Guild Wars 2

The “one of each ring” surprise situation is just dumb. “Unique” is a keyword that is never explained in-game, as there are no NPCs that ever mention it or even a hint about it. It’s also used extremely unevenly across the game; there are trophies and other items that have the “Unique” keyword even though they aren’t able to be equipped. I don’t have a list of which items those are, but I think a casual player is probably more likely to run into a unique trophy before they’re ready to buy ascended gear, which gives the impression that it’s just a flavor word, not something with hidden rules attached to it.

For anyone who thinks it’s self-evident that “Unique” has special game meaning, I present my first unique item. It was only available per-character and it was soulbound on acquire, making it basically impossible to get more than one into a character’s inventory. (Barring transmutation? Maybe?) Plus it’s a backpack, meaning it would be impossible to equip two into the relevant slot even if you did have more than one.

Look at that and tell me it seems more likely “Unique” is a warning against an impossible situation, and not just more flavor text. I realize this particular item is an extreme case, but if I go a month or two and only ever see that keyword in meaningless, flavor-only contexts, I’m not going to magically know that it has a special meaning for rings.

Half of what’s sad about this is how simple the fix is. Just add a “Unique Equipment” game hint that pops up the first time a player acquires a unique piece of equipment, explaining what it means. Teaching players this kind of information is exactly what that system is for.

Fenrir.3609:

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

emikochan.8504:

It says unique on the ring.

It’s a really small tag at the bottom of the stats, barely noticeable. And how are people supposed to know what this ‘unique’ tag actually means?

It’s called paying attention, reading something and applying common sense. But no, there should clearly be a fifteen page PDF guide to walk people through this.

If it were actually unique it would be impossible to buy more than one. and only one person would have it.

Fenrir.3609:

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

emikochan.8504:

It says unique on the ring.

It’s a really small tag at the bottom of the stats, barely noticeable. And how are people supposed to know what this ‘unique’ tag actually means?

It’s called paying attention, reading something and applying common sense. But no, there should clearly be a fifteen page PDF guide to walk people through this.

Condescending remark combined with an exaggeration, typical.

It should be literally stated that you can only wear one. And please be so kind as to keep derogatory comments about so called common sense to your self.

emikochan.8504:

It says unique on the ring.

When I contacted CS I received a reply with a link to the gw2 wiki where it defined what unique was with the suggestion I use the ring on an alt pc. In effect saying…

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

‘there is a tiny unique tag at the bottom, you should have known’.

Infusing is another option.

They are aware it would help… it’s been posted in the community thread over 6 months ago, they even replied and said it was a good idea.

Who knows why everything is taking so long, it’s like this game mode is completely off the radar for the devs.

There’s a grand total of 0 people on Anet who care about WvW so good luck

Sometimes you can’t join a squad because some people have to keep an eye on each tag though, otherwise how will you know where each group is?

There was a Commander Tag CDI with good feedback from both Commanders and Players which should of been put to good use by now.
Perhaps that’s me being passive aggressive, but there you go.

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

It isn’t even about being “the” hero. NPCs that should know you, regardless of heroics, simply don’t, and there are a lot of them.

Example. The first Vigil crusader I worked with is a recruiter for them in Hoelbrok. Now, in spite of what we did together, I’m an absolute stranger. This isn’t just about who the story should revolve around but a simple recognition of a simple fact. The guy should know me. Period.

Yet one more detail I really wished they’d gotten RIGHT – I really wanted Agent Ihan to be my mentor for my initiation, not Tybalt. I mean, he’s a fun character but he didn’t feel like the right type to be training my character.

And on the other hand, I didn’t mind my character being handed off to Forgal, because he was clearly an experienced and capable person. He knew what he was doing and he had the air of “just listen to me because you have a lot to learn”.

Lastly, Sieran . . . oh my god, Sieran . . . unless it comes out the Priory assigned my character to her in hopes of tempering her then I really don’t have faith in Steward Gixx to make good calls when it comes to decisions.

All this and more disconnected bits during the middle of the Personal Story drove me mildly nuts. In one instance, I’m supposed to be looking into a corrupt Krytan Minister, and my character should be well aware about the guy being investigated and not surprised. My charr warrior should know what the Renegades are and not have a dime-store explanation of them. My norn should know what the heck the Great Destroyer was.

Dawdler.8521:

To post a pic I made almost a year ago now the last time we had a long, long discussion about this. The slider is actually the color slider which would change color as you move it, I regret not having a description lol. It was just to illustrate one way of doing it.

Anet ignore everything that has to do with commander however. Its been suggested since release and the response from devs is always “we dont want to give you some shoddy solution to this, we need to have it 100% perfected!” and then proceed to probably not even start prototyping it.

I can appreciate their desire to want to get it “just right”. I respect perfectionism in the abstract and have been guilty of it myself. However, in a work-a-day world, it’s counter-productive. There is no such thing as perfect; if you make that your standard, you’ll never achieve it and anything you do will be delayed, delayed, and delayed (as we’ve witnessed). Sometimes “good enough” is good enough; even if it’s not perfect.

What’s more is, this statement demonstrates ArenaNet’s disconnect. It may be well-intentioned, but it’s also patriarchal/patronizing. It amounts to, “We know best and don’t trust putting solutions in the hands of the players.”; despite their paying lip-service to the concepts of community-driven gaming in a social MMORPG.

As an interim solution until they’ve “perfected” it, simply give commanders the option to choose their tag color or simply assign a new color for each commander that flags on. Then – and this is the important part – TRUST the players to figure out how to leverage this small improvement to their advantage. Let the community sort it out rather than trying to dictate every tiny little facet of the game.

The “we must perfect it and control every aspect of the game” approach is appropriate for PvE where everything is dev-scripted. It’s wholly antithetical to the dynamic player-scripted environment of WvW. This design philosophy and approach to development really demonstrates where their priorities lie and explains – in part – why WvW languishes. Too bad, too, since WvW has such HUGE potential that is just going to waste due to this mismatched design philosophy.

Knight of Zero.9201:

I was actually thinking about this last night but to a different extent. I would like there to be a commander rating system. For example, when they tag up, you can click on their tag and rate their performance. Whatever rating they get would correspond with a color coding system. For example, bad = red tag, neutral = blue, and good = yellow. Most commanders I meet are good, guild leading people… but I have ran into my fair share of terrible commanders that can’t lead a dog on a leash. Just a thought.

I can appreciate the frustration you’re experiencing that informs this suggestion. However, a player-based rating system is not a good solution. There are too many trolls in this game who would down-vote even good commanders just to be kittens.

BuzybSevenSeven.4061:

sorry what is CDI?

Officially = Collaborative Development Initiative. The effort on ArenaNet’s part to engage the player base in a discussion about specific topics in an effort to improve the game.

Unofficially = Confound, Derail, and Ignore.The PR campaign on ArenaNet’s part to assuage the forum users’ anger, disappointment, and frustration over the lack of response to their concerns and lack of substantive improvements and fixes to specific areas of the game by pretending to listen them. Ultimately, nothing comes of it.

Concrete example relevant to this discussion: The ability to change the color of commander tags has been requested since launch. Almost two years later and dozens of forum posts unanimously asking for this tiny little improvement (as well as discussed in a CDI, no less) and still nothing.

Aomine.5012:

I do not ask for the removal of spectate mode, but for the removal of spectate mode IN HOT-JOIN particularly. If you really really want to learn anything, you should be watching fair fight of Solo Q or Team Q, that people are actually TRYING THEIR ABSOLUTE BEST to win the game, but too bad we don’t have this basic option do we?

The problem with adding a spectate mode to Solo Q or Team Q is that it’s hard to prevent people from abusing that system: Some might get a second account, log into both accounts at the same time and use one to play and one to spectate. This way they know exactly where the opponents are and how they play. While this could also be done in Hot Join, you do not really gain that much from it.
A solution would be that you cannot chose a specific game you want to spectate, but that a random game is chose instead. But this makes spectating less valuable, too.

@Numot: Thanks! I always thought that number was their character level. kitten .

The trouble is that even if you join a winning team late, you will likely still end up getting more points than if you joined a losing team early. I feel that the reward needs to be restructured so it’s based more on what YOU did in the match, rather than piling most of the reward on being on the winning team.

As an example, the current system is:

Player A, who actively moved between home and middle, defending and fighting:
- 5 points for Top Defender
- 5 points for Top Kills
- 200 points for a loss.
TOTAL: 210 points

Player B, who basically ran around and capped unguarded points, but not much else:
- 5 points for Top Caps
- 500 points for a win.
TOTAL: 505 points

If we instead adjusted the reward structure so that the bulk of your points comes from your PvP actions, we’d get this instead:

Player A:
- 75 points for defending a point 3 times, 100 bonus points for Top Defender
- 120 points for 12 individual kills, 100 bonus points for Top Kills
- 50 points for a loss.
TOTAL: 445 points

Player B:
- 50 points for capping 5 points, 100 bonus points for Top Caps
- 100 points for a win.
TOTAL: 250 points

So Player A ended up getting more points based on what they did in the match, even though their team ended up losing. I think this would motivate players to be more willing to join the losing team.

I agree that a lot of tiny attentions (dedicated dialogues according to the PS/LS achievement status, forking dialogues according to personal background, etc.) (even if carefully, scarcely and cleverly sprinkled on, as Angel McCoy says), would mend things quite a lot and enliven the player’s sentiment that he/she’s really role-playing a character, rather than a MOBA avatar (I use RP as in “being immersed in a fantasy world” here). I easily figure that this work but may be time-consuming. It’s simply to be considered in the grand schedule of what has to be done to improve the game experience.

What is sad (and worrying?), is that this non attention (or time constraint-induced limitation) has lasted since the very game’s beginning, well before the LW. Go talk to the first level PS characters you brought back to your home (charr character’s father, etc.) to convince yourself. My theory is that the PS was (at least at some time in the past years) seen only as a mean to go with the fast leveling-up, and indeed, this (sadly) reflects well the mindset of many players (not those complaining here!).

So yes, perhaps, it could be a good idea to temporary hire a recruit to play the PS in an excessively character-focused way (hard-core/vet/meta MMO players shouldn’t qualify for this role imho), so that the devs and story-tellers would have a genuinely fresh, outside sight on what it feels to play a given character combination the way it’s implemented in game.

This would be just another game polishing action, a bit like when the devs decide to focus on a given profession balance in PvP.

One study I recall reading about came to mind as I was thinking about these issues. An fMRI study in Science recently showed that social exclusion and rejection activates the same brain regions that subserve experience of (physical) pain.

Ref is: Eisenberger NI, Lieberman MD, Williams KD (2003). Does rejection hurt? An FMRI study of social exclusion. Science 302(5643):290-2. Pubmed: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=williams+eisenberger+rejection

Most interestingly, the behavioural paradigm used for eliciting these feelings was a “video game” type protocol where the player could pass a ball amongst him/herself and two computer players. The computer players ultimately stopped passing the ball to the subject, eliciting feelings of exclusion and therefore pain.

Note that this was due to being rejected or not socially included. We are social creatures, and therefore, not including us in the “choices” of the story (switching back to GW2) can thus create similar feelings of exclusion, alienation, and pain that I’m trying to refer to.

It isn’t even about being “the” hero. NPCs that should know you, regardless of heroics, simply don’t, and there are a lot of them.

Example. The first Vigil crusader I worked with is a recruiter for them in Hoelbrok. Now, in spite of what we did together, I’m an absolute stranger. This isn’t just about who the story should revolve around but a simple recognition of a simple fact. The guy should know me. Period.

A quick follow-up to give a particular in-game example, and to demonstrate that even when “trying” to give the player more control, the sense of personal involvement can actually diminish or fail:

When searching Scarlet’s quarters in Prosperity, the designers admirably try to make the player “matter” by having the PC interact with the other major characters in exploring the room, e.g., “have a look at this” and all. So in a sense, yes, “we” (the PC) are “involved”. But it doesn’t create actual involvement. I, as a PC, obtain an experiential sense of involvement only when I perform actions such as open the door, go inside, and read the notebooks, etc. Some can be examined without the prompting of the other characters. But these moves and actions are not “recognized”, and therefore, the player is strongly invalidated. It’s as if they didn’t happen – and therefore, as if we did not exist. The actions that do matter, and the only ones that matter, are the ones taken by the other characters. They notice the “actually” important elements in the room, like the ley line schematic, journal, etc. We are “carried along for the ride” by being asked “oh take a look at this” but have very tangential roles. In fact, if I recall correctly, we are not even asked by the characters directly. We are instructed to participate by the UI, quest indicator, etc. That makes the feeling of involvement even less. Finally, when it’s time to leave, or make decisions on what to do, the other characters do it, not us. They announce what is to be done, and we definitely do not feel at all like we are “the Commander” nor “a Commander” by any stretch, just a passive observer, in fact almost just a disembodied, third-person camera.

I hope that helps convey some of the experience of the player in the Living Story that makes us (at least myself) feel quite alienated, useless, and breaks the immersion of the game in a very big way.

It almost seems that, ironically, by trying to make the story work for everyone, any particular player (any one, and thus, everyone!) becomes, in fact, excluded.

EDIT: I apologize for the excessive use of bold and italics, I just am very excited about contributing to this very fascinating discussion and IRL would express it with facial expressions, hand gestures, etc., so can only approximate this using bold & italics.

One point that seems to be getting “lost in translation”, so to speak, between the players and developers/designers/etc is the personal experience of playing the game. Aside from the issues of PC voicing, aside from the issues of first-person versus third-person (personal choice versus open world), aside from references to the player (or lack thereof), what pronouns are used, etc., etc., is the personal lack of significance or impact to the story.

Yes, it is true that all of the aforementioned points are factors in the creation of the personal sense of lack of involvement, lack of impact, but the sum is greater than the parts, and the experience I, and many others it seems, are getting is that we do not matter. It is a problem of alienation. It is a very visceral and somewhat demoralizing feeling, and it’s hard to convey here.

This, I think, sums it up very, very well:

Baltzenger.2467:

I don’t personally dislike any of our current protagonists, but I do feel distant from them, I don’t know why I’m supposed to run around with them, I don’t need them, I rather have my real friends join me on the adventures of Tyria, and we be the real group that saves the world. And of course, I am curious about their story, I wan’t to follow them, just, not pretending theirs is my story, because I don’t even decide where to go, I feel carried.

The solution is expressly not to actually have our friends be the protagonists instead of Rox et al. That would be missing the point. See below on my take on solutions (hint: I do not know what they are, only that they can be very simple, since the problem, though deep, is one of perception.)

It is this sense of feeling carried, of not knowing why the new characters are my friend, that contribute to the strong feeling of alienation. I believe part of the problem is that, as explained by Angel (IIRC), without race- or profession-specific choice points in the Living Story, there is less of involvement of the player’s particular idiosyncrasies of history to “hook onto” in the new Living Story. Of course, one aspect to a possible solution is to give player some (ultimately false, as always and as necessary for a game like this) sense of choice or personal control.

The biggest contributor to a solution is to attack the problem directly – make the player matter. This does not mean that everyone has a say and of course it’s impossible to do that. What it means can be as simple as referring to the player more often, making the player more explicit. We simply seem to not really exist in this Living World as an independent entity – we are carried along, not talked to, not referred to (except in the vaguest and briefest ways).

Others have already made my point here but I wanted to re-iterate and +1 to the player experience of alienation.

The key is that this is a perception. The solution may therefore be very simple. I am not a game psychologist (though this would be an interesting issue to study) but feel that someone like this would be best suited to addressing the problem.

Corollary: I think all game studios should have a resident psychologist or role where the experience (in a subjective, experiential or psychological sense) of the player is considered. Important player-game dynamics might otherwise be missed; the forest may be ignored due to focussing on the trees of dialog, voice acting, etc.

Corollary #2: someone less involved in the development of the game would be ideal, since as we’ve seen (and has been pointed out), there is a lack of expressing certain things about the story that are “taken for granted” by the development team (such as the curious ‘fact’ that we are not “the” Commander, but “a” Commander – not anywhere mentioned in-game). Why is this? Anyone’s guess, but a strong contender in my view is that there is office talk, there is a cohesive sense of the story in the company and during meetings that is not 100% being translated outside of the meetings and of the company – i.e., to the players. So someone who is almost an outsider, would be best to spot these issues – of course, they’d have to play the game intensely as well. (Perhaps these forums can serve as a good substitute, though there is a lot of information and voices floating around and some important unifying messages or themes might be missed, hence part of the motivation of this post.)

Shriketalon.1937:

Ms. McCoy, there is something in your posts which I feel needs to be addressed.

Angel McCoy.1832:

The whole “Commander” topic is another discussion entirely.

Bottom line is that, at the beginning of the Pact (almost 2 years ago in-game time), you were “The Commander.” After Zhaitan was killed, the Pact continued on and you went off into the world to do stuff. At that point, other commanders were brought on, and you become “A Commander.”

This never happened.

You never told that story. You did not write those scenes. Nowhere in the entire game of Guild Wars 2 does this ever take place, and therefore it is not the story you told.

This has happened repeatedly throughout Season 1, you refer to events and information that never actually transpire in the game. There are forum posts that detail how the Flame Legion were just using Scarlet to get their way, but there is no evidence for this in the game. Other posts describe how the dredge were inspired by multiple victories and motivated to keep serving as shock troops, but there isn’t a single NPC who says anything remotely justifying this. The krait were described as bitter and resentful after the Tower fell and struck LA in pursuit of vengeance, but there isn’t a single scene where that idea is conveyed.

If it isn’t in the game, it doesn’t exist. If it never makes it from your head to the page, it is never written.

The storyteller is responsible for conveying the entire narrative, and any holes in the tapestry are theirs to mend. It does not matter if you have the answers. It does not matter if you have it all properly arranged in your mind. It does not matter that you are a smart and clever thinker. All that matters is what you actually create in your medium. Art is judged by its results, not its intentions.

We never left the Pact. Anyone can claim we left to do our own thing, but there isn’t a single scene in the story that actually demonstrates this. It’s like leaving a gap between Chapter 8 and Chapter 10 and giving a brief synopsis of what was supposed to happen. That’s not storytelling, that’s telling that there should have been a story. And it’s all well and good to claim that there were priorities and time constraints, but maybe we didn’t need one or two of the hundred of lines of Scarlet’s “Mwahahahaha, I’m evil” rants or a scene or two of Marjory and Kasmeer making kissy faces, or a random interlude of Braham being a stereotypical moron. Maybe one of those scenes could have been spent actually moving the plot for the Player Characters.

You cannot ask us to pretend that you wrote the missing chapter of your novel. If it isn’t in the game, it does not exist. If it never happened in game, it did not happen.

Thank you. You wrote what I feel. I’m too blunt and tactless.
And, for me at least, these later “explanations” come off too often as plot pothole repair, rather than an original part of the story.

Ms. McCoy, there is something in your posts which I feel needs to be addressed.

Angel McCoy.1832:

The whole “Commander” topic is another discussion entirely.

Bottom line is that, at the beginning of the Pact (almost 2 years ago in-game time), you were “The Commander.” After Zhaitan was killed, the Pact continued on and you went off into the world to do stuff. At that point, other commanders were brought on, and you become “A Commander.”

This never happened.

You never told that story. You did not write those scenes. Nowhere in the entire game of Guild Wars 2 does this ever take place, and therefore it is not the story you told.

This has happened repeatedly throughout Season 1, you refer to events and information that never actually transpire in the game. There are forum posts that detail how the Flame Legion were just using Scarlet to get their way, but there is no evidence for this in the game. Other posts describe how the dredge were inspired by multiple victories and motivated to keep serving as shock troops, but there isn’t a single NPC who says anything remotely justifying this. The krait were described as bitter and resentful after the Tower fell and struck LA in pursuit of vengeance, but there isn’t a single scene where that idea is conveyed.

If it isn’t in the game, it doesn’t exist. If it never makes it from your head to the page, it is never written.

The storyteller is responsible for conveying the entire narrative, and any holes in the tapestry are theirs to mend. It does not matter if you have the answers. It does not matter if you have it all properly arranged in your mind. It does not matter that you are a smart and clever thinker. All that matters is what you actually create in your medium. Art is judged by its results, not its intentions.

We never left the Pact. Anyone can claim we left to do our own thing, but there isn’t a single scene in the story that actually demonstrates this. It’s like leaving a gap between Chapter 8 and Chapter 10 and giving a brief synopsis of what was supposed to happen. That’s not storytelling, that’s telling that there should have been a story. And it’s all well and good to claim that there were priorities and time constraints, but maybe we didn’t need one or two of the hundred of lines of Scarlet’s “Mwahahahaha, I’m evil” rants or a scene or two of Marjory and Kasmeer making kissy faces, or a random interlude of Braham being a stereotypical moron. Maybe one of those scenes could have been spent actually moving the plot for the Player Characters.

You cannot ask us to pretend that you wrote the missing chapter of your novel. If it isn’t in the game, it does not exist. If it never happened in game, it did not happen.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

tekfan.3179:

…

…

The level of detail a character can have is of course limited in games like this and we fill out the gaps.
However, couldn’t the game-world react? Couldn’t we share a bit, at least a tiny bit?
Aside from the journal and a few mostly mute characters in the home-instance there is nothing in the world that takes note of the characters actions.
Did you play the LW-Story where you killed Scarlet or not? Doesn’t matter, the game world assumes it and slaps the characters name on a monument.
Did you kill Zhaitan before entering Season 2? Arenanet assumes it for the ease of the story, yet there is no mention of that(Although it is saved in your journal, so there could be a check for that).

Another example: I have a asuran thief who met Professor Gorr three times during the personal story. The choices I made led to three meetings with Gorr, once when I joined an order, later when I helped him to test his new weapon and brought him and the weapon to claw island and lastly in the Pact, when he was the researcher to run tests on the captured Eye of Zhaitan. The game doesn’t react to that. There is not even a text-bubble that Gorr remembers the character.
I’d rather have a short reaction, instead of imagining for myself that Gorr has a memory-loss or something.

…

Why limit myself so thoroughly when there’s plenty of stuff to make use of?

Exactly the point I crave and which I think Vincent does, too. Why limit the interactivity when a few more lines of text or one or two checks of the Story Journal could improve the immersion imensely?

…

…
There may be branches, and options, but in the end they matter only as a means of getting me to the final part of the story where those decisions might not even affect the outcome in more than a few lines of text.

I’ve experienced letdowns too. Namely Mass Effect.
Yet you say that you’d find it a limitation to ignore the personal story, so story seems to have importance to you.
I had some differing dialogue with Taimi, since I played an asura who won the snaff-prize. That’s something for me. Only a few lines of text, yet they hightened the immersion.
I don’t expect every decision I make to make a difference in the outcome, but at least the world could react to more of them, aside from my pc’s race.

…

Reacts to your character, or to the Living Story? Because so far it seems the world is reacting to the LS events and progression (the vines), though it’s far too early to call it one way or another for the whole of LS2. If you’re talking about the character, that’s never going to happen outside something like a MUD where there’s someone in charge changing the the stage dressings in reaction to what players do. There’s too much in the way of potential for people developing the game to get it all.

For instance – I still can’t load asura into trebuchets and launch them back to Rata Sum from Fort Salma. And other players can’t lead a force of Separatists against the Black Citadel to try to retake Ascalon. And yet more players can’t just squat down somewhere in the Shiverpeaks and make a fort from which to fight the Icebrood.

And most importantly . . .

Nobody can beat some sense into Logan over his infatuation with Queen Jennah.

Yeah, Logan… I’ve given up on him even before the game launched, when I read the book.

Launching Asura from fort Salma to Rata Sum…I got you on my list now.
Still, I’m not talking about creating totally new story-branches in the end, based on how you came to the point of defeating Zhaitan.
However, the things that already happened in the personal story of a pc could at least get some attention.
In most cases the pc is a hero who did heroic deeds for two years. Yet, the pc is just another stranger to pretty much every NPC.
The pc saved Claw Island? What do Kiel and Magnus care?!
The pc saved Lions Arch twice and fough alongside Rox and co in the pavilion to save people in Divinity’s Reach? What do the Seraph in Brisbain care?!
Oh yeah, and on a sidenote the pc was the leading Pact-Commander in the mission where Zhaitan got killed…just a character who reunited the famous Destiny’s Edge and led them to the victory against an Elder Dragon. Something they failed at years ago(thanks, Logan btw) which still made them famous.
Not that I want the whole lot of Tyria cheer to my pc and praise him, nope, that would be more awkward than anything else.
However, at least some npc’s should recognize the character and react to the pc in some way. May it be that the Seraph-leader at brisbain recognizes the pc as the Commander who brought down Zhaitan and makes a comment that the group should be in good hands and can take care of their own in uncharted territory.

Whether or not you believe any of the living story or personal story really concerns you is beside the point. The thing is we were lied to. From the minute we finished creating our character, we were greeted with one of the most epic cutscenes I’ve ever seen. It went something like, “I was born here, grew up in this place. Had these friends, overcame this obstacle, and here I am now… I am <character name>, and this is MY story”. Gave me goosebumps first time I saw it.

It was wrong.

I’d be ok with the state the current living story is in except for a few points. First, if we are just part of a really good team, then make the rest of the team at least partly competent. Even with the most recent release, it’s made out where the only person doing any damage in the group is my character. If I am downed, they won’t even come over to try and get me back up. If I die, the mission fails. That’s not part of a team, that’s me carrying the entire mission. Second, for the non combat question and answer part, if you aren’t willing to listen to the people who are telling you the ‘romance’ thing is sappy and a waste of time, then please put in a dialog option to where we can tell them to shut the kitten up and actually have them not have that type of conversation again. Not in just that chapter either, but ever.

Honestly though, with the devs complaining about limited space for dialog and all that, there are much better uses that can be made of what space they do have than trying for a bad high school movie remake.

tekfan.3179:

Also it’s kinda hard to belief that the pact, pretty much forged to kill an elder dragon and show that it can be done, wouldn’t plaster the cities with posters of the victory against zhaitan to give the people hope and to raise recruitments.

This idea gave me a thought. We know that phasing technology allows players to see different things even when they’re logged into the same zone. I wonder if would have been possible to generate a poster of the character’s face and put those all over LA?

Or perhaps easier would have been to use asura tech to create holographic busts of the character’s image proclaiming they were the hero instrumental in taking down Zhaitan. To fit with the story, I suppose the holograms could cycle through images of the Destiny’s Edge NPCs as well and perhaps one or two notable NPCs, that would have been neat to see our character shown along with the others.

Now everyone would be seeing their own character faces so RP-ers might not like it, but you have to figure they always need to work around that part of MMOs.

Heh, and every now and then the hologram tribute could be interrupted by Evon Gnashblade doing a commercial for Black Lion Trading

Very interesting thread and really great to see the Devs responding in such detail!

It is great to hear our character may soon have a voice, I think it will add considerably to the cinematic scenes.

Braham: Hey there.
Me: Hi, how are you doing?
Braham: Did you… just talk?

Followed by even more hilarity

Thank you for that

It is hard to write a story focused around a character for an MMO. Regarding the OP’s concerns, I don’t mind the current batch of NPCs because I think the story has done a decent job pointing out that they need the player character. Rox and Braham were just rookies when we met them, I think the story should continue show that they view the player as their mentor. Kasmeer and Majorie might bring up the reminder that they never would have met without the player. Perhaps they have a quarrel and we have to help mend things up. The player needs to continue to be the "glue* for this group. Never, ever show this bunch doing things as a group without the player.

Essentially, I’m saying it is critical never to lose the idea that the NPCs need the player. Don’t miss a chance to bring this up. And don’t lose it in the story.

In contrast, people have mentioned how our player is called the ‘Commander’ in the PS, I never got the sense my character was commanding anything in the Personal Story. My character was a lackey being told what to do. It’s shoved in our faces what an expert Trahearne is from the moment we meet – he already has Pact connections and all this knowledge of Orr. Our characters just serving as an instrument to do damage, replaceable by any other. We see the future showing he’s going to unite the Pact and we don’t see a our character by his side in that vision. We don’t get the magic sword and we just get to watch as the NPC we’ve been repeatedly told is more dedicated, more knowledgeable and more destined than our characters could ever be fulfill that destiny. Take our character out of the story and it ends the same.

The Destiny’s Edge story was better since it showed our character serving to bring them together. Again acting like a glue for them. This was helpful, of course, since the player character could talk in the cinematics. It was a little disappointing in the end that we weren’t made an honorary member of Destiny’s Edge, our character still didn’t rate enough to be part of the cool club, I guess.

The introduction of the new batch of NPCs brings a group who are very competent but they’re not already famous and renown. That made them seem to need the help of the player character. That gives us a sense of investment that has been lacking IMO. A hero should be needed, not just be something to point at the next boss mob. I really hope ArenaNet can keep that sense as the story continues and Rox and the other continue to develop and grow.

One last thing I have to add, I really hope you guys have a good villain planned for Season 2. A story is only as good as the villain (and having yet another nutso sylvari that we have to take out in this beginning chapter was not a strong example of one. That mysterious Master of “Peace” guy on the other hand….hmmmm)

Sir Vincent III.1286:

tekfan.3179:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

…

lnguy.5127:

Angel McCoy.1832:

They might have heard your name, but would they put your face with that name in a world where there is no television and no mass printing presses?

I understand your point. However, what I find to be inconsistent with this is that the majority of the time the NPCs get recognized but the PC doesn’t? How does that make sense? The PC is arguably more of an important figure than the NPCs and yet they get more recognition than the PCs when there is no television or mass printing presses?

You actually buy that? If that is even true, I guess seeing Kiel’s and Evon’s face plastered all over the place during the election was just my imagination.

But never mind that, in Ebonhawk, the resistance are mass printing their propaganda and the Whispers have a mass printing machine.

Gotta agree with you Vincent.

Same thing with Divinity’s Reach. Five tyrians, no VIP’s at that time, killed some dragon champions and failed at killing an elder dragon.

In Lions Arch children play their adventures and some NPC’s in the world talk about them.

Brilliant point! I forgot about those children role playing in LA.

The pc achieved something at his/her home(great hunt, snaff prize, etc.), skyrocketed through the ranks of an order, played the major role in uniting three orders to become the pact(the largest civil military organization in Tyria), reunited the famous Destiny’s Edge(without the help of the orders), farms Dragon Champions for a living and was the leading commander in the successful mission to kill zhaitan.
Right after that the pc took a break from winning against the dragons and intervened against Scarlet, killing her and thus saving hundreds or even thousands of Lions Arch citizens to give the city a future. Now the pc’s name is even mentioned as the hero of Lions Arch on one of the monuments there.

So how did Destiny’s Edge end up as the 5 tyrians idols, while a character who continually saved the world for two years until now remains just some guy?

Perhaps too many of us that they are still debating which face to put on a poster?

Not to mention, when Kiel was elected, we get to see her big as— I mean hologram for all to see — who needs TV?

EDIT: I just thought of something better.

In Finding Nemo, fish has no TV nor printing press yet the news traveled faster than Marlin can swim.

Also it’s kinda hard to belief that the pact, pretty much forged to kill an elder dragon and show that it can be done, wouldn’t plaster the cities with posters of the victory against zhaitan to give the people hope and to raise recruitments.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

…

lnguy.5127:

Angel McCoy.1832:

They might have heard your name, but would they put your face with that name in a world where there is no television and no mass printing presses?

I understand your point. However, what I find to be inconsistent with this is that the majority of the time the NPCs get recognized but the PC doesn’t? How does that make sense? The PC is arguably more of an important figure than the NPCs and yet they get more recognition than the PCs when there is no television or mass printing presses?

You actually buy that? If that is even true, I guess seeing Kiel’s and Evon’s face plastered all over the place during the election was just my imagination.

But never mind that, in Ebonhawk, the resistance are mass printing their propaganda and the Whispers have a mass printing machine.

Gotta agree with you Vincent.

Same thing with Divinity’s Reach. Five tyrians, no VIP’s at that time, killed some dragon champions and failed at killing an elder dragon.

In Lions Arch children play their adventures and some NPC’s in the world talk about them.

The pc achieved something at his/her home(great hunt, snaff prize, etc.), skyrocketed through the ranks of an order, played the major role in uniting three orders to become the pact(the largest civil military organization in Tyria), reunited the famous Destiny’s Edge(without the help of the orders), farms Dragon Champions for a living and was the leading commander in the successful mission to kill zhaitan.
Right after that the pc took a break from winning against the dragons and intervened against Scarlet, killing her and thus saving hundreds or even thousands of Lions Arch citizens to give the city a future. Now the pc’s name is even mentioned as the hero of Lions Arch on one of the monuments there.

So how did Destiny’s Edge end up as the 5 tyrians idols, while a character who continually saved the world for two years until now remains just some guy?

Kaleban.9834:

I don’t believe you understand the meaning of the word “personal” and have argued with others back and forth about the “you” and the “me” while being wrong the entire time.

First of all, let’s clarify one thing; “you” = your player character, “me” = my player character, “us” = our player character.

Now that’s out of the way

The Personal Story is about the player character.

No it’s not. You just have this bias that the personal story is about the player character because we all did bought into that notion that GW2 is all about “us” and if you take the time to reflect on your journal, nothing in it is about “you” — the “you” is missing, thus is not as “personal” as it was advertised.

Period, full stop. If there was no PC, the story wouldn’t happen, Tyria wouldn’t exist, heart quests would not be completed, the map would never be explored, dynamic events wouldn’t exist, and absolutely the Personal Story would never even be touched.

I disagree. I’ve met the Order, the Pact and have explored Orr with one of my alt without ever progressing the story — I tried to complete them when I’m bored. So contrary to your belief, the story do progress even without you. The dynamic events would exist and will go on their own cycle. None of what you mentioned requires the PC which further reinforce my statement that it’s not about “you”.

The PC is the protagonist, whom the story is about, because without a protagonist the story could not exist.

No they’re not. Protagonists only exists on a single-player games, not in MMO.

This is pretty much fundamental writing 101.

Which you obviously failed. Not knowing the application of protagonist is a Litmus Test on how much you know about “fundamental writing 101”.

As to the gaps in the narrative, flexibility in roleplaying may be a factor, but most commonly is due to it being an MMO, with multiple character possibilities and choices, such that nailing down a certain variable alienates a percentage of the player base’s choices, race and sex being the most obvious.

Which further supports the idea that the story is not focused on any single individual.

There’s no Schrodinger’s Cat version of the personal story, no illusion of whatever you’re trying to point out. The PERSONAL story is about the player.

That’s because you bought on the idea that it’s about you. If you step back for a second and reflect on your experiences. Nothing in the game is about you.

Your story begins when you login to the game and it ends when logout. Whatever you did during that time is your player story — not the “personal story”. You need to have the ability to separate the two.

Calling the personal story “personal” is a misnomer, it’s more like “story missions”.

The Living Story is about the world, and the problem I and others have with its implementation is that so far the PC’s contributions to the world of Tyria are being marginalized in favor of two dimensional characters that are George Lucas-ing certain plot elements into the game, such as Marjory and Kasmeer’s “love” which literally is the Jar Jar Binks of a homosexual relationship.

It would be boring if not for those “eye rolling” moments. There’s plenty of those while hanging around the members of Dentiny’s Edge, specially Logan.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Was any of those choices in the personal story — of course not — because what is logged in my journal IS NOT my personal story. That’s my point.

because the personal story is not about you.

Eh, its not personally about me, because some of the choices my character makes or the things they say or do, I would never do myself. But the story is personally about my characters, so it still is a personal story, just not mine. For example, I could never get along with that annoying priory girl, and yet in the spoken diologue my character genuenly cared for her. So it is my characters personal story, and in affect, should be concluded properly… only, it wasn’t; and that’s where they failed.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

In the Living Story, their goal is to focus on the world and let the players role play their characters and create their own history and personality — which I believe should have been the goal in the first place. Them trying to define our characters will only lead to failures.

My bad, I was feeling lazy and didn’t read previous post (except the ones by Anet). I do understand your point now, the complaint is not that the current personal story is not personal enough, but that the previous personal story wasn’t, and that trying to do so caused problems latter on in the game.

Though… I don’t think there would have been these ‘problems’ if they had concluded personal story properlly; if they had tackled the emotional aspects of our characters, and tied up their loose ends. For example, we lost Forgal, the only bad-kitten in game with a witty sense of humor and the strength to back it up… and there is certainly emotions there that it sturs within our characters, but they never addressed or touched up on them.

This could have been resolved by transforming forgal into a Risen, and forcing us to slay him, allowing them to really dwelve into the emotional depth of our characters, and yet… he died, and we moved on; that was it, the issue pushed under the table and forgotten, despite us having strong personal bonds. That left the matter unresolved, no, far worst than that, they devaluded our relationship by ignoring it. If that’s the case then it truly would have been better to avoid personalizing the story all together.

Then there is claudicus, who is set on dethroning the queen, and the bandates, who have a strong tie to the white mantle… and yet, these too, die off when we join an order, left unconcluded. Though, I still have hopes living story will touch up on these matters.

OtakuModeEngage.8679:

That’s interesting, I have always played it imagining that the Pact had a number of Commanders from the start.

The big reveal was the fight against Zhaitan — you can’t do that without partying with other commanders.

lnguy.5127:

Angel McCoy.1832:

They might have heard your name, but would they put your face with that name in a world where there is no television and no mass printing presses?

I understand your point. However, what I find to be inconsistent with this is that the majority of the time the NPCs get recognized but the PC doesn’t? How does that make sense? The PC is arguably more of an important figure than the NPCs and yet they get more recognition than the PCs when there is no television or mass printing presses?

You actually buy that? If that is even true, I guess seeing Kiel’s and Evon’s face plastered all over the place during the election was just my imagination.

But never mind that, in Ebonhawk, the resistance are mass printing their propaganda and the Whispers have a mass printing machine.