Heh.
Also, I just realized that you don't have to win an invasion event for it to count for the Vorpp quest, at least based on the achievements. Although I'm feeling down anyway because my current score is 2-2.
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Guild Wars 2 |OT3| Two Week Updates, One Box, Zero Subscriptions
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Heh.
Also, I just realized that you don't have to win an invasion event for it to count for the Vorpp quest, at least based on the achievements. Although I'm feeling down anyway because my current score is 2-2.
Kos Luftar
Member
Yeah I got the achievement completed with 3 wins and 2 fails.
If you take away the caveat "for an MMO story" then it's just generally poorly written with mostly poor characterization. It is engaging me more than the personal story or other MMO ongoing plotlines, but of course that's not saying much. The odd thing is the secrecy of the update definitely lent itself to a revelation in terms of lore that advanced the plot, but there was nothing like that so far at least. I guess I keep coming back to how basic it is being a negative because I have all these questions, and we want a lot of dots connected to the game world. But to the layman the surface value is likely good enough (some lunatic attacks the queen and attempts large-scale invasion of Tyia; basically easy to understand if you aren't paying attention). So far it remains disappointing from a perspective of telling a compelling story for itself. I add my caveat back and I can shrug at it as something personally disappointing but also not that big a deal. As much as I, or Woodenpotatoes, might really want something compelling to embrace in terms of lore for its own sake, the more important concern for an MMO is whether or not it succeeds as a game.
It turned out this update was surprising mainly in how it impacted the game mechanically. If you don't enjoy the invasions I understand... not every aspect of gameplay added will appeal to everyone and none of the gameplay additions to this game ever have. But at the same time for those who do, they are a pretty good reminder of why Guild Wars numero two is a good videogame, which is what it's supposed to be. They are fun, large-scale, fast-paced, take place all over, and have great rewards. They accomplish the unconscionable task of creating an actual challenge to be completely cooperatively by literally hundreds of people of every skill level, forcing a server (or ragtag overflow) to work together for success, and they are wholly failable without some coordination or awareness. Sitting in the middle of a massive ball of players is an option for newer or unskilled ones, and a good source of loot and leveling, but will not win the day or even contribute effectively since the scaling will slow individual events down and it's a time attack. Groups of any size can contribute (similar in principle to WvW) and it can be downright exciting when you're cutting it close with just a couple of minutes left and one of the bars requiring a couple key events taken down in time. Meanwhile the rewards during the events and even for failure make the attempts worthwhile. The overflow issue should improve with time (my general annoyance doesn't have anything to do with being in an overflow- I don't really care; it's having your party split into different ones when just placing all of them in the most empty shard would be fine) and generally it's just a great addition to the list of stuff you can do when you log in.
If you're sick of them already they can also be safely avoided and ignored. Unless you're "unlucky" enough to happen to be doing something in the invaded zone there's no reason for them to affect your life. The "gating" of getting access back to the Pavilion behind them sounds like a legitimate complaint in this regard but as usual there's a simple course of action to cheese your way around it; all you have to do is complete the brief Scarlet's Playhouse instance which means going in with someone who can access it, and you can be carried through the instance itself.
It turned out this update was surprising mainly in how it impacted the game mechanically. If you don't enjoy the invasions I understand... not every aspect of gameplay added will appeal to everyone and none of the gameplay additions to this game ever have. But at the same time for those who do, they are a pretty good reminder of why Guild Wars numero two is a good videogame, which is what it's supposed to be. They are fun, large-scale, fast-paced, take place all over, and have great rewards. They accomplish the unconscionable task of creating an actual challenge to be completely cooperatively by literally hundreds of people of every skill level, forcing a server (or ragtag overflow) to work together for success, and they are wholly failable without some coordination or awareness. Sitting in the middle of a massive ball of players is an option for newer or unskilled ones, and a good source of loot and leveling, but will not win the day or even contribute effectively since the scaling will slow individual events down and it's a time attack. Groups of any size can contribute (similar in principle to WvW) and it can be downright exciting when you're cutting it close with just a couple of minutes left and one of the bars requiring a couple key events taken down in time. Meanwhile the rewards during the events and even for failure make the attempts worthwhile. The overflow issue should improve with time (my general annoyance doesn't have anything to do with being in an overflow- I don't really care; it's having your party split into different ones when just placing all of them in the most empty shard would be fine) and generally it's just a great addition to the list of stuff you can do when you log in.
If you're sick of them already they can also be safely avoided and ignored. Unless you're "unlucky" enough to happen to be doing something in the invaded zone there's no reason for them to affect your life. The "gating" of getting access back to the Pavilion behind them sounds like a legitimate complaint in this regard but as usual there's a simple course of action to cheese your way around it; all you have to do is complete the brief Scarlet's Playhouse instance which means going in with someone who can access it, and you can be carried through the instance itself.
That's correct. It's just being present for a full one, win or lose, that advances it.
Kos Luftar
Member
Anyone know if once you do all17 events, does the meta event on the top right corner disappear?
It would be interesting if there is some kinda of quota we are filling in the background where once we reach it something new starts happening, maybe she gets angrier maybe we attack her headquarters.
I doubt it though especially since next update seems to be about SAB which means this invasion will probably be forgotten till the current living story team releases something.
From a thread on reddit regarding the Queen's
Big Announcement which did not happen, I saw this post from a redditor:
It would be interesting if there is some kinda of quota we are filling in the background where once we reach it something new starts happening, maybe she gets angrier maybe we attack her headquarters.
I doubt it though especially since next update seems to be about SAB which means this invasion will probably be forgotten till the current living story team releases something.
From a thread on reddit regarding the Queen's
Big Announcement which did not happen, I saw this post from a redditor:
Anyone else watch the live stream and can confirm this?
The invasions are neat, but like the original Karka Queen event, there are issues they'll need to address in the future if they want this to be a defining feature of later Living Story events.
1. Context. There's no context for why any of this is happening. Why are these people attacking Fireheart Rise and Sparkfly Fen when their target is the Human Queen? But I've harped on this enough.
2. There is nothing fun about joining a party with my friends and then being sent to different overflows and unable to find an overflow that has the event and my party. I'm not so sure what they're able to do about this, but it's painful. I'm sure that this will ease up as the event goes on, though.
3. The idea is great conceptually, but it's actually fairly basic compared to their other meta event chains. I think they need to use the concepts they've unveiled here to strengthen meta event chain zones, particularly Hirathi Hinterlands and Orr. These areas already have context, but could be made greater with better execution.
4. It's very odd that they chose this to be one of the first major "permanent" events, when this should be one of their most temporary due to the fact that it will get very old very quickly.
1. Context. There's no context for why any of this is happening. Why are these people attacking Fireheart Rise and Sparkfly Fen when their target is the Human Queen? But I've harped on this enough.
2. There is nothing fun about joining a party with my friends and then being sent to different overflows and unable to find an overflow that has the event and my party. I'm not so sure what they're able to do about this, but it's painful. I'm sure that this will ease up as the event goes on, though.
3. The idea is great conceptually, but it's actually fairly basic compared to their other meta event chains. I think they need to use the concepts they've unveiled here to strengthen meta event chain zones, particularly Hirathi Hinterlands and Orr. These areas already have context, but could be made greater with better execution.
4. It's very odd that they chose this to be one of the first major "permanent" events, when this should be one of their most temporary due to the fact that it will get very old very quickly.
The overflow thing is just universally bad. Because of the "world is full message" (the Join in.. feature had mostly worked very well for me since it was added) it feels a lot like the overflows at launch, where you just got chopped up from your party. There should be some kind of system to keep parties together even if it means putting them in newer overflows. Definitely the biggest issue with this for now IMO.
I'm not really concerned with getting sick of them in the medium term. It's just another thing to add to the list of stuff to do if and when you feel like it. Anything will get old if you do it too much.
I'm not really concerned with getting sick of them in the medium term. It's just another thing to add to the list of stuff to do if and when you feel like it. Anything will get old if you do it too much.
Personally, I'm tired of all of these meaningless 'filler episodes'. Does anyone remember we are supposed to be on the brink of world destruction because of a bunch of dragons, of which we've actually seen "one" (and not even that one if you haven't done the complete story)? We're a year in and we really haven't heard anything. Why exactly are we supposed to be terrified of these dragons again? We're having festivals and elections and everyone is just milling about doing their business. There is no threat in the world at all. The game seriously needs some conflict.
Jest Chillin
Member
The nature of the game doesn't allow for any kind of "brink of destruction" scenario for long term. As you pointed out there are people who haven't even finished their own personal story.. so how does that play out if the open world is constantly progressing towards destroying those dragons? Events in the world need to either be short lived or in a stasis in order for an MMO story to have a chance at making sense.
Think about WoW after Cataclysm. A new player starts out in this recently destroyed world where major characters have also recently had a paradigm shift. Then, at level 60, the player heads to Outlands where those major characters are shifted into different roles (old roles to those who know the lore) and have no references to the Cataclysmic events the player just spent 60 levels experiencing. Then at level 70, they're sent to a frozen wasteland to fight a bad guy that was already dead for the first 60 levels they played. Then at 80, they go back to the cataclysmic world that hasn't been refenced for 20 levels, characters are shifted again into the roles they were in for the first 60 levels. It's all over the place in terms of narrative. But they can't push the story forward and avoid that.
So what Anet is doing is the next best thing. Leaving the Dragons in stasis while they push other minor (in comparison) plotlines to keep the world feeling alive, while they work out the tech and strat for how they're going to apply it to the Dragons at a later date.
I had 3 failuresLuigi87 said:
'( you beated me) and one of them was in Frostgorge. I believe my first one (massive zerg in what-is-going-on mode in Fireheart at the beginning, and my Dredgehaunt overflow were the others I think). My last one of the day was a Sparkfly overflow that was pretty cool though. It wasn't looking great and Aetherblades were largely being ignored by the commander until the very end, but a couple of smaller groups including one I was running with knocked out a couple captains rapidly. Scarlet popped with about 2 minutes remaining. Feels good to pull a whole map together like that
That's kind of the thing. I'm not looking for a masterpiece, but they already have these great, built in threats that could make a year's worth of story arc, per dragon. All they'd have to do is mention that Kralkatorrik has stirred somewhere far off in some corner of the world, and have the ripples begin to effect us. Just the carrot of "hey, at some point you will face this dragon" is far more compelling than "here's a bunch of random people you don't know doing things that you don't understand".
I feel that it's simple, but I don't work for their writing teams. I'm sure that story is the last consideration, given that the actual systems content of LS updates are often changed around last minute. The story needs to be flexible enough to wrap around whatever content they push, and that's fine. But they've got to make it more interesting and the best way to do that is to introduce a Dragon. But keeping Dragons secret (if they are) isn't helping them at all. Put them front and center.
Which is exactly why they need to delete the personal story. Get rid of it. It's holding the living story back from actually being something.
Put all story progression in for character through the LS. Figure out a way to make it a little more personal based on character creation choices. I know I've posted this a few weeks back, but the two story telling systems cannot coexists. They need to choose one or the other.
The only way the personal story can work with the LS is if they change the personal story to be extremely general and vague. Never deal with dragons directly, never mention them by name. Never mention any enemy that comes up in the LS unless that LS plot has already passed. Focus instead of whatever order you chose and some racial missions.
The sooner they delete the current personal story system, the better. Unfortunately I don't get the impression that's something they're going to be working on. IIRC Colin did an interview not too long ago where he implied it's not something they'll be doing in the near future.
Yeah, pretty reasonable.
I haven't been in the rooms, but I feel like the writers got a degree of creative license ("whatever you come up with, we'll attempt to implement it mechanically and make it fun") but also given an enormous creative shackle ("do not reference this list of stuff, including the Dragons, mursaat, Orr... don't alter the fates of characters in the personal story... don't create arcs too complex for casual players to follow" and so on).
Ultimately I think Jest had his finger on the button, in that the writing team is probably pretty enslaved to the implemented technology. What I mean is that they've made a lot of strides in delivering the Living Story and incorporating a variety of gameplay types and content/reward availability, all of which is considered more important to the game designers than the accompanying story. And of course they have a point. One thing that would be objectively worse than what we've got now would be a truly epic plot arc carrying us toward the next Elder Dragon with no foundation of content delivery to make the gameplay experience compelling, such that we'd be saying "man this is a cool story but this isn't fun at all to play."
I think they want to really solidify all of the individual things like scaling storytelling instances, zone-wide failable events, introducing activities organically, achievement progression, and appealing rewards before turning those systems toward more serious story developments once they can do them justice.
I guess I actually sort of disagree, but basically for the same reasons you propose this. I mean, I agree the personal story is definitely holding back the living story but I also don't think it's worth going to so much trouble to redo the entire thing. Honestly it's not strong enough to try and wrangle into a compatible form start to finish. I think it would be simpler to just say "relative to current events, the personal story takes place in the past" and just kind of call it a day. The ambiguous temporal relativity we're working with now is just silly.
The story team is absolutely at the whim of the gameplay teams. Which is how it should be. If anyone's been keeping track, a lot of the gameplay content has been shifted around to different dates, it's hardly ever planned out.
I mentioned it before: The story team has the task of writing around content that could change at any moment. Deadlines are missed, ideas change, and implementation clouds the vision. The main LS story writer has said as much. It's not an easy task to wrap these chunks of content into story that makes sense.
This only further proves my point: They'd be much better served by introducing a threat up front, and then that would allow them to structure their stories around that. That's not to say that they'd remove the mystery, just provide context.
Say what you will about the beat-to-beat plot of the Personal Story, it's actually well structured on the macro level. We learn about our character in the racial story, then we learn about the dragons and the threat they pose in the order story, and finally we turn the tides and triumph in orr in the pact story. It's a perfect three act structure that would have worked if the actual writing in it had been good. They need to follow this structure if they want to make a "living story" interesting.
I mentioned it before: The story team has the task of writing around content that could change at any moment. Deadlines are missed, ideas change, and implementation clouds the vision. The main LS story writer has said as much. It's not an easy task to wrap these chunks of content into story that makes sense.
This only further proves my point: They'd be much better served by introducing a threat up front, and then that would allow them to structure their stories around that. That's not to say that they'd remove the mystery, just provide context.
Say what you will about the beat-to-beat plot of the Personal Story, it's actually well structured on the macro level. We learn about our character in the racial story, then we learn about the dragons and the threat they pose in the order story, and finally we turn the tides and triumph in orr in the pact story. It's a perfect three act structure that would have worked if the actual writing in it had been good. They need to follow this structure if they want to make a "living story" interesting.
Wow. 4-3! Gonna have to step up my overflows!
Honestly I wasn't surprised at all by the first failure (except in the sense that I was surprised failure was possible). We were learning and it wasn't really until 5 or 10 minutes left that I realized we could help the map far more by just leaving the zerg altogether.
Frostgorge is the clear standout in terms of difficulty. I loved the chaos in Dredgehaunt with the many overlapping events (though one EXTREMELY stupid commander-led zerg on the overflow I was on was sitting in the middle of a Venn-diagram-like battlefield with Aetherblades and a dredge event, scaling both up to ludicrous levels and wasting a million years, contributing to our failure). Sparkfly and Timberline were awesome because the layout meant lots of stuff accidentally caught in the crossfire and easy "sidequests" to do during or after. Plus it's fun to see huge groups swimming across the lakes in opposite directions.
Well, it's also the highest-level zone that can be invaded. Mobs are definitely tougher!
I also got tied up during our attempt at a mysterious minion event that wouldn't complete despite apparently being cleared of mobs. I stumbled back to it multiple times which wasted a lot of time. Eventually I realized a Twisted Nightmare was stuck under the ice sheet! Looking back, I bet I could have cleared it by jumping into the water and swimming under that sheet and shooting up at him.
Better when it's an adorable baby quaggan.
I decided last night after I stopped playing that Scarlet stole our mini Watchknights and we'll end up winning them back and throwing them into the mystic toilet with some other stuff to make those new minis. But not the new mini Caithe because there isn't one because Anet hate me.
Obligatory proof that the event is a massive zerg fest.
I love all the "if you are zerging you are doing it wrong" comments, considering every screenshot we've seen of the event has 100 people clumped around in a fight. And since I've yet to fail one of these events in a zerg, and the last one we finished (just now) with 15 minutes remaining on our timer, I'm going to go ahead and say that zerging it is not only the right way to do it, but considering the loot you get for doing it this way, it's the best way to do so.
RE: The event being a massive zerg fest.
The content won't be here forever and lots and lots of people play the game. Hence, lots of people at events at the same time.
What's the preferable solution then? Solo instances? Mandatory 5 man instances? Right now we have a mix of those plus the open world zerg and I have no problem with that at all.
The 'zerg' may have its drawbacks, but I think we need to remember this huge benefit: Everybody gets to play. There is a place for soloers and for groups to jump in and contribute at their leisure. Last night it was a bit wonky due to the overflows, but everyone was on for brand new stuff shenanigans, and I am betting the numbers will calm down a bit and it will be easier to get in as the week progresses.
The content won't be here forever and lots and lots of people play the game. Hence, lots of people at events at the same time.
What's the preferable solution then? Solo instances? Mandatory 5 man instances? Right now we have a mix of those plus the open world zerg and I have no problem with that at all.
The 'zerg' may have its drawbacks, but I think we need to remember this huge benefit: Everybody gets to play. There is a place for soloers and for groups to jump in and contribute at their leisure. Last night it was a bit wonky due to the overflows, but everyone was on for brand new stuff shenanigans, and I am betting the numbers will calm down a bit and it will be easier to get in as the week progresses.
I found plenty of opportunities to start events by myself that were being ignored by the zerg. Usually faired better against Molten or Minion compared to Aetherblade unless more people trickled in, but if you don't want to zerg, you don't have to.
Edit: Want to clarify that I do agree with many of the criticisms here. Concerning both story thin-ness and chaotic and draining nature of the invasions.
Edit: Want to clarify that I do agree with many of the criticisms here. Concerning both story thin-ness and chaotic and draining nature of the invasions.
Almost ironically, I actually like the invasions themselves. I like the fact that it forces people not to zerg, and if you have a good five-man party going you can feel an excellent sense of accomplishment. It's rough around the edges, but its still an excellent blueprint, gameplay wise, for future updates. But it's just that: A blueprint. Future iterations need to have more varied tasks with more unpredictable results. Instead of a win/lose goal, make it a this-or-that result that changes the finale.
True enough. It's just after the Pavillion I was hoping for something else. I'm worn out of the 100 people killing a mob stuff. Reminds me of old school EQ raiding.
Just finished another one, 20 minutes left on the timer. Mass people is the way to go if you want to complete them successfully without worrying about time.
Slightly Live
Dirty tag dodger
"Please return to your home world when prompted."
No prompt.
Yeah thanks for wasting almost 40 minutes of my time. Real fucking awesome. =/
Bad enough I have to jump through hours of hoops just to get back to the Pavillion, but buggy fucking hoops? Ugh.
No prompt.
Yeah thanks for wasting almost 40 minutes of my time. Real fucking awesome. =/
Bad enough I have to jump through hours of hoops just to get back to the Pavillion, but buggy fucking hoops? Ugh.
Unsure that's a "bug". The mainflow server must just be packed to the brim. I've never seen the prompt appear before the event ends. People spam join option to get in asap, leaving patient players left waiting. You'll have more luck trying to join in on an overflow that a friend or guildie can confirm has the event going I imagine. You'll still probably see the "full" message a few times though. Best just to make sure you are in the zone within a few minutes of the hour..
The 10 minute window is better than anything they've done so far but still falls short.
The 10 minute window is better than anything they've done so far but still falls short.
I haven't really had time to get on and check this out yet but - do the events spawn on the same maps at the same time each day? For Example: will Sparkfly Fen always have an event at 2pm and 6pm? Or is it random?
And when are you notified of an attack? Right at the hour or just before it?
And when are you notified of an attack? Right at the hour or just before it?
theMrCravens
Member
I also think we're due for an expansion announcement with new Elder Dragon villain.
Hopefully very soon. (won't be...)
That picture I posted was within a couple minutes of the first invasion I tried, and we failed. I was intentionally taking a picture of how many people you could see with culling off and nothing more.
I am glad you have had better luck in all cases. It is however highly unlikely that all the times you were in successful ones were because "zerging is not only the right way but the best way" or because "mass people is the way to go" but because somewhere on that map assorted people were mopping up easier, lower-scaled events that progressed the meta. There is plenty of loot to be had in the larger, hugely scaled events (which is great for people who care primarily about that) but they take much longer and do not progress the waves any further.
I think there's a heavy tint of anecdotal experience here. The time that I succeeded that was the closest to failure was also the time I stayed mostly in a zerg the full duration rather than targeting specific things on my own; it was my last one of the night in Sparkfly, and I just followed a commander because I was tired and no longer had a party with me. But it was completed with under 2 minutes remaining. In contrast, in the invasions where my servers won with the most time to spare (like our Timberline invasion), my party was almost wholly ignoring zergs (except for two very Wallach-unfriendly encounters) and hopping all over the entire map to clear the most-needed groups.
You insinuate that you wish to do the alternative but don't seem to believe that it is practical to participate in invasions. I proffer that it's actually more satisfying and fun to take care of smaller events and watch the meta progress knowing that you had a personal impact on it (whereas the zerg would be doing what it does with or without you). I would be happy to post shots of this scenario if you would accept it as proof that it is not just what you say it is, just as you have taken the shot I did post as proof of what you dislike.
If getting back into the Pavilion is what you're looking for most, just do the instance with someone and you can ignore the progression and walk back in. I would be happy to take you through it tonight if you like. It is quick.Slightly Live said:
There is a definite difference between the factions in terms of the general difficulty and the group size best suited to them:
Molten Alliance events can be handled by anyone. I literally soloed one of their "Tunneling Device" events that I happened across in under a minute. The champion Shamans they get are the squishiest invasion champions.
Steam creature events seem to be the second easiest. I've only done them in small groups (never tried soloing) but I actually haven't seen them spawn a Champ at all yet so I don't know how nasty they are.
Twisted events are a disaster to try and solo, I got completely wrecked. A small group can totally do them but it's really important to stomp/finish the downed clockwork; they seem to come back stronger. The champs hit HARD and I think the reavers do a ton of confusion. These seem to actually be the best to zerg with a massive group, though. Oodles of loot but they don't seem to scale to the ridiculous heights of the...
Aetherblade events, best done with a group of 10-20. These are the hardest and the scaling goes nuts in huge zergs. When multiple Champ Strikers start spawning, things can go south really quickly, plus many people don't try to isolate the Captain when he spawns and end up fighting two waves' worth of veterans simultaneously. I witnessed a zerg of 40+ literally wipe to an Aetherblade event in Dredgehaunt yesterday.
Actually I found learning this stuff over time and being able to consider the capabilities/most efficient tasks for the group you're rolling with to be the most compelling part of the release. But the overflows/party slicing is a huge problem at the moment. For example, I'd love it if we could all get (as a guild) into the same invasion map and say, split into two coordinated groups, it would probably be a blast, but it's just not practical with the numbers so far.
There's only been one day so far, and I'm back at work today.LkPr said:
So no clue if there's a map "schedule" or a random shot. It appears nearly random with a small bit of logic. For my part, I saw two repeats over the course of the day, but no consecutive repeats. I don't know if there's any API info on this yet and we may get some insight over time.It notifies you on the hour (the upper right LS event tracker will update, with a subtle sound too), and then you have 10 minutes to get to the map to secure one that will be guaranteed to have an invasion. Following that, you can attempt to get ferried into a map with an ongoing invasion and still get the rewards, but it's a bit of a crapshoot at the moment.
thoseAREmySHOES
Member
Considering my limited amount of time I could play last night, I went 1-for-1 on Sparkfly Fen, and got to try the new "dungeon". Not too shabby.
I haven't failed it yet and I've always been in main/overflow with 5-10+ commanders(mixed around the map with ~20-30 per commander) and huge zergs(most of the champ farm ones end up having ~100 people near the end of the event). The least amount of time I've seen remaining was ~20 minutes(we finished it just as the main server was starting the final tier).
Even in the huge 100 person zergs I haven't seen more than a few people get downed at any time and pretty much everyone I've played with has known when to switch events(not stick around for an event that isn't needed). I think it's a player/commander issue more than anything else(maybe a lot of lowbies).
As for the overflow issues, yea I'm really disappointed in how that worked out. I had a fair number of crashes and lost progress(as did a TON of other people), and I've ran into the overflow "please join your home server" message quite a few times(even when showing up well before the 10 minute overflow mark).
It's definitely disappointing(probably the biggest letdown as far as LS updates goes), but the achievements themselves are quite easy to obtain and re-entering the Pavilion is easy enough(either do it yourself or find someone to do the dungeon with).
The on-going issue I'm worried about is that this event isn't really timed; ANet said it was going to be persistent and the rewards for completion/champs are quite lucrative(basically on-par with the nerfed CS farm now)...so I'm a little puzzled at how things are going to progress. Unless we get HUGE gold sinks I can foresee a large amount of the playerbase getting left behind in the gear/money front. That all ties in with the zerg/farm nature of these events and a definite "shift"(or at least emergence) of players with "elitist" attitudes lately. The mapchats(both home and overflow) have been, to use a word I don't really like, toxic at best lately, which has me worried for the new players out there(and the overall future of the game). It's puzzling to see ANet discussing 3g median player earnings along side discussions of upcoming ascended armors/500 crafting/etc(which can't be cheap). I just don't see how they're going to balance the two playerbases :/
Even in the huge 100 person zergs I haven't seen more than a few people get downed at any time and pretty much everyone I've played with has known when to switch events(not stick around for an event that isn't needed). I think it's a player/commander issue more than anything else(maybe a lot of lowbies).
As for the overflow issues, yea I'm really disappointed in how that worked out. I had a fair number of crashes and lost progress(as did a TON of other people), and I've ran into the overflow "please join your home server" message quite a few times(even when showing up well before the 10 minute overflow mark).
It's definitely disappointing(probably the biggest letdown as far as LS updates goes), but the achievements themselves are quite easy to obtain and re-entering the Pavilion is easy enough(either do it yourself or find someone to do the dungeon with).
The on-going issue I'm worried about is that this event isn't really timed; ANet said it was going to be persistent and the rewards for completion/champs are quite lucrative(basically on-par with the nerfed CS farm now)...so I'm a little puzzled at how things are going to progress. Unless we get HUGE gold sinks I can foresee a large amount of the playerbase getting left behind in the gear/money front. That all ties in with the zerg/farm nature of these events and a definite "shift"(or at least emergence) of players with "elitist" attitudes lately. The mapchats(both home and overflow) have been, to use a word I don't really like, toxic at best lately, which has me worried for the new players out there(and the overall future of the game). It's puzzling to see ANet discussing 3g median player earnings along side discussions of upcoming ascended armors/500 crafting/etc(which can't be cheap). I just don't see how they're going to balance the two playerbases :/
gamergirl85
Member
Haven't been reading much on here or paying attention elsewhere so is there anything goin on tonight with the guild since the new stuff is out?
One thing to note: During the developer livestream, it was apparently mentioned that the queen's actual announcement has merely been postponed by the event, and that there is still an announcement that is coming. This is, of course, paraphrased and I could be totally off.
It does seem like there will be more story to this update, but as always, keep expectations in check. We don't even know for sure that there will be anything, but just know that hints have been thrown out.
It does seem like there will be more story to this update, but as always, keep expectations in check. We don't even know for sure that there will be anything, but just know that hints have been thrown out.
I just realized something, storywise:
Anise is probably the real Jennah. It pains me to say so, since that's literally the plot twist of The Phantom Menace, but it just makes too much sense. All of the illusions have been coming from Anise, but that's really strange: Jennah is the powerful mesmer, not Anise. Also, if you listened to Anise's dialogue in the Jubilee story event, she implies that she is the one making all of the moves on behalf of Jennah. Also, why would anise want to tease Logan with rytlock? It makes far more sense for someone very close to him to do it.
The only thing that throws that off is the story of CM. But even then, Jennah was never really afraid, and Anise wasn't present, so I don't know. It could be that she has begun to "protect herself" in lieu of Logan so that he's no longer bound to her.
The only thing that throws that off is the story of CM. But even then, Jennah was never really afraid, and Anise wasn't present, so I don't know. It could be that she has begun to "protect herself" in lieu of Logan so that he's no longer bound to her.
Right, just a reminder that we do have a Guild Event scheduled tonight!
World Event Train beginning at reset on the dot (8:00PM EDT)
You can just tag along for the ride and listen in Mumble/read guild chat for more instructions, but if you want to more proactive here are a couple resources:
Gw2Stuff's Stormbluff Isle Tracker
Gw2stuff's in-game overlay (a download, but does NOT interact with the game executable or modify files)
GW2 Wiki Page on World Events (I'd like to hit every event on the list 'cept the Karka Queen, and this will likely involve guest-hopping to other servers to fill in gaps. The wiki can tell us which servers they are up on.)
Our original goal was to really see what the impact of turning culling off had on huge dynamic events... obviously, we didn't know exactly what was in store with the update, and most of us have already experienced this by now. But it'll still be fun to hop around the world and I bet at least one of us will have never done Flame Temple Tombs or Zho'Qafa Catacombs.
The new question is what to do about invasions. I will suggest that our train will not stop for invasions. If you want to hop off and go do one that is of course your prerogative! Otherwise, we'll just keep hopping until we hit 'em all.
However, if an invasion happens to begin in a zone we were already in coincidentally for the world event, I say we stick with it and see it through. For one thing, it'd be an opportunity for us all to be on the same map. I think the odds of this are rather tiny though.
World Event Train beginning at reset on the dot (8:00PM EDT)
You can just tag along for the ride and listen in Mumble/read guild chat for more instructions, but if you want to more proactive here are a couple resources:
Gw2Stuff's Stormbluff Isle Tracker
Gw2stuff's in-game overlay (a download, but does NOT interact with the game executable or modify files)
GW2 Wiki Page on World Events (I'd like to hit every event on the list 'cept the Karka Queen, and this will likely involve guest-hopping to other servers to fill in gaps. The wiki can tell us which servers they are up on.)
Our original goal was to really see what the impact of turning culling off had on huge dynamic events... obviously, we didn't know exactly what was in store with the update, and most of us have already experienced this by now. But it'll still be fun to hop around the world and I bet at least one of us will have never done Flame Temple Tombs or Zho'Qafa Catacombs.
The new question is what to do about invasions. I will suggest that our train will not stop for invasions. If you want to hop off and go do one that is of course your prerogative! Otherwise, we'll just keep hopping until we hit 'em all.
However, if an invasion happens to begin in a zone we were already in coincidentally for the world event, I say we stick with it and see it through. For one thing, it'd be an opportunity for us all to be on the same map.
I think the odds of this are rather tiny though.Let's do that this weekend. I'll think a little about it and put a thread together tonight.
Don't forget that with the "return to your home server" bug, that overflows aren't considered part of any one server. If the bug is happening on home servers as well, it's because of the needing to sync with overflow servers to make sure the event doesn't propagate across overflows forever.
It's not just the Personal Story, but they also need to change hearts. It's one of the biggest things that piss me off. It's fine in zones like Kryta that are mostly removed from dragon threats (lucky them) but a lot of zones never needed them. They're just static quest areas and it'll be extra work to change them if the story of a zone changes, which unfortunately gives extra pressure for zones to stay static.
You can see it right now, where while mechanically it's cool to run into hearts and events that overlap with an invasion, the invasion should also affect the NPCs and the enemies in the zone more. The Seraph and Centaur should be turning around and focusing on the larger threat. The Pact should be turning around and handing out weapons if there isn't a dragon champion to take on. And the icebrood should be looking to kill anything that they won't join in with Jormag, and that should include the Aetherblades.
But the above is literally too much work to expect any team to do on such a short time frame.
Does Harathi fail often for anyone else because of waypoints? I'm thinking that for zones like those you need to have dedicated teams opening up waypoints while doing nearby invasion spawns. Like a team roaming around a part of a map but always returning to check on a supply camp.
It's not just the Personal Story, but they also need to change hearts. It's one of the biggest things that piss me off. It's fine in zones like Kryta that are mostly removed from dragon threats (lucky them) but a lot of zones never needed them. They're just static quest areas and it'll be extra work to change them if the story of a zone changes, which unfortunately gives extra pressure for zones to stay static.
You can see it right now, where while mechanically it's cool to run into hearts and events that overlap with an invasion, the invasion should also affect the NPCs and the enemies in the zone more. The Seraph and Centaur should be turning around and focusing on the larger threat. The Pact should be turning around and handing out weapons if there isn't a dragon champion to take on. And the icebrood should be looking to kill anything that they won't join in with Jormag, and that should include the Aetherblades.
But the above is literally too much work to expect any team to do on such a short time frame.
Jest Chillin
Member
I agree with Hawkian here in that I don't know that the PS needs to be deleted or reworked. I think the fact that it's optional is the biggest hinderance because it does serve well to introduce the player to the dragon issue.
If the PS wasn't optional then they could simply phase Orr, or perhaps.. even better would be to make the pre-PS completion Orr zones a separate instance.
Even in such a case, it would be a bad move to move the Dragon story along so quickly. While it would be great for the short term, in the long term life of the game you end up running out of material fairly quickly. This would force Anet to cycle through antagonists quite a bit (new, current, or resurging characters) and would bring the story to an almost comic-style constant endangerment. I mean why can't the world ever just stay saved?
Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see progress with the Dragons but it needs to move at a fairly slow pace to get a few years out of it. I'd like to see relatively slow building moving into a crescendo, allowing room for things like Holiday events and smaller scale conflicts as well. Just because there's an overarching danger doesn't mean all the other enterprising villain types take a break. In this regard, I think Anet's doing pretty well with the story. I'd just like the actual combat scenarios to see some change. Longer solo dungeon experiences. Longer group dungeon experiences. I'd also love to see some world stuff that involved cooperation in non-combat. Things like collectively collecting and crafting parts to create a weapon or device that will allow entrance into a previously blocked zone. Don't limit it to time and let each server progress in such an event at their own pace. Or gate it with a time limit but allow it to have a pass and fail state so that if I server fails, they have to resort to another plan of action to complete the overall objective.
This kind of stuff is probably too grand for the moment but it's the kind of thing I'd like to see in the future for sure. For now though, I'm pretty satisfied with what we've been getting so I'll continue to play and wait to see what they roll out in the future.
I dunno, there's five dragons left (that we know of). Even if you did one dragon every year, that'd be six years of content. I'm not saying the dragons need to be around all the time, but they need to be a threat, even if far off. It could take two years to get to Kralkatorrik, but I at least want to have some idea that in the end, we'll go after him. I just don't get that feeling right now, and it's odd. As someone said, it feels like what we're doing is filler when the rest of the game has told us "we must unite to defeat the dragons!"
Sure, the current plot could be tied to a Dragon, but we have no idea if it is or not, so it's not as compelling as it could be. Re introducing the dragons captures the imagination and pushes the idea that this is a moving, living world. Hell, the sylvari were basically born for the purpose of defeating the dragons, and any time the story doesn't involve them it just seems odd.
I don't see that as a problem. There are five dragons, each of them could last a "season" or around a year of the game's life. Then there are capable villains already in the game, from the Nightmare Court, Flame Legion, Inquest, etc. And there are past enemies in lore such as Palawa Joko. And then you can also have new threats such as the Aetherblades.
They could easily string this out for a decade.
I missed the only Harathi invasion I saw yesterday so I dunno how it went, but that's a pretty cool idea. Travel was definitely an issue in Frostgorge in the fail I was a part of there.
Aw. Maybe we'll both get it, we've got a bit of time.
Jest Chillin
Member
Well Zhaitan was the first dragon and since we've dispatched him we've had to deal with this other storyline, which is exactly what I meant in that other bad guys don't just stop being bad because there's another threat. There is constant frontline warfare but since it's been around since launch it just feels old but that's not all that dissimilar from how a war plays out anyways. I'd say give this Arc time to wrap up and see what Anet has in store for the next Arc. If it's still not a dragon based Arc then, then I see a cause for complaint.
Well I mentioned burning through Antagonists because the general reception has been one of "why haven't we fought more dragons?" Which lends to the idea that we need to be killing more than one dragon a year. At this point, we've killed one in one year, which I think is a good pace. Once we start killing dragons 2 or more per year.. we run out of dragons incredibly quickly unless they introduce new, unknown dragons, or something.
Hope you can make our event tonight!
At least some of them are borderline totally guaranteed to be GAF-only.
How far along did you get with your character(s), and what class? Combat feels very different depending on class, and sometimes even within classes based on the options available.
I love it, and in all honesty it is what keeps me able to play for such extended periods of time. If I didn't like it so much I would definitely not have lasted this long. For all the other things I enjoy about the game (huge fan of jumping puzzles and exploration, never shy away from a good minigame and SAB stole my heart), the overwhelming majority of time spent in-game is killing stuff. I'm completely pumped for new skills coming by the end of the year.
Full disclosure would be that I play with a gamepad, and it feels very satisfying (with all the classes I've spent considerable time with). I honestly don't find the default keyboard and mouse controls to be that natural.
edit: definitely do NOT approve of there being any more than 6 elder dragons (other non-elder dragons would be awesome, especially neutral/Glint-related).
With that in mind I fully expect and would put money on us having fought (or at least clearly started the preparation to fight) another one by this time next year.
Don't know what much more we can tell you if you've already played it to be honest. I love the combat. I could go on for a long long post but I'm unsure if it would communicate much. In short, I like the importance of positioning, skill/experience of knowing the fights (or being able to anticipate from a new opponent), the dodge system, the down state (though it was weird to get used to) and the traiting system. I don't miss the hundreds of (often useless) skills and trinity from GW1. I'm personally unfamiliar with other mmo combat.
I do hear REALLY good things about Tera combat. I would try it, except, you know, I'm always playing this.
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