Guild Wars 2

8/10. Taylene especially sounds like the sorts of names we see on NPCs.
My only Sylvari is a burst thief called Thy Leafy Doom

Downscaling has nothing to do with Queen farm. If you removed downscaling it would be even easier to farm! If you have your panties in a twist because some people like to do something and it’s not where you insist they play, fine, but think about your fix before you declare what’s best for the game. I don’t love everything about the game but the team at Anet knows more about solutions than the schmucks on this forum by a factor of about 30million.

I have been laying into Anet for this latest LS, so I thought I would drop a line and say thank you for improving it with the latest patch. With the knights massively more doable, people show up and you beat it. I just beat them twice, along with prime and scarlet, having never managed any of them (I know, I could have done scarlet with the back piece, but I didn’t want to if it didn’t come to that).

I still find the fights gloriously uninteresting and would much prefer smaller instanced fights to these, but I recognize you were going for epic and you wanted to make the fights not merely aft on auto. That’s a tough balance. You flubbed it at first, because it was awful, but now it’s about as good as it could be, consistent with the above. So, thank you. I have a much better taste in my mouth regarding this event.

(Escape was far better, tho. Just sayin.)

To clarify my comment, because some here are speaking abou the LS as a whole while others, or at least myself took this to be a thread abou the END of season 1. I liked the LS a lot overall. Some didn’t blow me away. I knew Scarlet had more to her than most thought; she wasn’t a groundbreaking villain but she was fine, and the slow reveal didn’t bother me. World events take time to unfold.

But the final chapter? Kill me now. What a trainwreck of irritation and tedium. Huge letdown after I enjoyed the bulk of every other release.

Trends also scare me, because what I loathe here seems to be the intended direction. I pray I’m wrong.

Agreed. This whole event is an untter trainwreck.

2/10

I’d have gone as high as 4/10 without the bugs, but ugh. I don’t mind a zerg, but I’m so sick of the DPS checks combined with 4-5 random hoops to jump through designs that fail 80% of the time in what should be a completely accessible story to all players. This is the living story. Let everybody have FUN. Even winning is simply tedious. Leave the volumes of fail for the Teq and Wurm crowds.

Story was OK, and I didn’t need to be shocked, but since it was as expected all it could do was be implemented well. It was. But the event itself felt lame, I felt impotent, and uninspired. The last LS was totally the opposite. It felt like a war, and I felt like I was contributing and making a difference. More of that please.

Should have been a triumph with thus release. Instead it is their worst ever… and then they made it worse with a patch.

There are no words for my disappointment with this garbage, nor for my despair going forward. I pray things change, a lot.

Yeah, you don’t really have to get into WvW at all, really, to map it. You’re likely to get ganked once or twice roaming, and I’ve had (and won! with a ranger!) a few 1 on 1 encounters I wasn’t looking for, but were it me I would have required only stuff around the center of EB for map completion, and all three color zones should just mirror each other, so if you open up a point on one, it’s open for all. That forces you to explore your own color’s map a bit, and the heart of EB. But it’s doable even if your server blows. Hey, look at that: middle ground.

They don’t have to be involved in a major way in the new releases for the theory to be true. All that has to happen is clarification that she’s looking into ley lines and those were places of resonance. It could literally be confirmed by a line of dialog somewhere.

KeyOrion.9506:

I use to login during lunch time, and head into the map that was most controlled by our side. Actually completed mappage of WvW last week on my Ele in two days. I don’t think the enemies heart was in it that week.

That’s great, and pretty much what you do if your side eventually gets to be all colors. It’s how many of us are sitting at 99% w.c. But when you are literally never green, you’re not going to get, e.g., the vista in the green keep in the E.B., which is annoyingly difficult to do even if you have the luxury of being in that keep. (Full disclosure, my side was green at times a full year ago; the vista had me giving up, but then, I figured, we’ll be green again one day and I have only 26% complete now anyway, so I’ll come back when I’m better at jumping…. if only I knew then what I know now.)

VodCom.6924:

The Xs could be potential digging locations, and only one of them is the actual site she was looking for.

I’m definitely tempted by this thought, which I’ve had for a while now. The x’s all line up in the areas of the orders, but right smack on them? Well, fiddling with images left me a tad dubious. They seem to me to line up better with probes near the orders. Of course, why would only the probes near the orders be noteworthy, and isn’t that suspicious?

Well, yes, but there is another way to explain the link besides the orders being targets, to wit, a common-cause scenario. We have good reason to believe Scarlett is looking at the ley lines, dragon magic, chaos magic, etc. Perhaps, just perhaps, what she’s finding about these locales is they have connections to the lines and these magics. Perhaps the orders are founded there because for one reason or another they too have found that spot to be useful, due to those same magical energies. It would be rather like the Asura building the transfer chamber near Primordus.

The priory have that central whirl of golden light and tablets, and Durmand established something there for some reason. The whispers, well, they have that funky globe thing, and the Vigil have at least a gate. All seem to have bored into the earth in one way or another as well.

Just throwing it out there.

Gods, if only this were true. You might think it must be true, because it’s the only sane thing they could possibly decide to go with, but you would be wrong. Alas and alack.

The colour off your server is random. the worlds in a match are chosen based on rank, recent playtime against eachother and rng. When that is determined, they use RNG to assign the colours. so yes it is luck.

I don’t mind that much WvW being needed for map completion (though if I had to vote it would be 100% no), but what bothers me is the rotation through colors is based on rank. That means there are a couple of ENTIRE SERVERS that simply cannot get map completion now. We’re simply never green. Ever. Period. Because we’re bottom of the heap.

Yes, we can hoarde a ton of gold and pay for a server transfer (and then back), but come on. Why should we have to do that just because people bailed on our server when transfers were free? MC is one of my absolute favorite parts of this game. I love mapping with alts. But when it comes to completion I feel like I’ve been given the finger. I feel like Anet couldn’t care less about my entire server because we don’t WvW enough. I find the whole arrangement ridiculously unfair, shortsighted, even cruel.

You keep saying the same thing like I haven’t already replied, but whatever.
A zone-wide invasion would be far preferable to an insta-kill just for being in the zone.

Why not just kill everyone in LA while you’re at it? After all, they should have participated. We know when and where it happens. sigh

Pragmatically, I know what I do in response. The point is if this is good game design. This one element of the story is stupid. It makes sense as a bit of story, but it doesn’t have to be there for the story to work just as well, and it’s bad for the game. End of story. I’m done repeating myself.

Kumu Honua.2751:

Required means that you have no choice in the matter. You have a choice. You can participate or not.

The event is part of the story of the game. You can choose to ignore it and keep doing what you are doing, but that does not mean that you are immune to consequences such as dying to the loss laser.

Much like you can be working on a heart quest only to get interrupted by a dynamic event. It’s a consequence of the game world. You either participate or not. You have that choice, but the game will carry on regardless.

That is NOT what required means, I’m sorry. See my already stated analogy about being required not to kill, despite it being an option for you to do it in many situations. You have a choice, but it’s required you avoid it in the sense that you will be punished (justly in this case) for making a certain choice because society (rightly) has deemed that choice to be wrong. Anet has effectively imposed a penalty on people for not playing (and winning!) the event, thus requiring them to participate. Now, semantics aside, as I said, whether we call it requirement or not, the question is whether the event is built in a way that is good for the game, fair to the players, and true to what anet advertises as their design philosophy. You argue that it is good for the game because it creates consequences for not helping out with the event. I can see that point, but it doesn’t move me, because it detracts from the GAME. I don’t want to have to choose between playing a crappy event my server always loses, ignoring it and getting killed for no reason, or leaving the map I wanted to play on. This is far and away more intrusive than an event popping up in the middle of a heart quest (most of which are soloable and usually contribute to the heart anyway, but at worst simply require that you approach the heart differently or come back later to that tiny spot on the map). In those cases, you aren’t forced to map out, do something you despise, or die. Really different. Apples and oranges.

Now, repair and wp costs associated with getting killed for no reason are small, and not a big deal. It’s just irritating and stupid. It contributes nothing to the marionette event itself. It just bends a number of players over a chair for no reason.

What does required mean, except that you will be punished if you don’t do it? That’s like saying going to jail for murder doesn’t mean we’re not required not to kill, cos after all we still have the option, it’s just there are consequences.

The point being that the imposition of those consequences in this case is unjust, and contrary to the stated design of the game itself. If your only point is to say there are consequences, yeah we know that. That’s the point. What’s being argued is they shouldn’t be there, not for everyone map-wide. Give an argument as to why it’s better that they are there and we can talk about it.

Kumu Honua.2751:

If you are in the zone during the event (It’s every single even server hour) and you are not assisting in the event you can expect to pay the consequences for your failure to assist. Being blasted by the laser is entirely your own fault.

I’m sorry, but are you saying that it is REQUIRED of all people on the map that they come and participate in Mari? And here I thought it was a big open world and we were supposed to be allowed to play how we want.

Pray For Kosmos.5849:

1) Inexperienced players. Many events up to now have been too easy. If Anet continues to make more difficult content things should improve. Probably half the community can’t even use a dodge button.

I just flatly disagree. Some events are easy, but that’s okay. In the living story, especially, the content needs to be accessible. Erring on the side of easy is okay with me. I think stuff like the current Jormag and the wurm in Caledon are just about right, difficulty-wise. For a lot of people (and yes, far far more than 50% can use the dodge button), anything harder is just no longer fun, even if it is doable. I can absolutely hold my own in hard content. But I find it stressful. I don’t like it. Don’t confuse preference for incompetence. This is a theme with those who like hard content. They assume the only possible reason someone could disagree with that preference is inability. That’s mistaken. A lot of people play the game to unwind. I am all for harder content being there. And the skill required to beat the Marry really isn’t that much. But it remains frustrating and stressful for many, because what it requires of one makes the game not fun for those of us who come to Tyria to unwind. Again – hard content should be there for those who love it. Amen and huzzah for the wurm and Teq, both of which I ignore; but this is the living story.

3) Maybe make the event slightly easier and have a instanced guild version with better rewards.

I would love something like this. Give better rewards or titles to those who can do an instanced hard mode of an event. Give everybody the level they want and go ahead and give those who struggle with the hard stuff something in reward… so long as it doesn’t affect power balance, etc.

4) …..Not everything should be timed or have DPS check. It’s just silly.

Amen. The timers are getting very very old.

5) Lets be honest. The biggest problem with these events is overflows and achievement leechers.

Erm, not in my view. They’re bad by design in many ways, mostly requiring too much coordination to be enjoyable for a large segment of the base.

I think the amount of hate and frustration the events are causing show that they are not in fact great at all. They might be up your alley, but that’s another story.

Happened to be in LP when the event triggered, so I figured since I was about to have my armor broken unless I zoned out, might as well help out and get some fragments. Went to lane 4 and literally nobody was there. Lane 5 had one guy. I just logged off. Bad enough the event is dead (because it requires way too much for what it is), but throwing armor repair and WP costs on top of it?! I’m avoiding LP entirely until this garbage is gone.

The depths of Tyria are pretty much all over. I think the drill and probes make whatever happens likely to involve the depths, just because it would be hard not to. There’s no really deep connection between LA and the depths. The LA entrance was basically just the door between prophecies and eotn. You entered north of LA (though after the flooding, that’s where a lot of the new LA is… then again, the X in LA seems to indicate the water and the original LA), and went into a couple of hallways befor hopping into a gate to go elsewhere.

Primordus is in the depths, but not under LA. He’s near the central transfer chamber, which is elsewhere. At least, that’s where he WAS before awakening. If you read the gw1 wiki on Primordus, there’s a note that the Asura siphoned magic from him to power their gate network. That’s why they built their hub by him (not knowing he was a living entity, just that he radiated useful power).

That said, entirely possible Prim is the focus here, because he’s awake and moving around. I wouldn’t rule out that Scarlet is intending to drill in LA to get to him or release him or anything. But there’s no more reason to think so because it’s LA. That could be her plan drilling just about anywhere.

I haven’t beaten Marry – tried about 10 times, but mostly just to get the necessary code fragments to do the lair stuff and for dailies to get the meta. I have to say that I am really really glad Anet had the foresight to add the daily as a possible route to the meta, and full marks to them for that. However, the event as a whole to me was quite disappointing, primarily for two reasons.

I don’t know if I’m a “bad” player or not. I’m not even sure what that means. By definition, half the players in the game will be below average. I know how to dodge and the like, etc. etc. I’ve saved my dungeon group as the sole survivor to avoid the TPK. I read over and understand the event mechanics. I’ve only failed a platform once, and it was due to getting one-shotted by an attack I couldn’t see coming. Not the point. I have two main gripes about the setup.

I think, in general, that the living story should be pretty accessible to just about the entire player base. While everyone can PARTICIPATE in the Marry event and get the meta, the story, etc., the event is built in such a way that, quite predictably, will cause a lot of people to feel unwelcome. The setup is confusing. The game itself gives no sense of where to go or what will come or how to succeed. The design is such that a guide like Dulfy or something is all but required to do be widely read for the event to succeed. A lot of players enjoy gw2 but aren’t that devoted, which should be okay. But then you have players who ARE that devoted (and good for them!… until you realize), but for whom the work they put into figuring things out is “ruined” by people showing up to participate in the new release who aren’t so devoted. They then turn on these people as if they had been griefed. This fractures the community, makes the Marry event quite unpleasant and nasty at times. Other times, you have people being very kind and helpful and patient…. but OMG the hatered I have seen flung into chat! This isn’t good for the game, and it was absolutely 100% foreseeable. You see it to some extent in Wurm, but not as much, because it’s understood that’s elite content. I think with LS, it should NOT be elite. This was a misguided attempt to split the difference, and I don’t think it worked.

Second gripe: while I generally am not a fan of hard content, I do do it, and can do it. I’ve soloed all of Orr, despite the “challenge” of waiting in various ways and various places for a group event to be completed or whatever (I fail to see this as a challenge of any note, but more of a unnecessary inconvenience, and don’t get me started on map completion requiring access to places your server will never see because you happened to pick the wrong name from the hat when you signed up, but whatever….). What’s wrong with the dubiously-labeled “challenge” of Marry is success has basically nothing to do with you. Were I to try Marry again and succeed, I’d have ACCOMPLISHED nothing more than getting lucky with who else was there and how they did on that day. That’s not a compelling challenge.

As a result, once the meta was done, I said goodbye and good riddance to Marry. I’ve seen and will forever ignore from now on the Wurm and Teq, because I don’t find hoping 200 other people jump through the hoops with me very interesting. Since other people love it, I’m very glad it’s there. It just has no business in the living story, which should be universal, general, and far more forgiving. I thank Anet for making the meta at least work for anybody who can log in and slog through the negativity and frustration 1/day for 10 days, but I feel more like a part of a team, more like a member of a community, and more engaged by the story, frankly, when the centerpiece is a zerg.

Content that requires high percentages of people to succeed will succeed only in making large portions of the player base feel unwelcome, whether or not they are told as much in their chat window. And they are. In droves. The event made me like the player-base, and hence the game itself, a little less. That’s a failure.

tldr: 1) If a player is “bad” they shouldn’t have to choose between not participating in the living story or interfering with other “good” players. 2) It is a dubious success to manage a moderate challenge and then get lucky in that 95 others pulled it off too. 3) I don’t blame “bad” players for showing up, but others are, predictably, because the game is encouraging us to resent their presence.

Loving all the speculation, and I think the fact that the next update is the edge of the mists suggests that the X in LA is likely having to do with the gates. However, that being said, a really close study of the scarlet map and the game map lead me to question this. First of all, the other Xs, when closely examined, seem very very precisely placed on a fuzzy (and obscured around the water) map. They correspond indubitably to the centers of the three orders. I don’t think this can be doubted. Whether they mark secret lairs or targets we can’t know.

But the X in LA, when you look at it, really isn’t anywhere near (to the degree of precision the other Xs are placed) Fort Mariner with its mistgates, nor really the fractal gate. It’s closer to the gate to Southsun than any of these, and really it seems to be smack on the stone pillar in the water between the southsun gate and the old lighthouse. This got me thinking, so I poked around out there a bit. I noticed a few things.

My first thought was, hey didn’t the Karka come out over here? But the bigun that came up in the cinematic came from the other side of the lighthouse. No go there.

Underwater out there is a thumper. Aha! There is also a suspiciously perfect and intact circular construction right beside it. Could be something. We know rings and what they seem to do. But meh, nothing really grabbed me. Also, I just was really convinced after flipping back and forth between the maps (the scarlet one seems tilted ever so slightly) that the X denoted something a hair further east. That put me on or just east of the huge pillar out there in the water. Poked around and didn’t find much but a strange swell in the ground.

I was about gived-up when I clambered out of the water and happened to examine the mariner plaque right there. Lo and behold! Oriented so as to indicate the waters I had just left in the manner of a tourist plaque, it proclaimed the spot to be the resting place of the ship, Pride, and the MAW, and “undead leviathan.”

Now, I love the speculation, but I’m not going to declare this to be correct just because I found it. Still, I have to wonder whether or not the X isn’t smack dab right on top of the remains of the Maw. If so, that fact is ripe for speculation.

Just saw Dulfy’s guide, which states the wurm takes two hours and alternates with the puppet. So there ya go.

Thanks. I hope some people find the info here, so the thread is useful.
Why Anet doesn’t just provide these details I don’t know….

I spent 4 hours in total banging around Bloodtide and Lornar, with no one ever answering queries, before figuring out the puppet shows every odd hour. Cool. Now that I know it’s less horrific. Is there anything similar vis a vis the wurm? Or is it just go and sit in the blasted map twidling your thumbs until it feels like showing up?

I am not going to get into thumbs up or thumbs down for the events, but it would be really nice for people who don’t have all day to sit on their butts if we could get some info on when the events happen.

Without the mask he looks like Lemmy.

In what world is the prince a great character? Scarlett isn’t that interesting, sure, but what is the prince bringing to the table?

Yup, worked for me on an alt.
Thanks for posting a workaround.

Second time, I only got silver due to huge huge massive lag. 10 bags.

Sure, but they can still learn from any mistakes to avoid them in the future.

Yikes. Yeah, that event is at best inconsistent, and I think ppl dismissing the observations of those struggling with a bugged event are being obnoxious and unfair. But that’s the internet for you. They want to remain ignorant, they will. I just hope ANet looks into it.

Bags only here too. Either bugged or lame.

Same. 25 bags only.

I was in spider form when I opened the chest. Don’t know if that contributes somehow.

Yes please! +1
Really can’t fathom why they haven’t done this. The balloon towers were annoying because of the lack!

Maw hung up at spot described for days on Devona’s Rest as well.