Guild Wars 2

Forgive me if this question has been asked before, but does all of this living story content have anything to do with the dragons? I know there won’t be any expansions, but the current living story stuff has nothing to do with the dragons. Has Anet just dropped the dragons entirely? And if they do bring the dragons back to the front of the story next year, won’t that mean new players will start to miss out on fights with elder dragons because they’re part of the living story? Can someone please explain this to me?

In my opinion, Kiel is the best choice for ALL players.

Not all players care about the Gem store.

Not all players care about a Guild Wars 1 lore event we already know all about.

Even if you do care about those things, the selfless choice is still Kiel. Slashed waypoint prices are good for all players.

Simple Question. After complaining so much, if you could go back in time and become the game’s lead story writer, how would you change it?

I would…

-Sack Trahearne: a pointless character that adds nothing to the story but takes away a lot. He’s a boring mary-sue glory-thief. Just make us lead the Pact(or don’t have one, see 2 below)

- Give the player fewer choices but make them more important. Having a bajillion kajillion billion choices doesn’t matter if none of them have depth.

-Make our choice of order affect more than one act. It should follow us all the way to the final battle. Heck, it would be cool if we never had a Pact and it was just our order. A Vigil invasion of Orr could just use the overwhelming might of a multi-racial alliance that you would spend the the second third of the PS gathering (the first third being your racial story and the last being the invasion itself.) The OoW could invlove sneaking through Orr and sabotaging the risen army and Zhiatan himself. The Priory could technological might to take down the beast’s army with golems, laser cannons, airships and more, while also finding ancient artifacts to utilize. Can you imagine how epic any of these would be?

-Don’t throw Norn and Humans under the bus.

This….thing sends the Norn and Charr running for the hills like scared rabbits. The Norn, who have been known to stop Charr invasions solo in lore, who wouldn’t retreat from the feet of freakin’ JORMAG until the Spirits told them to, and who were the first race to even dent an Elder Dragon, are running away! As for the Charr, they’re the freakin’ Charr. They don’t run away( but they do employ tactical retreat).
Surely a simple dredge/flame legion alliance couldn’t do this?

There has to be something more (either that, or Anet is trashing Norn lore for this story). And whatever it is, it’s powerful.

Most Likely (and my personal wishes):

1. Tengu: Way too much potential and context to not be. Plus, an avian race is pretty cool. The fact that they were originally going to be playable also gives them momentum.

Problems: Their “blocked off area” is barely large enough to hold one city, let alone a whole starting area as well. I guess they could share Caledon forest and Kessex hills, but that doesn’t seem fair to this new race. Anet would have to change existing land or add new, illogical land (like they did with Southsun Cove)

2. The Largos: Humanoid models make them easier to code for. They’re very interesting and have a lot to work with. The little info we have on them ends up making them EASIER to add, since they don’t have to shoehorn them into a random, previously unheard of area. They also make sense to add in a Deep Sea Dragon expansion. Plus: mostly or entirely aquatic starting zone=awesome.

Problems: As said by others, they’re supposed to be heavy isolationists. It would be weird to see hundreds of them running across Tyria if it wasn’t explained.

3.Kodan: Polar bear people! My personal number one choice, but they’re lower because they’re less likely. They’ve got a cool settlement design, cool culture, and interesting outlook on life (even if I don’t agree with it). Also, statements that they’re not customizable make no sense. All Largos and Tengu have basically identical models as well, but I don’t see anyone bringing THAT up. We would still probably be able to change skin(fur?) tone from white to a light yellow or light gray, plus all body, face, and accessory customizations. We could also have teeth and claws to customize as well. They’ve also been shown to have fur paintings/tattoos on them in concept art, so that would add another layer of customization. We all also love the look of their sanctuaries, wouldn’t it be cool to see a full city on one? Finally: they were apparently supposed to be much larger before release, as the Snowden Drifts loading screen indicates. Why would the devs scale them down to Norn size, if not to make them possibly playable?

Problems: Only problem I can think of is finding them a home. All known sanctuaries are either under attack or too small. They could have one near the Woodland Cascades, but that would ruin the snow/ice theme unless they made part of the woods snowy or chilly. Still, only a minor obstacle.

Races that probably won’t happen

-Quaggen(models too weird to work)
-Centaurs(see above)
-Skritt (to frequently fought as enemy race0
-Dredge (see above)

Many of them are very, very hard. They were clearly designed with only humans in mind. For example, the camera gets VERY, VERY crammed in Trolls End as a Norn or Charr. Our bodies are far too big and sometimes we can’t even see anything. The camera also wobbles and makes it hard to focus. Sometime we get forced into first person where we pretty much have to guess how far to jump and run. The slower stride of Norn and Charr can also make it hard to judge your jumps. I often OVERshoot my jumps because my character’s walking speed* deceives me as to how fast I’m going. I’ve also gotten stuck in the geometry a few times.

Please adjust your more cramped JPs to fit norn and charr better. Way too se,many players are having trouble in these puzzles. Give the camera more space and adjust the geometry of the offending puzzles.

*Norn and Charr appear to have a slower stride to make up for their longer legs.

NOTE: The only puzzles I’ve personally experienced frustration on are Troll’s end (cramped camera) and Zriath’s Beacon(stuck in geometry) . I’m sure there are more, so if any other players have had frustrations with other puzzles, PLEASE mention them. We need to form a good list of offending puzzles.

Right now, there are no new events in either of the two advertised regions. Anyone have any idea when they will start?

Charr wouldn’t be able to defeat the Norn, for several reasons:

1. WAY to many of you guys are stereotyping Norn as the followers of Bear, the “Strong but stupid warrior”. You completely forget the cleverness of the Raven followers, the cunning and stealth of Snow Leopard followers, and the teamwork of the Wolf worshipers (There’s a reason why the only Norn military force is called the Wolfborn). Snow Leapord worshipers could easily be a match for Ash Legion, Bear followers would easily overwhelm the Charr melee infantry, Raven would produce brilliant strategic minds, and Wolves would work together as effectively as a warband.

2. WEATHER. Many of you mention Charr tanks and artillery, but how long could Charr tanks run in the mountains before getting stuck in the snow? A few weeks? Maybe less if there are lots of snowstorms. If real life tanks can get stuck in snow, then primitive Charr tanks surely can. As for artillery, good luck aiming over mountains or in snowstorms. Snow Leopard followers would sniff out your scouts. Finally, Charr aren’t built for cold weather. They’ve never lived anywhere cold. Sure, their fur may delay them from freezing to death, but it would definitely be uncomfortable. Constant discomfort would only have bad effects on morale. Finally, I laugh at the thought of a squad of Charr in a snowstorm. I can already imagine them freaking out as Norn in snow leopard form popped out of the dense, thick rain of snow , picking off them off one by one.

3. Finally, experience! Norn have fought in mountains for thousands of years! Charr have probably never fought a war in the mountains. Nuff’ said.

Because of all of this, I have a really hard time believing that a war between the two would be a piece of cake for the Charr. In fact, unless the Norn were the invaders, the Charr would probably lose.

So toady I was doing some events in Wayfarer Foothills, and then I noticed something:

There were corrupted wolves and ice spikes… as far south as the southernmost Lionguard fort on that map, Twinspur Haven, at the Ice Steppes. I’d never seen any of those things that far south before, so it immediately set off alarms.

I thought back to how Anet foreshadowed the Lost Shores event, with the signs and the beached whales. Could this be something similar? That would certainly lend evidence to the “Jormag vs. Primoridus” theory. Are the citizens of Wayfarer Foothills about to be displaced by the Icebrood?

Another problem with Zhiatan was that he was a faceless villain. As said in another thread, he was supposed to be an Eldritch Abomination, but he never gives off any real sense of threat, menace, or horror needed to create one. Unlike Alduin or Hermeaus Mora form Skyrim, Cthulhu of Lovecraftian fame, or half the bosses in Dark Souls, he never really seems like a threat. He never taunts us, threatens us, or acts in an arrogant way towards us. In fact, he doesn’t even show up until the end. How can we be expected to actually fear him when we never even see him? Finally, when we do see him, he’s a very, very, very easy boss.

Because of all this, Zhiatan fails as a villain on almost every level. He’s not very threatening or menacing. He is never even given any personality. He’s a very easy boss. He’s just there to be evil and give us something to root against. That is the very definition of a bad villain.

Now, how would we improve on this in the expansions?

1. Make future Elder Dragon fights challenging using mechanics mentioned by the OP. Pretty simple.

2. Have the other Elder Dragons appear throughout the storylines simply by having them show up and cause destruction during missions before leaving. Throwing in a hopeless boss fight early on in the story would help as well, with the player character being forced to retreat and recover from their wounds (In-storyline, of course. There would be no change to actual gameplay. Just have us pass out when we “die” and re-awaken several in-storyline days later. Kinda similar to the opening of the human storyline, only we pass out in actual gameplay instead of in a cutscene). This would really set up these dragons as actual threats and make them intimidating.

3. Give the dragons a voice. If this breaks some lore law, than retcon that lore law. Just give them a personality. This is very important to creating a good villain. If a villain has no real personality, then they really are just there to be bad.

Thanks to all of those who read through this whole post. I really think villains are important to a story.

Predictions:
This story arc will feature a war between Jormag and Primoridus. Yes, the devs said no dragons, but they didn’t say no dragon minions (If you also meant no dragon minions, please tell us.)The dragons don’t have to appear in person.
Worries:
If the northern half of Wayfarer Foothills gets blocked off or changed, what will happen to the events, hearts, etc that were there?

LieutenantGoogle.7326:

I’m not some professional critic or something but holy crap after playing through the personal story I have to say that the overall plot is bad. I’ll list a few reasons why

3. Big gapping holes in the story – I am really not joking when it comes to this. There are so much missing details in the story sometime that I wonder if my quest line glitched an I missed something. For example In the human storyline when you talk to the female bandit about the queens authority and then leave without showing your identity, she shows up at the bar suddenly knowing that you were the one she was talking too.. The introduction to dragons was just thrown at you after you finish your race story. I barely remember but I think it was something along the line of saying how the dragons were a huge gigantic problem when you have seen absolutely nothing related to them before hand. Things like this are innumerable in the story and I feel should be fixed.
.

That’s all I have to say about the personal story, I love the game but the story is less than satisfying.

In the norn storyline, they do take the time to introduce you to the dragons- Jormag, that is. In the norn storyline, you’re left wondering " Wait, why Zhiatan all of a sudden? I thought I was gearing up to fight Jormag!" I presume it is the same with all the other races: a ton of build up for one enemy, then suddenly YOU MUST FIGHT ZHIATAN. I think the Sylvari storyline is the only one where this doesn’t happen.

I’m not insulting anyone, I just don’t think this is a great idea. If you guys have good ideas, please share them. And I don’t mean that in a sarcastic way, either.

Neeho.3859:

Jurrzy.1594:

Wait, so Gasm and Pro are just gone now? Did two of our biggest guilds, one of which has been here longer than I can remember (GASM), and another that always acted like they had our backs (PRO), betray us as soon as paid transfers were announced? Sorry, I haven’t played in a few days, so I’m a little out of the current events.

Yes, GASM and PRO are both (for the most part) gone. Half of PRO left a couple of weeks ago, the rest followed shortly after, although I don’t believe to the same server. The rats always abandon ship at the first sign of trouble. We have righted the boat and are working on getting ourselves back underway. We’ll be fine, although probably a tier lower for a few weeks.

Infuriating. Gasm and Protocol have are so untrustworthy. Abandoning a server you’ve been with for months, not even saying goodbye. All of their talks of server pride were just lies and deceit, I guess. But we can pull the server together.

Anyway, Back on topic. Darn Kaineng, you guys are kicking are butts. You might go all the way to top tier.

Theagenes.7403:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLmOVFk63-Q

Im just gonna leave this here so that you guys can have a laugh and reduce some tension…

Rainbow mini quaggans, CHARGE!!!!

Now, like many people, I recognize the fact that free transfers, in their current state, are unacceptable. There’s way too many bandwagoners. However, paid transfers were announced only a few days before the process will go live.

Because of this, I worry servers that are losing will quickly become abandoned in fear. Devona’s Rest has lost some major guilds, including those that claimed to have “server pride”. I’m not too worried for us, but I am worried for others. I worry that entire servers will just die, especially those in lower tiers.

What if, when paid transfers come in eight days, servers have populations so low that they are pretty much dead? What will the unlucky few WvW players who remain (those with true server pride) do? Scavenge for gold in PvE for a long time just to be able to enjoy their favorite activity? Pay Anet again just to enjoy their favorite activity? Furthermore, varying the price based on population makes little sense to me. It doesn’t really seem fair. Again, free transfers are rather problematic, but so is this system as well.

A system I would propose would be to just make transfers to low pop, losing servers free. Why would you pay gold/gems, even a relatively small amount, to go to a losing server with a less active community? This way, low pop servers could have the chance to recover.

Wait, so Gasm and Pro are just gone now? Did two of our biggest guilds, one of which has been here longer than I can remember (GASM), and another that always acted like they had our backs (PRO), betray us as soon as paid transfers were announced? Sorry, I haven’t played in a few days, so I’m a little out of the current events.

I honesty think the Sylvari pose a larger threat than the Asura. Despite their arrogance,The Asura can barely control their own machines, and they would never be able to keep them running right long enough to conquer the world. Meanwhile, the Sylvari are being produced by the Pale Tree and taking over positions of power at a scary rate (it’s only been 25 years, but they’re already one of Tyria’s most powerful and populous races). If the Pale Tree ever stops being so peaceful, we could have Tyria’s greatest war yet on our hands.

I hope that, sometime in the future, possibly in the deep sea dragon expansion, that the Largos will become a playable race. Then we’ll know for sure.

I definitely think, that in future stories, we need to just kill off Trahearne or just pretend like he doesn’t exist. We need to be the hero, or it’s not our story. I understand why Trahearne exists. The developers want to be able to reference the obviously huge events of the game in future lore, for example, “Zhiatan was slain by Trahearne” instead of “Zhiatan was slain by the leader of the pact”. There’s just one problem, though: In Skyrim, there’s a whole, readable book describing the events of the previous game, and it managed to do just fine by referring to the game’s hero by just their title. So they really can’t use that excuse for Trahearne existing when Skyrim does just fine when not using it.

Also, I really love the idea of returning to our hometowns before we gear up to take down our next Elder Dragon. It’ll be nice to see how the characters from all the way back in act one are doing after our characters haven’t seen them in in-game months, possibly years.

Shriketalon, your Zhiatan boss fight sounds incredibly epic. Instead of a wimpy, scared animal that seems like it has no idea what’s going on, Zhiatan would be a huge beast that would wipe out a quarter of the pact, destroy their flagship, and nearly kill the Destiny’s Edge and our heroes, before finally falling not to big cannons or fancy futuristic weaponry, but to courage and strength of five heroes.

As long as this boss fight was hard as well as spectacular, I’d have no problem with it.

Works for me all the time.

I don’t think us rangers are broken, I just think many people don’t know how to play ranger. Awesome video.

Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas to all!

This part was hard for me as well, but I managed to do it by sneaking around to the left with a speed buff. You don’t have to fight the undead, in fact, that’s impossible to recommend as a single player, the risen respawn too fast for one guy to handle.

This is however, a hard mission. It was the only personal story mission where I had lost all of my armor by the end. Unfortunately, this made it impossible for me to take the scene where you beg the war master not to leave seriously.

Which of the three “fear” storylines are your favorite? These are the quests based off your “greatest fear”: letting innocents die, being dishonored by your fellow soldiers, or forcing another person to suffer. I chose “forcing another to suffer” but I haven’t been able to complete it yet.

I’m at the battle to retake claw island.

This guy’s voice is so wooden, it sounds synthesized at some points. No, scratch that. There are some points where Siri would have performed his lines with more emotion.

Am I the only one who is annoyed by the fact that Trahearne is constantly whining (in monotone, of course) about his Wyld Hunt. Okay, dude. We get it. You want to disinfect zombie land. Now please stop going on about it.

Morningstar.6208:

Rob.7624:

Jurrzy.1594:

The situation in EB has turned into a stalemate. Neither we nor NSP have enough strength to smash eachother’s defenses. We can’t take stonemist, and you guys can’t take overlook. We can’t get organized enough to take stonemist, and you guys can’t build up enough strength to push through our absurd amounts of siege. It’s very exhausting.

Tell me about it.

But then again, I have a nasty plan for tomorrows (todays) night shift.
Prepare to lose your keep while you sleep cause I’m going to creep.. all da way in.

It rhymes, you love it.

My suspension is over Tuesday 5am server time in the morning you better prepare your self.

No offense Morningstar, but “Tuesday” is Christmas Day. Don’t expect us to have huge numbers, or the other servers, for that matter. I know I won’t be playing. There will be some people, of course, but don’t expect huge numbers.

Still, it’s good to have someone watching. I’ve got a very bad feeling NSP will pull some trick on Tuesday

Heros Slayer.7081:

Any chance of a score update? as someone who recently got crushed by DR I’m curious to see how they are doing in T6, also from the few posts I’ve read it seems like a good match

We’re doing pretty good, with a nice balance. We’re leading, but not by a ridiculous amount. We had a ridiculous stalemate today, the lines didn’t move for five hours, and not because no one was playing, but a final push by two of our greatest commanders, mainly Darkestshadows, made us victorious. Anvil Rock and Northern Shiverpeaks are clearly very talented. Sorry for not having a screenshot.

Epic ending to that stalemate. NSP really fought hard, but the end result was, as always, a Devona victory. Viva Devona’s Rest!

(P.S. Not mean, just showing a little server pride. AR and NSP, you guys are amazing)

The situation in EB has turned into a stalemate. Neither we nor NSP have enough strength to smash eachother’s defenses. We can’t take stonemist, and you guys can’t take overlook. We can’t get organized enough to take stonemist, and you guys can’t build up enough strength to push through our absurd amounts of siege. It’s very exhausting.

Sorry that happened to you Morningstar. .

However, this is a really intense match! Lots of exciting battles and sieges,

The moot does seem bad, because it’s appearance is so dull. Are its effects bad?

My fav would have to be Twilight, personally. It just looks so cool. I’m still trying to decide whether my ranger will get that or Bolt. My ranger’s number one preference is short bows, but again, hate the dreamer. As Amiron said, legendaries should wow your companions and intimidate your enemies, not laugh at how silly your weapon is.

The quality of the legendary appearances comes in very wide ranges. The problem is that there is only one legendary per weapon type, so if you don’t like the theme of the legendary of your favorite weapon type, too bad. I personally DESPISE the looks of Kudzu and Dreamer (the long and short bows, respectively), which sucks since I’m a ranger. I also dislike the look of the spear and speargun. It ultimately comes down to personal preference, though.

What is your favorite and least favorite legendary and why?

PS:For those of you who haven’t seen them all, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w64x8AH7AM8

Wow, fantastic match so far. Great job everyone on our team, I’m really proud.

Anvil Rock and Northern Shiverpeaks, you guys are great too. It’s nice to have a bit of a challenge after last week. I can tell that you guys are very skilled. We haven’t fought this hard in a few weeks, and I’m really impressed. You guys have my respect.

61. Siege Towers- Durable and mobile, but also slow, expensive, and take tons of supply to build.
62. More guerilla warfare options, like destroying bridges, blocking roads, and making it easier to ambush. The destroyed bridges and road blocks are supposed to block dolyaks and they can be repaired/destroyed by enemy teams.

During the part where you stop to build the bridge, I fell to my death. I waypointed back but got stuck on the loading screen. Anyone having similar issues?

Sumwun.3846:

I hail from Devona’s Rest and I think we are best known for the small bakeries we set up in redbriar and greenlake. The morning coffee is excellent and the croissants are to die for.

Normally around lunch time you can get a pretty kitten good ham and cheese on a french roll. It’s been pretty successful thus far. Rumor has it that our server is about to begin accepting WvW tokens as payment at our 3rd location, atop the EB jump puzzle.

if you haven’t had the deliciousness of a DR baked good, then you might as well be fighting hungry and tired. .. in the cold beating rain.

Please tell me this is real and is not a joke. Please.

I’m worried that the new map will be a "one-time only thing. Any info on this?

I think its low on their list of priorities, but I’d like to see more siege. I’m personally waiting for siege towers. I think they would be rather balenced.

Ladders would be so fragile that even the NPC archers coud destro them in a few hits. This makes it harder to "sneak an army in with a Mesmer because a single mesmer’s ladder would be turned to twigs easily. They’re only supposed to be useful for small groups who have distracted or killed the NPCs, and this would cause the yellow swords to appear and alert everyone. You could hire special “wall patrol” NPCs to.

Also, to prevent single mesmer takeovers, they could be immobile, having to be placed right at the foot of the wall, or take multiple people to “raise”. Finnaly, perhaps they would only be usable on outer walls. All problems solved.

I think siege towers and ladders would be very fun additions to WvW. Siege towers would be mobile (but slow), expensive, tough, and take huge amounts of supply to build. Ladders would be cheap in both terms of supply and coin, but would be very, very fragile.

I haven’t completed all dungeons yet, so I can’t comment on this, but I was interested in everyone else’s opinions.

Trahearne is my favorite NPC!!!!

I think that with a few more skills, the ranger could really reach its full pontential. Right now, it’s a little underpowered (though still strong enough to be viable). Please note that these are just ideas and I’m totally open to criticism as long as it’s not in a harsh way.

-Net Trap: A trap that imobolizes enemies for 3-4 seconds
-Net Throw: Throw a net, immobilizing foes for 2 seconds if you hit. (works underwater, very short range.
-Camoflage: You and your pet become invisable for up to 40 seconds as long as neither of you move or attack. (the longer duration is to make up for your immobility.)
-Guerilla: retreat and briefly gain invisability.
-Tracker: (Elite) See the paths recently (3 minutes) traveled by enemies. (Duration: 20 seconds)

The first two skills are supposed to make you feel more like a hunter (previously, the only utility skill that was very hunter-ish was the spike trap.), while the last three are supposed to make you feel more like someone who knows the land and is an expert at using it (like rangers are).I’m open to suggestions.

@scooby treat:

Sorry for misblaming you. But the fact is that sportsmanship has gone way down. It’s just sad to see. I’m not calling anyone a bad person, but I’m sick of everyone being angry at everyone.

People, please act civilized and have good sportsmanship. I’m glad that we’re one of the competitive brackets, but people are being really mean. Really, guys? I’ll admit it, we Devonians(As I call the inhabitants of our server) have been really arrogant lately, but this is just sad. Kain and DR used to be in a friendly rivalry. Then PRO came, then we started winning, then we got arrogant, then people started transferring, then you guys got jealous, and now everyone from all three servers are acting like children and are being very unsportsmanlike.

Please guys, this is just really stupid. We’re all bottom bracket, we all (currently) suck, and we don’t need to be so ugly to eachother. Can’t we all just be respectful and fair?

To Kain and Ferg, I’m sorry you guys lost a bunch of players to us. You guys were too awesome for that.

I know that free server transfers are quite a problem for WvW. Many people have absolutely no server loyalty and will leave the second your enemies are 5000 points ahead. On the other hand, let’s say, for whatever reason, that once paid transfers start, you need to move your guild. It would be quite a headache to get everyone to pay to move on their own. Many people would be unwilling to pay the money, be it paid for in-game or with real-world cash. Others would simply be unable to do so for whatever reason

The idea I have, is that once paid transfers start, you can pay an extremely high amount of influence to give everyone in the guild a “server Transfer ticket” or something to that extent. The cost would scale with your guild’s size, so it would always take a long time of saving up influence no matter how large your guild is, but that it wouldn’t take small guilds over a year to gain. What are your thoughts on this?

CM is currently bugged. My group reached the point where you fight the captain, but, when we killed her, she didn’t count towards the 3/3 separatists killed, and Queen Jennah just stood there like an idiot.