Guild Wars 2

Xcorpdog.2840:

And for those who don’t know there is an npc up by the centaur camp, watching us, by the name of Mysterious figure.

. . . Zhed? Is that you?

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Whatever the Master is doing, it doesn’t include Glint’s body. The reason why I can say this with absolute certainty is the skill challenge, which says:

“The magical energies of the dragon champion Glint still linger around the wreckage of this garden used by her Zephyrite followers to grow their Aspect crystals from her crystalline remains.”

It sounds like they turned Glint’s body into their “Crystal Garden” (per the skill challenge name) and grow Aspect crystals from her remains – perhaps the Quartz too, given the blue coloring of the crystal. Given the skill challenge, though we don’t actually see anything (shame on you Anet, we know you have crystal models that could have been used for appearance!) it seems to indicate that most of Glint’s body is supposed to be at that skill challenge or just simply dismembered.

I don’t think that’s the whole of the body, just part.

TheDaiBish.9735:

What if…the Master of Peace is taking Glint’s offspring to Mordremoth to be corrupted, as Mordremoth as yet to choose it’s champion?

I think he took off with it to hide it, since there clearly was some force out to get to it. Probably to find “the battleground” . . .

I also think, in true GuildWars fashion, we will confront him about it, he will retort it’s not our business . . . we kill him, then find out he wasn’t doing anything evil just in time for it to explode in our faces.

darkace.8925:

crazy.9083:

Has the whiniest voice ever – I hope she gets eaten by a rabid llama.

I agree. Every time I hear her whine I wish I could push her into that well. The foreman, on the other hand, he’s voiced quite well.

You can really hear some of the “this is so not my problem” getting into his attitude when the one miner is complaining about the mine.

Mitch.4781:

I loved this game…but unless I see PROPER DEEP content then yeh..I’m done and I know for a fact I’m not alone.

Now, I don’t mean this with any enmity but . . .

Given “proper deep content” is a personally subjective measurement, I think you might want to skip to the last page and pack up.

It doesn’t seem to be the mark GW2 is aiming for, much like “extravagant rewards” instead of achievements. Heck, GW1 didn’t even have achievements and there was still a lack of interesting things to do outside of UW/DoA and PvP content.

Omar Aschi Popp.7496:

“Kormir”

Yah okay, good one you guys. Next thing you’ll be telling me is that we lost the Guild Wars.

Well, that depends on who “we” in this context was.

If it wasn’t the (haxxor) Flame Legion? Then yes, everyone else lost.

sazberryftw.3809:

And last of all… LLAMAS.

All hail the llama vortex and herald its return . . .

Lord Kuru.3685:

That’s probably there to gate those who have to buy it from the gemstore in the future.

Isn’t it already gated so you need to complete the first story before you can walk through? I may have missed that though.

All in all, after a few hours of kicking around, liked the Zephyrite crystals being used sparingly (they are used sparingly enough), liked the sandstorm mechanic and needing to climb tiers for better rewards to purchase, liked the mining town’s bit of dialogue and such from when I hung around . . . big fan of them deciding to stop the brakes on the lore and drop in enough to raise questions . . . one of which for me was “wasn’t the fight with Glint in the east instead?” but as I never read Edge of Destiny . . .

Not so much a fan of the “Inquest mine rescue” as it seems there’s not quite enough time and getting to the other half is tricky. Not a fan of the devourer queen not showing up on the map when it spawns. Not a fan of the timing-out of crystal skill uses so I have to keep going ahead on the JPs. Not much of a fan of the Geode-based economy (thanks Oba- . . . Kiel).

First night’s impressions? I give it a 6/10. Good start. Will hope I don’t throw a keyboard doing jumping puzzles.

At least someone remembered I was Commander of the Pact.

infantrydivEU.9670:

What happened to doing a cool quest line or killing a difficult boss to get a weapon skin in games?

I’d like more things like that. But on the other hand . . . I recall how many of those I never actually use still in GW1 and are sitting in a corner of my Xunlai Chest probably even now. (Full set of Urgoz’s bows, how about some neat uniques with interesting appearances which I never use . .. and the “awesome” . . . Banana Scythe.)

Of course, maybe with the Wardrobe it’d be less taxing on me but still.

Perhaps they can whip up a single-use Ticket to claim something at the end of LS2? Or include a chance at BL Claim Tickets as part of specific world boss event bonus chest prizes? (Those are once per day per account right?)

Riot Alice huh . . . also it’s interesting, I think we see where supplies are being sent into Brisban from for the bandits there.

Apparently, Lumps of Ambrite (salvaging into Pieces of Ambrite), lockpicks, and Geodes. Known so far.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Presuming that there isn’t just some hidden Nightmare Court faction hiding behind the walls.

Or underground?

Dizzie Mizzie.1069:

I don’t know how anyone else feels about it, but I don’t think paying a fee if you miss living story content is fair!

It was a lot less fair when you missed it and it was gone, never to be seen again. As someone who has waited 10 days on a delivery of replacement RAM so I can play again? Yeah, that’s kind of significant if the other 4 days I had no chance of really sinking my teeth into whatever there was.

(Notably, last time it was “Last Stand at Southsun” which I really had wanted to take part in beyond token efforts.)

Is it also bad to point out this is still better than previous MMOs where if a massive event happened, it usually happened with little to no warning and you had to be on right then to get anything out of it? I mean, assuming you could.

. . . keep trying, prinny, keep trying

Rieselle.5079:

Ok, so ANet took away a lot of MMORPG combat mechanics when going from GW1->GW2. What did they add? The main thing is dodge, and evasion on certain attacks, which adds an action combat element to the game. But they didn’t adopt any other gameplay mechanics from Action Games, some of which are really important. If we ignore the MMORPG and just focused on the action combat with 2 identical players dueling, then we can see that GW2 falls -really- far short of good, dedicated action games. (The extra MMORPG stuff helps make up for the lack, but it only goes so far.)

Anyways, like I said. It all depends on the target audience. I’m gamer who’s used to playing games like fighting games, Devil May Cry, Dark Souls, etc. I like having lots of combat mechanics to think about, tinker with, get better at. I don’t need content – I’m happy with playing the same levels, fighting the same enemies, over and over again. But give me a good combat system and I can do it forever.

Sounds like what I had to say about Monster Hunter. (Seriously, try that if you liked things similar to Devil May Cry and Dark Souls.) Though, while I might find the combat method for that game really something to emulate in GW2 as far as the possibilities . . . everything else can go jump off a cliff. Punishingly tough bosses (hi Golden Rajang) and really laughable drop rates (Heavenly Lao Shan Scale) and the utter cheese of Flash Bombs and Shock Traps . . .

Regardless, that sort of combat is actually more on what I was expecting before BWE2 and my crack at GW2. It’s close, but there’s . . . how do I put this . . . there’s not enough attention required to timing. But that’s mostly okay, since a lot of limitations from MHFU (maximum four players, and often times really hard to get them all into the fight at once) are dropped in GW2, in favor of more open-world play.

(By the by, if they ever make a persistent open world, MMO style Monster Hunter game and it’s not grindy as a peppermill, I’ll be the one camping the ’Los . . . )

Does the combat need fixing in GW2? I don’t know, the basis of it seems fine but the implementation of some aspects don’t move up the difficulty well. Specifically, in open-world it’s still easy just to pile-on a boss and get picked up by other people without dodging. In dungeons, as aforementioned, stacking is massively important to people due to various limitations meant to encourage not spreading out too much . . .

And in WvW, well, it’s all about the arrow carts and ninja captures when the zerg is elsewhere. And stacking.

Zaxares.5419:

And Warmaster Forgal, who has the amazing power to self-res himself from death as soon as no enemies are within aggro range. XD

He’s a warrior, of course he can do that.

Kalavier.1097:

Zaxares.5419:

Ehh, I dunno about that. Rytlock keels over after only a couple of slaps from the ghosts in AC Story. He can’t even handle a few gravelings by himself!

Then again, Logan also got his rump handed to him by Councilor Zamon and I basically had to defeat both enemies by myself. :P

If going by that method, almost all friendly forces/characters are useless idiots who can barely take on a single enemy of similar level :P

Except Tybalt, who strangely is always awesome despite being the most useless secret agent which exists in Tyria.

Frosch.7809:

Kalavier.1097:

Or I understand somebody like Rytlock is not going to be easy to kill unless you are a dragon or a giant.

One does not have to be a dragon or a giant to kill one Charr (unless game mechanics turn him into a Legendary). Rytlock is a big bulky Charr, they always were rather easy to kill.

Technically, anything is easy to kill with five people stacking in a corner . . .

Omar Aschi Popp.7496:

I’m starting to think you sound suspiciously a lot like a Charr-loving sympathizer.

I’m starting to think you’re sounding a lot less like someone who wants to reclaim a homeland and more like someone who wouldn’t be satisfied until all charr were wiped out.

What you pictured happening in your post? Isn’t going to happen. King Adelbern is not a trustworthy ally, the charr have locational advantage in a war trying to invade Ascalon, and Ebonhawke isn’t suited for an offensive campaign.

Short of both asura and norn deciding to support such an effort? It’s not going to happen. Given either race don’t have much of an interest in the proposal? Give it a few generations, then talk about it again.

maha.7902:

What do you want to replace stacking with? Everyone spreading out and ranging?

A question for you folk to chew on, and I don’t have an answer to but . . .

Why does stacking in dungeons exist? What is the benefit of doing it versus not doing it?

nexxe.7081:

Before there was an “ARR”, there was an “NGE” for SWG.

As for GW2, it doesn’t need to go to that extreme. It just needs an overhaul to some mechanics.

Wasn’t “ARR” basically viewed as a positive re-work while “NGE” was viewed as overwhelmingly negative?

Personally, I go back and I recall the Trammel/Feluccia split

Kalavier.1097:

Oh right, the whole thing of “Hey, here is the person causing trouble. Let’s throw them in jail/kill them now.”

I do remember the kittening Braham got from players cause he wanted to Kill Scarlet instead of letting her monologue and do who knows what.

The funny thing is, if it had been my choice? I’d have killed her too at that point. D-shot to the face, no thank you Scarlet, just die and stop trying to get extra time to escape or do something.

Even more amusing, to me, is how many people wanted her dead and how many people really didn’t care about anything other than just getting her out of the picture. Hey, what do you know, we got that. Enter the lovely crop of people who want to hold it against Braham since he was the one character there who would be the one to go “. . . no monologuing”.

It’s an averted trope situation which the writing sorely needs now and again to prevent being too simple.

Kalavier.1097:

I fail to see how Braham or Logan aren’t believable. and I like both of them just fine. I also respect Logan. Braham as well, but they both have their own traits.

They’re not believable because, basically, people can’t accept simple and direct folk as existing. Both Logan and Braham have simple answers to issues – hit it til it stops. Use whatever you can to get it done. They’re both Guardians by profession, and their focus is towards acting second rather than first in an engagement.

Here’s where a lot of people get hung up – the unbelievable parts from what I hear most: Logan Thackeray is not of noble blood but apparently is trying to hook up with the Queen. Braham is supposedly of great lineage but is unable to really shine.

(Which suggests people keep forgetting the cultural barriers involved – Logan can’t actually really be seen wooing the Queen without tarnishing them both, and Braham can’t rely on his mother’s reputation without drawing doubts on his own potential.)

Secondly, its that Logan doesn’t do anything ‘wrong’. Which is in itself incorrect, as he’s a hothead with the aforementioned “cut directly to the problem” approach. Which causes the Queen so much trouble she says “maybe you should take a break, you know, and not hover menacingly and give Caudecus more to work with?”

Then there’s how Braham never seems to do anything good . . . which then is also off base because he was in the Molten Weapons Facility. He just can’t claim sole credit for that. What can be claimed is how he has never backed from a fight without good reason, and he has always attempted to do something selfless.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

I’m pleased to see such a well reasoned and fact-driven theory put forward. Clearly Evon Gnashblade would never have let this happen to the Zephyrites.

If only because it might, somehow, come back to have eyes on him.

And we all know he doesn’t want that until he finishes the shakedown for Black Lion Keys this season.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

I watch Game of Thrones because I like characters that shift between good and evil. I like characters that are gray. This is why characters such as Logan Thackeray bore me to no end; they are unable to make any mistakes, because the writers do not want them to. We’re told that Logan once made a mistake in the past, and now he’s redeeming himself. Whoopteedoo, how about an actual mistake now? How about we see him do something that contradicts his usual character? Let a character that is normally noble, do something not so noble. And let a character that is usually the villain, show a more human side of his personality.

We’re watching the same Logan, right, because I’ve apparently been seeing him make mistakes a lot. Notably connected to the emotional troubles he has with Rytlock. He’s also made incredible mistakes concerning trying to protect Queen Jennah with a blunt personality instead of a deft hand when politics comes into play. (See: Minister Caudecus)

I don’t need him to do something not-noble to make him less perfect for me. What I need is a reason to actually root for him other than his ancestor being one of my favorite character development pieces ANet has done.

I want him to stand up and realize his job of protecting the Queen doesn’t mean it has to be him, personally, who is the reason she is safe. I want him to grow up enough to not snap at Countess Anise for doing her job, because he thinks it makes him look bad. (No, Logan, stomping on people who are supposed to be your allies makes you look bad.)

But you know what I want more? I want them to flesh out the ‘new generation’ of B-Iconics so we can get more out of some of them. Luckily, I am expecting that to come through.

(I also want to hear the casting of Peter Dinklage as Miles Vorkosigan, but one miracle at a time.)

sorudo.9054:

most watch GoT for the sex and kills, every time someone tries to pull me to GoT it’s ether because you see naked ppl or because there is some gore in it, not even close about what the store is about.

I’d go into this but, really, it’s the same as trying to talk to people who want to tell me “Babylon 5” is a knock off of “Deep Space 9”. (I’ll need to see more B5 to be sure, but I can almost safely say they’re different shows; one with a better arc concept, one with some darn fine acting trying to break through stifling season one scripts.)

Though I will say, I have five people who sit together in my house and watch the television when Game of Thrones is on. Only one of them is less interested in the show and more in the blood/bewbs and he shows up because he gets free beer out of it anyway. (His spot is taken up by someone I actually try to synch watching up with in California so I am watching the episode when he does and have him on IM chat. He does not watch for the blood and gore.)

Your experience may vary, but despite the outright unpleasantness of the Red Wedding, the reactions it evokes suggest it’s not just the gore which did that. It’s people having cared about the characters and gotten attached. It’d be akin to ANet having the stones to kill off Marjory instead of “just knocked out and Rox got her back to consciousness”.

SG1 has a good story line, plenty of variation and just overall awesomeness without the need of nakedness or blood everywhere.

You seem stuck on “naked and blood” when SG-1 had its own form okittenward plots going through it. (Shall we count how often that black-ops organization showed up just to prevent things from going smoothly? I forget the name of it, it’s been way too long.) The biggest charm of SG-1 was the self-awareness oozing through the script.

and yes, i have “tried” to watch it with an open mind, it just didn’t even try to pull me in.
just some sex scenes, shouting at each other, gossiping everywhere but a good script is nowhere to be found….

Really? Nowhere? Most of Peter Dinklage’s scenes in Season Two come to mind. So does Maise Williams’ scenes later on, notably the one opposite Charles Dance. (Not in the books, so they can’t take credit for that one.)

If it sounds like I’m hard-pressed to find a “good script moment” it’s not because they’re lacking. It’s because I’ve read the first three books, and I’ve made sure to watch the episodes at least twice each. (Well . . . except one.) I rather like the world and the efforts to make it feel real rather than just a fantasy epic.

Giving credit where it’s due, SG-1 had that feeling as well. Atlantis was harder for me to get into, probably because I was more attached to the “other side”.

But in all seriousness, it’s rather hard to compare the two franchises – Stargate was lighter-hearted and it did not take it self too seriously. Game of Thrones does neither of those things. One is a semi-realistic modern take on the “classic science fiction formula”, and owes a lot to an almost-forgettable summer blockbuster leaving some holes a couple writers could exploit. The other is a fantasy epic (not a quality judgement, in the literary term) which draws a lot of inspiration from history and other fantasy writers’ works, and is adapted for TV.

. . . not to mention there are only 40 episodes of Game of Thrones and more than five times as many episodes of Stargate SG-1. The best episodes of SG-1 (in my opinion, “Window of Opportunity”) also have two clunker fillers to go with them. Game of Thrones doesn’t have filler, due to having a tighter “time budget” on how much they work with in a season.

Nerelith.7360:

The thing is, a lot that many players considered broken, weren’t..they were just what you could do with the tools provided, that the devs left alone, because they agreed … 55 monks.

I counter with “Perma SF”, which was more what I was thinking of. 55 Monks could be beaten if you knew what you were dealing with and had a means of stripping enchantments

Ask anyone else, they would say " that was Broken, and the devs couldn’t Un-break it." but for many it was Just doing what the tools allowed.

The game was fun, and fine. As for " many ways to play it bad." yes… you are right. The alternative is.. a game with mediocre skills.

It’s fun, it’s fine, but it’s also pretty flawed in the skill department due to the massive pool of interactions.

I mean, I go back to MTG for this, but there are tons of broken decks in that game which are possible to beat if you have the counter-decks in hand or they are unlucky. That doesn’t make them less broken or less a problem to consider. It’s why there was the split for a tournament scene where they decided to limit the pool of available cards to the last two blocks and the most recent core set.

And to come back to the topic we are discussing? GW1 made the Codex Arena. People I knew who liked the PvP hated the Codex Arena, because it was “not for true PvP”.

Nerelith.7360:

They did a good job with Guild Wars, although I really think this is a different Anet from the Anet that produced Guild Wars, maybe this Anet may not be up to the task? I mean they cannot balance the limited set of skills they have now.

They did only a passable job of balancing the skills before, also. It worked, but there was always grumbling about how the balancing was done badly.

Eh, on the topic of the skill system of GW1 . . . it was really good but really broken at the same time. It had the complexity and flexibility to offer a lot of options in how to build a character . . .

. . . and there it ran into two problems. There was way more ways to set up your skills/attributes which was “wrong” than there was “right”. Much like there is a “wrong” way to play a class in GW2. There was so much in the way of possible ways to set up your character it was really difficult to figure out what to work with . . . without really having to spend time diving into build theory. (Or downloading a build and doing what it said to do with it…)

Secondly? People figured out how to break the game with the skill system, necessitating frequent balance patches to try to un-break it.

Both these things are a problem with my favorite other example of “constant content release” – MTG. Seriously. They have so much complexity if you decide to include any and all card sets (save two) that you’re looking at tens of thousands of unique cards. And they put out a constant stream of “content” in the expansions which I think are on a schedule of every other month . . . AND a revision of the core set every year which shakes up the state of the metagame each time.

I still have fun playing it but by any and all gods you could name, I would never try to take it seriously enough to go pro.

Kalavier.1097:

. A man who literally on the day the Ebon Vanguard left to go south, had dozens of families pack up and leave, and only two options were given for it. “Pride of the unit” or “Fear of the king” and it’s implied to purely be the latter.

Oh come on, Kalavier, we’ve been on this before. I believe Nicholas would have to chime in: “That lore doesn’t count because reasons.”

A: Adelbern would see humans, not Ascalonians. I doubt he could just look at you are be able to figure it out.

Or believe whatever you had to say about it.

B: Implies he reforms and is at all reasonable given his sword is now gone and there is a priory camp inside the catacombs. Note he openly attacked the two Ascalonian’s in “Ghosts of Ascalon” and in order to Reach him (or draw him out), they’d basically have to slaughter their way through the ghosts.

Exhibit A for why he would probably not believe you loyal sons/daughters of Ascalon.

YES, because it’d be so easy to murder Rytlock Brimstone, TRIBUNE of the blood legion, member of the Edge of Destiny, wielder of an ancient blade which is one of few that can actually cut dragon scales…

I could see it being done, there are many ways to make it happen from “accident” to “round up a few dozen people and tell them he drops guaranteed precursors”.

. . . but the chances are slim you’d actually survive the attempt and get out with Sohothin and your hide intact.

It’s a what if situation. What’s wrong in actually talking about the details of the what if and having an intelligent discussion about it?

Well, it’s wrong to actually discuss it and disagree with details rather than just stand up and say “yes” or “no”. I mean, what kind of people actually consider things both IC and OOC for why something would or would not work out?

Omar Aschi Popp.7496:

Tobias, your entire reasoning is based on the massive assumption that I didn’t fully support with Adelbern to begin with, from day 1.

Oh? No, that’s not the assumption. The assumption is that my character is in some way descended from the guy who got kicked out of Ascalon with Prince Rurik, and therefore has some stake in remembering the old histories.

Heck, the only thing I assumed about you was that you weren’t aware Adelbern went coocoo for Quaggan Puffs some time close after the Searing.

Get off your moral trip and humor me for one minute

Firstly, King Adelbern isn’t my ancestral king since he threw Tobias Trueflight (first of his name) into the wilderness for supporting Prince Rurik. That makes my liege Rurik instead. Alas, he sort of caught a case of the death.

As for the concept of asking him that? Hm . . . no. I don’t think it would work. Frankly, I expect he’d see it as a transparent trick to weaken him or his forces and kick you out.

From there all you have to do is unify and rally Ebonhawke, which would be EASY since at least half the population are Seperatists!! The ghosts of Ascalon, which at the very least almost number 2/3rds of the Charr. Krytan Ex-Pats under your own leadership(Because Logan is a weak piece of kitten who kittens to that slag Jennah and doesn’t think for himself or the people who bore him). Then you have all the Champions of Old Ascalon! Oh the glory!

Relies on too many variables to actually happen. Firstly it relies on rallying a populace to war which may not be suited for field combat. (They’ve been fighting on a defensive front, not on offense.) Then it also relies on the charr not being agile enough with their forces to turn around and drop a defense line. Finally, it really relies on the Separatists actually being willing to submit to a leader who is not known to them.

And hell, murder Rytlock, it would be so easy!

If it was so easy, it’d be done already.

With Ruricks sword in hand AND Ascalon blood, you are legitimized to lead the living detachment of the combined army, after all that’s how Adelbern became king.

Here I thought you hadn’t known that detail. But I’m also fairly sure Adelbern remembers that too, and that’s why he wouldn’t let someone else get close to that potential outcome.

Also kittening MAGIC guys, Magic! The foefire, the Searing, all that kitten was magic. Implying you actually need manpower to destroy your enemies.

The Searing’s most important magical effect was breaking the Great Northern Wall, and permitting all that “manpower” of charr warbands to break through en masse rather than sneaking in a little at a time through the catacomb caverns.

Also, there’s another few little details which you lost track of – the charr have armored vehicles. The charr also have the current Tyrian equivalent of ‘greek fire’. Magic is less a force to be reckoned with when it is still wielded by very . . . very vulnerable flesh.

Also the whole question of this thread is “Would you fight to reclaim Ascalon?”

Not “would you fight in a sure-thing winnable land war that you can plan meticulously on this thread and never have to worry about the possibility of utter annihilation?”

But I guess the OP was vague about who you’d be fighting for to “reclaim” Ascalon.

As a commander in the Pact, I’d fight to reclaim it for Tyrians from Kralkatorrik’s Dragonbrand.

As a descendant of Ascalon, I’d fight for it to remain safe for humans to live there, in whatever arrangement is given.

As a ranger, I’d probably leave the fighting to the warrior and guardian zerg.

Omar Aschi Popp.7496:

Firs of all, Kalavier & Co, you aren’t really hearing me; When I said humans, I really meant Ascalonians, and said as much when I wrote that only Ascalons have the right to raise an army to reclaim Ascalon.

So, Krytans have no right to reclaim Ascalon because they were born in a place not ruled by the charr this last generation or so? I mean, those in the Ascalon Settlement who have been living in Kryta aren’t welcome either?

Totally legit.

All you people talking about ghosts aren’t listening; If ASCALONIANS made amends with Adelbern, who clearly is able to have a conversation, the ghosts would not be a problem.

I am not so sure. Adelbern was able to hold a conversation even way back before Nightfall happened. He was still just as unreasonable, so I don’t know what you’d expect.

I would fully expect there to be no reasoning with him by anyone, even if somehow we got the spirit of Rurik to return somehow and talk to him the conversation would descend into “this is why I banished you in the first place”.

Do I have to spell it out? No Charr, no Krytans, no anything not from Ascalon! I believe the spirits will rest, or at the very least be amicable if Ascalon is under Ascalonian control.

It’s good to believe something like that. On the other hand, I want to point out there are no reasons to believe it and every reason to believe the Foefire ghosts will continue to (attempt to) chase out everyone and anyone.

Because funfact; Krytans are the enemy! Last time I checked, Adelbern was the last sovereign Ruler of Ascalon, and his standing policy with Kryta never went away, so as an Ascalonian citizen, you have to respect that. It doesn’t matter if he murdered Evennia himself or not, it’s his bloody prerogative! Why is it okay for Shining Blade assassins to murder people but not okay for a legitimate Ruling sovereign power?

A few things. First, it’s not said where the last round of Guild Wars started except that Orr, Kryta, and Ascalon were all fighting each other through the guilds. Adelbern was leader of one of the guilds, so it’s likely he may have been the aggressor and not the victim. Of course, we don’t know but we do know he was happy to keep the Guild Wars rolling right up until the Searing happened.

Secondly, if I’m not an Ascalonian citizen (I checked my passport) I don’t have to respect anything. And considering if we’re talking about my character . . . he exiled my ancestor along with a whole bunch of people. We’re probably considered descended from traitors to the crown. Same with those in Ebonhawke, who were sent away for being too popular with the people (which is how Adelbern became king).

Third, I don’t say he murdered Evennia or had her killed. (Much as I kid, there’s just no proof of it. I’d say the White Mantle Ambassador had it done before thinking Adelbern would bother himself with it.) And even if so, it’s less it being his privilege/right and more about murdering someone who was operating under a flag of truce. There are rules about that kind of thing, and you don’t shoot someone who came to discuss terms of peace because they happen to be from the other side.

Lastly. The Shining Blade was a known, and avowed terrorist organization before it became legitimized as the bodyguard of the Krytan royal line. (If you want to split hairs over “freedom fighter vs terrorist”, get your own topic please.) A legitimate ruling power doesn’t do assassinations. They do executions. In various lovely ways!

Get off you high horses people.

There aren’t any horses and centaurs won’t let me ride after that incident with the ice cream.

And to say it again – I’d welcome taking back Orr more than Ascalon. It’s a holy land, where the Six Gods first entered Tyria and also lived for a time. It’s meant to be in human hands once more, restored to even a fraction of its former glory. And all you would need to do is tell the Pact to restrict their presence to Fort Trinity until they could acquire or build their own independent facility elsewhere.

. . . and deal with the leftover Risen, but that’s easier than killing off Foefire ghosts. At least Risen don’t reform endlessly.

sorudo.9054:

stargate SG1/Atlantis are true high quality TV series, GoT is a sidewalk compare to that.
then again, older series are generally better then the crap they make these days.

I like SG1 and Atlantis. I really did try my best to catch 90% of it but was hampered by it being hard to do around a night work schedule. I really liked the leads and the chemistry between the main characters, and they handled some worldbuilding really well.

But . . . I’m sorry to say, GoT is better at making character attachments in the audience and invoking an invested reaction. You need look no further than how the Red Wedding or other events got reactions out of the viewers which were emotional, visceral, and not “oh, they’ll be brought back”.

Meanwhile, SG-1/Atlantis didn’t hit that note for me. I rarely felt there was a sense of danger going into situations because they wouldn’t do that to the show.

It’s similar to how when you stop and think about it you know Riker isn’t going to take that promotion and leave the Enterprise, or Data will wind up being handed off to be dismantled for study and replication, and you know Voyager will always, always get stuck for another week out in the space-sticks when there seems to be a way home. (Doubly true for Season One.)

I have a show in one hand where you’re never quite sure whether a character is safe simply because “rule of TV casting” says they aren’t going . . . and in the other, one where it has to strive to make me suspend disbelief there’s a real danger to the main characters.

That’s not the sole useful measurement stick I use, mind you. I found other “good TV” where it was known there was a status-quo which would eventually return down the line. On the other hand, two of those shows I like to watch shake it up and shift the balance quite often (Grimm and Person of Interest) so it’s always an actual treat to see how things change while they do remain mostly the same from week to week.

Bottom line? Great writing, no matter the medium, does have to make me:

- Suspend my disbelief. “You will believe a man can fly!” . . . and not have it be blatantly obvious wirework or CGI. I know it has to be one or the other (usually – see the Inception hallway fight for an exception). But don’t show me the wires or harnesses.

- Get me to care about the characters. Tough to do, but if you can get me to care about the characters we’re partway to the first one from above. Note, I don’t have to like all the characters, I just need to care about their fates.

- Have your plot make some kind of sense to where I don’t feel I’m expected to spend too much time guessing about things. If at the end of an episode, I don’t know anything more about the characters’ overall arcs or what I just saw? I’m not going to care about the show. (See: Season 3 of Lost.)

Celestina.2894:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Obsidian.1328:

Also, there’s zero evidence that he murdered that ambassador, nor(before someone says it) Evennia either.

Of course not, at the time of when Adelbern called down the flame, Evennia was currently alive and well and sipping fruit-flavored drinks with little umbrellas in them with Jurah somewhere on a beach in Istan.

Yeaaah I’m with Tobias here, given our knowledge of Adelbern’s increasingly addled brain combined with the lack of Rurik to stop him, I think it’s very likely he at least did something with Evennia.

Did . . . something? Or did nothing?

These are the hard-hitting questions for which ANet has no answers. What’s there to hide? Huh? What’s there to hide?

Obsidian.1328:

Also, there’s zero evidence that he murdered that ambassador, nor(before someone says it) Evennia either.

Of course not, at the time of when Adelbern called down the flame, Evennia was currently alive and well and sipping fruit-flavored drinks with little umbrellas in them with Jurah somewhere on a beach in Istan.

Chrispy.5641:

1. Key word from my post being ‘either’. I’m pretty sure that means I already acknowledged that Penguin wasn’t painting the truth any better.

I’m pretty sure that was also my fifth time trying to post that without getting an error and having to retype the whole thing. Sorry about missing it.

2. Who ever said the destruction of Lion’s Arch was a tragedy? A city of ‘ex’ pirates getting wiped out? Scarlet did us a favor!

That’s one way to look at it. I prefer to look at the deaths of those who were there as the tragedy, but then I’m odd like that.

3. I don’t care if it was Evon’s, Kiel’s, Canach’s, or even the Skritt King’s fault. All I’m saying from that is that the explosions either occurred internally, or the trailer didn’t tell us everything because it was put together too quickly.

The last thing is probably more true not because it was slapped together on a lunch break but because its cuts are rather frantic so it’s hard to say exactly what happened. It’s like getting five slices of a few seconds out of a movie and having to figure out the context without anything other than press releases.

Actually it’s exactly like that.

Anyway, you’re not really the target of the little sarcasm which bled in. You’ve at least been more objective about this. It’s the people who would cheerfully use it for cases against either Kiel or Evon, when we don’t know anything about how or who or lots of other details.

We know explosions, and a crashed sanctum.

We could always just say “Michael Bay did it to pay back for the sass about his movie style” and call it a night.

Chrispy.5641:

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

pretty much /thread right there

How’s it the end of the thread? All the ‘lore master’ did was regurgitate stuff that Kiel supporters have been saying for months now. Stuff that isn’t exactly painting the truth either.

Neither was Penguin, but that’s beside the point.

I want to see evidence that Evon was not warning Lion’s Arch for months on end of another attack, even before Kiel got her so called evidence.

I want to see evidence he actually did anything more proactive than playing doomspeaker and nursing resentment. Until then, he’s as useless as Kiel was in preventing the tragedy.

I also want to see supporting evidence that the explosions in the trailer weren’t from the inside. I doubt that Anet got so excited for that trailer that they forgot to add rocket trails behind the invisible missiles just so we would spend a week speculating in the wrong direction.

And if they were from the inside, this makes it Kiel’s fault . . . how? Or Evon’s fault for that matter.

I blame Scarlet. Why? Easy. Because she’s dead and can’t defend herself. Nyeh.

Nerelith.7360:

Why do I feel this is 2 years of paid Beta?

I still get that feeling off some other games I really enjoy (Minecraft, Terraria) . . . but I keep coming back because they’re fun and I enjoy playing them.

I keep coming back to GW2 because I enjoy playing it, and taking my own pace at it. (Hardware and free time permitting.)

I could care less about the state of a game . . . so long as it’s fun to play. I find it more interesting finished games (from bigger companies than ANet or bigger publishers than NCsoft) exist which could have used more polish and patching before being released into the wild.

The end of the day discussing whether I still play a game comes down to two questions:

- Do I have the time to invest in a meaningful slice of play? (For some games, even less than an hour is worthwhile. For others, best to set aside a block of more or a couple on a day/evening off.)

- Is it still fun? (When I play, am I lamenting more about not getting enough done before I quit, or do I stop and go “okay, that’s good for today”? Do I enjoy the game, or is it more of a series of chores to get done? Do I have to sit somewhere and wait for something to happen I can go take part in?)

So far, the first is more a barrier for GW2 than the second. But then, I’m weird enough to find it fun to go chasing things for the Wardrobe or to just go do events I find entertaining, or hop in WvW and either join some effort to take/defend stuff or just screw around at camps.

Your mileage may vary with how you like GW2. And that’s perfectly fine. At the end of the day, if you’re not having fun? I will, without any malice or anger, just say it: “Maybe you should try a different game.”

Horst Hortensie.5420:

So, what drove the engineer mad?

She saw the script for next season on Game of Thrones and realized “oh no way can we compete with that, they got the episode titled ‘The Viper and the Mountain’ and we got silly hairstyles and Taimi”.

Nerelith.7360:

That is My point, we CAN do better. But just to correct you. All my profits on that other game come from sale to players, not sale to merchants.

Then I don’t know what to tell you other than the obvious: players in GW2 would rather throw their gold on other things, like rare exotic skins or materials to build their Legendary rather than other things.

All I can say is what my eyes see, my ears hear, and I experience.

In my experience, crafting has always been a lost cause to devote time to in most MMOs. Even in Ultima Online where it could get you neat things, more often than not it was easier to go make tons of money and throw it at people who already had done the work.

It’s barely been useful to add to single-player games unless the game was made to revolve around it (Monster Hunter) or had unique rewards which you only got through crafting (things by Square-Enix). The only notable exception I recall is Morrowind – where you could abuse the heck out of alchemy and beat the game in under . . . I think last I read was under thirty minutes without tool assistance.

It should be an unwritten rule – if crafting isn’t going to be an integral part to your game? Leave it out.

if you are correct that John Smith said that the Crafting system would Not generate profit, I wish i had known that before I reached max level on my Mesmer Tailor.

It’s not supposed to generate profit to NPCs. It doesn’t generate profit to players because . . . as mentioned, they’re just too miserly since they think gold is too hard to come by. (It’s really not as much hard as mildly tedious in ways, or requiring tightening the luxury spending.)

I don’t understand, this doesn’t seem to me to be a smart move. Why include crafting in the first place?

“Because it’s supposed to be in there” I suppose? Kind of like dungeons are supposed to be this particular way, there’s always supposed to be defined roles in a party, and rangers will always stink like dead quaggan.

Is it worth repeating, yet again, they had one of their employees (wasn’t it John Smith) confirm they did not want crafting to yield profit when concerning sale to NPCs. The profit is supposed to occur when other players get involved . . . but it doesn’t, because nobody pays for it. I’m guessing more would rather farm for it, and sell the by-products of farming.

Honestly, if more people bought 20 Slot bags for a bigger margin over the TP, I’d make them for sale. But they don’t. They don’t even pay for crafted rares/exotics usually. It’s usually better to craft a rare, then break it down into its components with a Master Salvage Kit for Ecto (after a certain threshold of equipment level) and sell that than it is to sell the item.

The strange thing is, this isn’t unique to this game. It happened in UO too – high-power magical equipment was generally easier to acquire off dead things. Either the original drop off greater monsters, or off some unlucky person who you hit with “An Ex Por” (Paralyze) followed by a pair of “Corp Por” (Energy Bolts) when you weren’t paying attention. (This would usually catch anyone who was being sloppy, which was 80% of the general public.)

And again, crafting in EQ was such a pointless and boring gold-sink . . . way more than in GW2 . . . they had to put shinies from quests to entice people to do it. (Heck, there was a period I think it was possible to fail combinations and lose your materials, when said materials might represent a considerable amount of money.)

On the one hand, thank god we’re past that . . . on the other hand, we can do better . . . right?

It was tar. See . . . ? It was all over the place where water used to be due to, I’m guessing, all the ash runoff over time and the intense heat from the Searing.

ANet hasn’t said one way or another if there’s an expansion coming other than repeating “not soon”.

Zaxares.5419:

Wanderer.3248:

I expect trolls.

Cave, jungle or forum?

“Yes”.

darkace.8925:

Celestina.2894:

darkace.8925:

- DE 2.0 sucking all of the air out of the room
– “Collect 150 drill fragments from the rubble in Lion’s Arch” achievement
– a whole lot of bugs
– “new items in the cash shop!”.

^Lots of posts like this no matter what

I tell you what, if you can find anything in the track record ArenaNet has established for themselves that shows my expectations to be unreasonable I’ll sincerely apologize for upsetting your sensibilities.

Are we talking GW1 or GW2? Though GW1 had its history of totally disappointing on “huge” updates. (Sorrow’s Furnace.)

Zypher.7609:

With the new megaserver you will not come across a zone that does not have activity. So does not really matter what the numbers are.

I can almost guarantee you’ll find zones practically deserted . . . I think Timberline Falls is one place which can be expected to have minimal player presence. Almost would add Straits of Destruction there too.

No one needs to tell me that stories don’t always have happy endings. I’m always the first do defend sad endings. But what we have with the first season of the LS isn’t a case of a sad twisted tale.

No, it’s not a sad ending, it’s a somewhat realistic ending for what we were up against. Bearing in mind, this isn’t the first time ANet has pulled this either. (For instance, what happened when we foiled Shiro’s presence in the Sunjiang District? How about defeating Varesh Ossa in the Ruins of Morah?)

Instead it’s a comedy of errors, where the people who are supposed to be heroes and protectors can’t get their act together enough to do anything meaningful until it’s too late.

And that’s where you’re mistaken. The people who were supposed to be heroes were doing their best to stop the primary threats being let loose and keep the damage to a minimum with regards to things like the invasion events and the Tower of Nightmares. They got their act together, the problem was . . . Scarlet didn’t care about whether those succeeded or failed. She wasn’t after their success, she was after the information she could gather.

I am not asking for unicorns and rainbows. I’m asking for my character’s presence to matter.

Individually matter? That’s . . . exceedingly unlikely. This is not the same as GW1 where your character was the driving force to move events along. Events are going to go along whether you’re there or not.

Matter in the form of “the adventurers of Tyria”? More likely, but difficult to work with because I don’t think there’s going to be much. Considering the players, I doubt we’ll have any real chance of things failing outright or having a “best possible outcome” fly by. About the only thing we could probably expect to see is a ‘vote’ type thing where we may be able to shift the path of the story into who lives or who dies.

(Which would mean another round of Kiel vs Gnashblade type crap.)

2/2

StarbornStriker.6493:

My point here is that the developers profess to want to create a living world; meaning a world in which player actions have impact. In order to do that, there does need to be at least the illusion of choice or impact based on what the players do. Does that require creative thinking and planning? Absolutely. And that’s exactly what this game needs more of. If this game actually wants to do something new and innovative at some point, there needs to be a lot more thinking outside the box.

I wouldn’t put it that way. I say “thinking outside the box” is a buzz-phrase which needs to die. Because there’s always some box which you’ll be thinking inside of, that’s just how it works.

Also, the “living world” was not meant entirely to be “players shape the world” so much as “players take part in a world which lives and goes on its own direction without player input”. Sort of how DEs were supposed to be a part of that “living world” feel – if no players are around, the centaurs are still going to assault Beetletun or the Ascalon Settlement. They don’t wait for players to come around before attacking, or wait for someone to start the quest signal.

They do need to do better with player agency, though that’s a problem across the board with games.

I am not asking that Arena Net create two different versions of every outcome, actually, because it’s probably a safe assumption that the players will always do enough content in the game to achieve the set goal unless it’s a ridiculously impossible number.

Not to mention there’s a logistics problem of planning out in advance if you don’t know the ending or details of how one Chapter would end. It becomes a maze of potential branches and it drives one crazy.

But if we had more creative planning, like I said above, we could at least have the illusion that our actions had impact. Conversely, it would be nice if there were some battles we did win as well as some that we lost, instead of a long string of failures leading up to a shallow victory.

I wouldn’t term the LS1 as “a long string of failures”. We had successes almost for a whole long stretch . . . just not total, overwhelming success. The feeling I got as we hit the last third of the story was “Scarlet’s goal is not simply to do X and hope it sticks, she’s in pursuit of particular pieces which she wants for later use.” Which happened to be the Battle of Lion’s Arch, where just about everything she did is shown to have had a goal beyond merely “winning”.

The Molten Alliance having its weapons development set back so fully was secondary to developing the basic sonic weaponry technology in the first place. The Toxic Alliance’s Tower was secondary to developing the spores into the miasma. The Aetherblades were secondary to getting a framework for quick-striking forces being able to hit fast and with minimal warning. The Clockwork minions were shock troops which could be deployed and recalibrated easily into myriad forms and designs.

None of the smaller parts needed to win outright, because that wasn’t the complete goal. The complete goal was to have the Breachmaker disrupt the ley lines under Lion’s Arch, and having a means to hold the city long enough to do that. Scarlet got exactly enough time to do that (thanks to dramatic license) but not much more.

The heroes did win, almost every encounter. The problem was more how the battles’ outcomes were less meaningful than the information.

1/2

ipan.4356:

GW2 is an incredible piece of art.

As a game I found it to be a total failure.

I’ve found it both a qualified failure and qualified success.

It’s really good at a few things, and can’t really scratch some itches I have with games in general.

Luckily, there’s always Terraria, Minecraft, and Steam Summer Sales.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

And no more villains monologueing, be it before they vanish, or in the form of a hologram. I hate that. Only bad villains spew monologues.

Careful with that universal assertion . . . that is the safest way to monologue, after all. So if you’re going to do it, best to do it in a way you’re not leaving yourself completely open.

(Note: There are villains who monologue who are not terrible villains. But in the end, it is a convention of storytelling which is well-known and can either be accepted or mocked. Back to BG? Jon Irenicus mocks it, continuously.)