.
I was sceptical with the introducion of acended gear, but is fine. Its not easy to get, but not really something you need to grind months for either.
I am glad the devs mentioned not to add any new tiers after that. I hope they stick to it. To be fair, somthing like ascneded gear was actually needed. Exotic gear can be bought 4 days after aquiring the game.

Now, what else could happen? New zones, bosses and dungeons ? sure thing. More pvp maps, wvw areas or features for those ? Anytime.
I wouldnt really call this a content update aka expansion though. Its just more things to do in the current state of tha game. And something like this can be easily introduced through living story. Arena net just has to introduce them more frequently. thats all.

So please be cautious with your wishes. Remind yourself that expansions in general are a bad move, gameplay wise. They are a great move to earn the company some money, true, but A-net got their own ways of keeping the cash flow up. We dont need any kind of expansion to ruin the experience for players. Especially for those that dont have much time to play.

Honestly, what finally convinced me to play this game was not the gameplay, or the no-subrciption-fee feature. Its because they promised NO expansion.

Em….are you like 12… world of Warcraft has had a heap of expansions and that game hasn’t died :/ most other mmos die before they get more expansions because people get bored of the game. Your thoughts on expansions killing games makes absolutely no sense whatsoever and seems to be based on absolutely no evidence other than perhaps you are thinking about the one or two other mmos you have played…

also, why the heck are you assuming an expansion means a higher level cap, a higher gear tier, etc? ascended gear has been pretty much locked in as THE highest gear, as a result you cant increase level tier because that outdates equipment ppl worked for…in essence, an expansion will NOT increase level max OR equipment tier. It could however, add more classes to play as, more skills on pre-existing classes, more races to play as, new weapon and armour skins, etc.

“I am glad the devs mentioned not to add any new tiers after that.”

Exactly, so you know they won’t do that, so why did you assume expansion = new tier?

“Now, what else could happen? New zones, bosses and dungeons ? sure thing. More pvp maps, wvw areas or features for those ? Anytime.
I wouldnt really call this a content update aka expansion though. Its just more things to do in the current state of tha game. And something like this can be easily introduced through living story. Arena net just has to introduce them more frequently. thats all.”

Sorry but wrong, wrong, wrong. You are really showing a lack of understanding. If I had 20 people and told them I wanted them to build me a bridge from the UK to France, but every 2 weeks I want that bridge to be 20 miles closer to the other side, irregardless of anything else, then that becomes the focus, the quality of the bridge doesn’t matter because the builders HAVE to produce the distance in a timeframe. Thus, the bridge could be a stick stretching 20 miles that couldn’t support a baby. Now lets say I took the same 20 people and instead said, you have 2 years, make me a bridge from UK to france. In 2 years we will have that bridge, and it will be built properly, because the builders can built supports first, then layer it, get more materials, etc, etc. Because they don’t have a stupid deadline to meet all the time, they build it right.

Now apply same logic to game, the current LS content forces the designers to rush content, to release it before its ready, to avoid doing things that would be awesome, because it can’t be done within a 2 week deadline, for example: they build maps that are designed linearly because they need an excuse to break up the map. (so that parts can be released every period of time rather than all at once.)

Because they cant build new content from the ground up, they are forced to stitch together whatever they can, irregardless, and the focus is story content, so EVERYTHING else is low priority which means wvw, pvp, new maps and dungeons never get any attention beyond what they need for LS (which isn’t a lot at all, just look at how things have changed over the last 2 years, look at how much has changed after all the work of LS1). An expansion is an ALL OVER upgrade to EVERYTHING, AT ONCE. LS is a slow progressive update to one aspect of the game , that eliminates focus on other parts of the game almost completely, that is not nearly enough to keep people playing, over an extended period of time where we are expected to just keep playing….because…em…in 2 weeks there will be 30 minutes of new gameplay…

As is, I have 5 characters at lvl 80, I have a legendary, I have completed season 1, and done everything else in the game so many times it bores the hell out of me. All I return to do is 30 minutes of gameplay every 2 weeks to a month and that is kitten. I have created my characters already, I have clothed and styled them. I don’t care that a new backpiece has been introduced into the game because it takes an ungodly amount of time to grind for it and I don’t need the skin….

Expansions are not a bad move, they are a necessity. If the game doesn’t get upgraded every once in a while, it grows stale and stagnant and simply can’t compete with the sheen and luster of other new games which have 100% new content I can explore. Yes, perhaps I should go play those games, and I am. But it annoys me I have worked so hard to earn so much in this game, only to get to a point where I have realised it is pretty much entirely pointless. It’s like ive found/dug/earned a 10 ton block of solid gold in real life, with 50 years of my life having been spent digging/grinding for it, to find out the gold bar is too heavy and I can’t sell it or do anything with it because its stuck in the hole where I found it. I don’t play this game anymore except for 30 minutes every 2 weeks to a month.

LS is fun, but there better be an expansion being designed because this game will eventually stop being a choice for people looking for a new mmorpg to play and without their playerbase sticking with them, the game will slowly dry up. All it will take is another mmorpg just like guild wars 2, that is better, and this game will start to bleed severely. You wont find people rushing to pay for the games old LS stories, of paying for the game, when a tiny bit of research will show them how much has not changed in so much time.

Why invest time and money into something that doesn’t reward you at the end. When you are ready to start enjoying the cool stuff you have collected but can only continue to do the very same thing you did whilst earning the cool stuff….

If you don’t believe me, why the hell do you think they merged ALL the servers together and started a market in China? This game is shrinking, constantly.

Guild Wars 2 is a slowly sinking ship, that is attempting to fix the problem by throwing marshmallows at the leak.

They need to bulk up the game with something more sturdy, or this bridge will collapse.

Equilibriator.8741:

~snip[~An expansion is an ALL OVER upgrade to EVERYTHING, AT ONCE.

No, it’s not. Not always. What do you think WoW has done? Burning Crusade Added Content. Outland. It did nothing to old content. Wrath of the Lich King? Added Northrend. No alteration to old content. Cataclysm? Possibly the most Epic Failure of Blizzard’s xpac’s (at the time) in a re-work of skills, a breaking of the world, Pre-Cata design flaws, Post-Cata design flaws, and 2yrs of constant patches to attempt to fix the only real Cataclysm -what the devs broke when they tried to release the xpac-. Mists of Pandaria. Again, New Zone, Pandaria. The only new change to old content was the ability to fly in old Zones (pre-BC). That was it. Each new xpac was nothing more than new content, not upgrading anything in existing content (i.e. breathing life into old zones).

[/quote]As is, I have 5 characters at lvl 80, I have a legendary, I have completed season 1, and done everything else in the game so many times it bores the hell out of me. All I return to do is 30 minutes of gameplay every 2 weeks to a month and that is kitten. I have created my characters already, I have clothed and styled them. I don’t care that a new backpiece has been introduced into the game because it takes an ungodly amount of time to grind for it and I don’t need the skin….[/quote]

This is all you would still be doing in the event of an xpac. You would fly through the new content in a week or two, and then… What exactly?
No really, I’d like an honest answer. I’m not trolling or being sarcastic. If it takes 30min for a 2wk LS update, then an xpac would at best take 2wks. Then what? In most xpac release games they come about every 2yrs. So what would your plans be after the xpac’s content was played?

[/quote]Expansions are not a bad move, they are a necessity. ~snip~[/quote]

No, they aren’t.

[/quote]LS is fun, but there better be an expansion being designed because this game will eventually stop being a choice for people looking for a new mmorpg to play and without their playerbase sticking with them, the game will slowly dry up. All it will take is another mmorpg just like guild wars 2, that is better, and this game will start to bleed severely. You wont find people rushing to pay for the games old LS stories, of paying for the game, when a tiny bit of research will show them how much has not changed in so much time. [/quote]

The game already has changed in the time it’s been released. It won’t take an xpac to show that.
Also, do you think that if they decide to release an xpac -for money- that they will still continue to provide LS updates for -free- as well? Does that make any kind of sense? Does it make sense to provide whole new areas and themes for cash, and to also provide whole new areas and themes for nothing in between? Something there doesn’t track to me.

There is nothing to support the thought process behind “the only way to get a new playable race is via xpac” likewise “the only way to get a new playable profession is via xpac”. They are releasing Feature Updates regularly. These are not only QoL Updates, but complete revamps of some of their Core Systems. If we are to get a new race or profession, why would it stop them from giving it to us via a Feature Pack? They already give us new skills and revamped skills this way.

[/quote]Why invest time and money into something that doesn’t reward you at the end. When you are ready to start enjoying the cool stuff you have collected but can only continue to do the very same thing you did whilst earning the cool stuff….

If you don’t believe me, why the hell do you think they merged ALL the servers together and started a market in China? This game is shrinking, constantly.[/quote]

This was not the reason they are now using MegaServers. Their old technology was flawed, and many, many people complained about the Overflow maps and being stuck in “bad” maps for World Events.
As for releasing to China- There are lots of Games releasing to many other countries now. Including Blizzard. Why would you think that GW2 if failing because there was demand for it in another country?

[/quote]Guild Wars 2 is a slowly sinking ship, that is attempting to fix the problem by throwing marshmallows at the leak.

They need to bulk up the game with something more sturdy, or this bridge will collapse.[/quote]

Show me your proof, then I will listen. All I hear is this. I heard this a year ago, before they removed the LoD limiter. People cried because “the game is dying! I don’t see anyone on my maps anymore!”. Then the LoD was changed, and holy crow There’s people everywhere. I hardly see a time when there’s not people everywhere, not just peak hours.

tovadaun.6304:

Equilibriator.8741:

Guild Wars 2 is a slowly sinking ship, that is attempting to fix the problem by throwing marshmallows at the leak.

They need to bulk up the game with something more sturdy, or this bridge will collapse.

Show me your proof, then I will listen. All I hear is this. I heard this a year ago, before they removed the LoD limiter. People cried because “the game is dying! I don’t see anyone on my maps anymore!”. Then the LoD was changed, and holy crow There’s people everywhere. I hardly see a time when there’s not people everywhere, not just peak hours.

[/quote]

They added megaservers so of course your gonna see people everywhere but before then most parts of the game was a ghost town…

An Xpac is SUPPOSED to make a game feel new again, give us a fresh experience on the world we already seen without changing the core mechanics of what makes the game great (something the living story just cant do from what i seen so far).

I’ma just be clear on this one NO ONE from the people i seen quit GW2 since launch are excited to come back because of a “living world” but i’ll bet you at least half of those people would be the first in line to pre order a GW2 Xpac if it showed the right content. The game is starting to get stale and small portioned content that could be completed in about 40 min every 2 weeks isn’t gonna cut it for the longevity of GW2.