Feedback: Account-bound map unlocks

Now that more and more maps are being added, and those expansion maps are considerably more complicated than the base Tyria maps, it's becoming increasingly frustrating to play multiple characters. I have nine characters -- one for each class. However I never get to play them really because it's so painstakingly tedious to get walk through all the maps and get all the waypoints. The biggest complaint I've heard in regards to having map completion be account-bound is that it inhibits the gaining of XP or gaining certain loot/legendary materials from map completion. However, I'm not saying that full map completion needs to be shared across characters. I just would like for waypoints to be unlocked across all characters if you discover a waypoint on one character. Or at the very least, a single waypoint on a map and also having the maps no longer obscured (such as when you discover a new area) if you've discovered it on another character.

I know this isn't a perfect solution because those things still contribute to XP, but I feel like a middle ground needs to be struck because now that there are so many more maps, it's absolutely ridiculous that I have to go through those areas NINE TIMES just to be able to play my other characters.

I really hope Arenanet looks into a way to make it easier for veteran players with lots of heroes to be able to enjoy new content.

You do realize that mounts will make it faster and easier to get around on most maps, right? PoF has an answer (of sorts) to the issue already. It's not the answer you want, but I think it will actually make map completion more fun and faster than your suggestion in the end.

If you have PoF and get the mounts, that is.

Mounts can make map completion a bit faster, but if you want to do guild missions on a character that hasn't been to certain maps, you'll end up missing out on some things. It would be nice if map completion was account wide, but.......

Each map you complete gives you random items rewarded, sometimes a black lion chest key. And you can create a character to map out Lion's Arch and the 5 racial cities for a guaranteed transmutation charge per map, letting you get as many for free as you want as long as you're willing to spend the time creating and deleting characters.

And take into consideration for specialization collections you need to get map complete in a HoT or PoF map playing as a specific profession (depending on what collection you're working on).

Ultimately, they would have to change way too much to make account wide map complete work, since there are things in the game that rely on map complete for individual characters.

The last episone in LS3 showed account-bound WPs are possible, I wish we could have gotten at least one.

If you do not have the lilly of the elon pass how are you supposed to even get your other characters into the new zones other than starting the story on each one? Annoying for people that have 5 characters but what about people that have 50 or more?

@Menadena.7482 said:If you do not have the lilly of the elon pass how are you supposed to even get your other characters into the new zones other than starting the story on each one?

Do the story it does not take that long.

At this point I honestly think waypoints should be removed from Map Completion progress entirely and made account-wide. This may sound like a harsh solution, but: there's already enough hearts, PoIs, vistas and HPs in the core Tyria and HoT. Removing waypoints from the list would not honestly make much of a difference. When you unlock them on one character, unlock them for all. 100% map completion would still take a long time, and getting the Gifts of Exploration would still be a considerable effort. After all, it's only a small part of a legendary weapon; it's not like anything would drastically change. The QoL for alts however would improve substantially.

In the new maps the waypoints are so scarce anyway, it would make even smaller difference there. I expect the future expansion and LS maps will also be fashioned in this way because of the mounts, so might as well make them account-wide.

I wish maps as a whole were account-wide. In a game that's otherwise extremely alt-friendly and makes almost everything account-wide, and I love that (it's the only MMO I've ever seriously played an alt), I've always found it really jarring for the map to not be.

I understand a lot of progression and rewards are tied to it right now, but I'd rather those just be reworked and reintroduced somewhere else. At the very least, though, I'd take a compromise where something like Waypoints and the visible regions are shared between characters.

the only thing I want is a pricey vendor item that allows you to unlock all Core Tyria waypoints if you've done a 100% map complete atleast once, with the price maybe dropping for your account for each time you've done 100% map complete, for example I've done it multiple times so I'd get a significant drop in price compared to someone who has only done it once.

Yeah it sucks.It should be all account shared, with the choice f Redo for achi and fun.

no. that would be to boring.

Boring to have the choice without forcing anyone?Serious?

@Hevoskuuri.3891 said:At this point I honestly think waypoints should be removed from Map Completion progress entirely and made account-wide. This may sound like a harsh solution, but: there's already enough hearts, PoIs, vistas and HPs in the core Tyria and HoT. Removing waypoints from the list would not honestly make much of a difference. When you unlock them on one character, unlock them for all. 100% map completion would still take a long time, and getting the Gifts of Exploration would still be a considerable effort. After all, it's only a small part of a legendary weapon; it's not like anything would drastically change. The QoL for alts however would improve substantially.

In the new maps the waypoints are so scarce anyway, it would make even smaller difference there. I expect the future expansion and LS maps will also be fashioned in this way because of the mounts, so might as well make them account-wide.

EXACTLY I'm glad you understand. People seem to be unwilling to budge on how you get XP from WPs. You can still get a lot of XP from everything else and map completion will still give you whatever you needed for your legendaries.

@Stalkingwolf.6035 said:no. that would be to boring.

Seriously? Because to me, map completing the same area or doing the same story over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and OVER is pretty freaking boring.

@zoalerah.2470 said:Or at the very least, a single waypoint on a map and also having the maps no longer obscured (such as when you discover a new area) if you've discovered it on another character.

I would just be happy with this, even without a starting waypoint and just having the maps you've discovered/explored visible and no longer obscured. The obscured / fogged maps are what really annoy me, not being able to see the maps plays havoc with my OCD. The first time I understand it's obscured because it makes the world a bit of a mystery and more fun to explore, but once world completion has been done at least once, there's no good reason for it to remain obscured on alts. Running to key waypoints for events / bosses you might want to do doesn't take long, so they don't bother me. But I would pay gold/gems for an item that just makes all the maps visible across your account (as long as you've completed them on at least 1 character)