Jump to content
  • Sign Up

Should I have played GW1 to understand GW2?


ROM.3586

Recommended Posts

I joined about two weeks ago and admit I'm having a lot of trouble following the game.

It's not like I have had zero experience with MMOs. I've been playing them since my first one on City of Heroes, and played WoW, EVE Online, Champions Online, and Star Trek Online. I think my problem is I've never played GW1 before so I'm starting off without a frame of reference. I had hoped trying a few characters of different races and types would help me ease in but all I've done is delete them after a few levels and started over.

I'd like to get some suggestions on how to understand things better so at least I don't end up deleting yet another character.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As a similar mmo background myself I understand where your coming from, city of heroes is a big role to fill. guild wars 2 lore is kind of hard to get into at first, it can be the art style that throws you off as well.There is a ton of backlore from guild wars 1, but in guild wars 1 you could only be different human races, there where other races in the game but not playable. I recommend watching a youtube video like this

But in all honesty you need to fins something you enjoy and get past core content, and do events not the hearts, the hearts are more side things. Gw2 has allot of depth to it trust me.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There's a ton of extra background if you do that, but far from necessary.

For the Personal Story (lvl 1-80), there are a bunch of parallell stories (depending or you choices in character creation) and these interconnect in some ways, but lvl 30 is where the Dragon story kicks off.

For later, we have the problem that Living World Season 1 isn't available. As that's the season where we get introduced to Taimi, Braham, Marjory, Kasmeer, Canach etc, Season 2's beginning can be jarring.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

No you don't need to know GW1. It might be that leveling is bit boring and the same time game overwhelming for new player.You see , read things here and there then you need to et back to hearts for exp. Herts themselves give very little info of lore and what is going on.What i did is just played the game, did hearts events, pvp, got my first class to 80.But way before that happened I have given up on game 4 times. I wish I got to 80 the first time.It's like old meme 'Juts do it' :) Peaces of puzzle will start to look like a picture.When you get bit time you can read bit of lore of gw1.I'll give you hints: Abadon, Ascalon, Orr, Kormir. This all you need to know IIRC.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Because Guild Wars 2 takes place hundreds of years after the first game, it's totally acceptable to play it first and then go back to enjoy Guild Wars 1. It's kind of like watching the Star Wars films 4 5 6 and then 1 2 3; you kind of get this eye-opening 'ohhhhh THAT'S what that was' enjoyment that comes from understanding after the fact.

Also, a ton has changed about the world of Tyria between games, so they're largely independent of one another and can be played by themselves or together in either order with no issue.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Honestly with them bringing out the GW1 complete heroic deluxe super buy it all for 1 price edition I would buy that, play it and enjoy it as a fresh untarnished experience. Especially now they fixed the net code so you don't rubberband everywhere like my first experience.

I played GW2 first and it was/is very difficult to get into GW1 because of it's age and lack of fluidity compared to GW2. Additionally I kind of know a lot of the major stuff that happens so not a lot of the story is a surprise.

With GW1 being considered a classic and one of the best MMO's there's been and the way GW2 feels much more fluid and satisfying in combat I would recommend playing through it, doing the stories and quests, maybe getting hall of monument points then going to GW2 after because GW2 really does spoil you in terms of gameplay.

As far as trouble getting into GW2, yeah I had that issue, I went through multiple classes getting bored of them by lvl 30 and running around not seeing anyone or doing anything but fighting some random NPC's stood around. This was before mega servers and I didn't know anyone. Now it's a bit better but I'd say try to find a guild of new players, party up while doing stuff in a map and leveling. For me the "get in" moment was when I randomly went to Gendarren Fields for my next levelling map and saw lots of people. They were doing the living story event where Scarlett sends watchwork minions to create chaos and you go to stop them. I'd never seen so many people working together to do something and being helpful, rezzing, healing, helping to escort to the next waypoint and linking it for everyone.

That's when I decided to just level my ele to 80 and get really stuck in on these events and well 5 years later here we are.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Tanner Blackfeather.6509 said:There's a ton of extra background if you do that, but far from necessary.

For the Personal Story (lvl 1-80), there are a bunch of parallell stories (depending or you choices in character creation) and these interconnect in some ways, but lvl 30 is where the Dragon story kicks off.

For later, we have the problem that Living World Season 1 isn't available. As that's the season where we get introduced to Taimi, Braham, Marjory, Kasmeer, Canach etc, Season 2's beginning can be jarring.

I am getting close to finishing season 2 and you are correct about it being jarring. I watched the overview video of season 1, but you just miss so much. Season 2 still doesn't feel that it is connected and flows from the ending of the personal story. I am hoping going forward that everything will feel tied together. I have completed HoT and PoF stories on other chars, but no seasons. On this character I am going in order and actually paying attention to the story.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@"ROM.3586" said:I joined about two weeks ago and admit I'm having a lot of trouble following the game.

It's not like I have had zero experience with MMOs. I've been playing them since my first one on City of Heroes, and played WoW, EVE Online, Champions Online, and Star Trek Online. I think my problem is I've never played GW1 before so I'm starting off without a frame of reference. I had hoped trying a few characters of different races and types would help me ease in but all I've done is delete them after a few levels and started over.

I'd like to get some suggestions on how to understand things better so at least I don't end up deleting yet another character.

As the others have said, the lore in GW2 is derived from the lore of GW1, but separated by about 250 years, so it's possible to ignore it. There are lots of traces of GW1 in the GW2 game world, and playing a bit of GW1 (especially the beginning part of Prophecies) will explain why some things are the way they are, and playing other parts of GW1 will explain the importance of certain people in GW2, notably

! Kormir (found in the Nightfall campaign), Ogden Stonehealer, Lazarus, and Livia (all three participants in the Eye of the North expansion).

All of those people were alive in the time of GW1 and have in some way or other survived until GW2's time, and all of them were important in one way or another to the story of GW1 and, in a different way, in GW2.

Other people are obviously descendants of important people in GW1's time, notably

! Logan Thackeray, descended from Gwen Thackeray (née something else), who is buried in Ebonhawke.

And although the Sylvari themselves are not part of GW1 in any way (the very first of them were only "born" - not really the right word - only 25 years before GW2 opens), their story (the Ventari tablet) refers directly to an NPC in GW1.

! Ventari, a centaur.

But all that said, I'm not sure that GW2's fairly intricate lore is really your problem. How did you get started in WoW? In there, how much did you know about the lore of the world? How did you learn it? What is it about GW2 that makes it hard, for you, to "attach" yourself to the characters? For me, that process was aided by being able to transfer names from GW1 to GW2 when GW2 opened, as well as knowledge of the combined lore of Tyria, but not all my initial characters were inspired by my GW1 characters (and my very first was definitely not).

What might help is to start with a Sylvari, where the major links to GW1 are indirect and remote, and all of the Sylvari lore is new, so you can treat the journey of your character as a journey of discovery for both of you. (It's worth noting, for example, that a new Sylvari character actually begins playing before (in "narrative time"(1)) the character's "birth".) For humans, Charr, Norns, and Asura, the links with GW1 are everywhere around them:

! All those statues of Jora in the Shiverpeaks are direct references an NPC in GW1's Eye of the North. 90% of what goes on in the newbie zone for the Charr, "Plains of Ashford", is a direct reference to GW1's Prophecies campaign, as are the Wall and the Searing Cauldron. Shaemoor in Queensdale shares its name with an important village in GW1's prophecies campaign, and the Godslost Swamp, also in Queensdale, is the site of GW1's Temple of the Ages zone. Rata Sum is the same Rata Sum that the Asura were building up in Eye of the North. And so on.

(1) Time as it flows "in the game world's story" as opposed to "wall clock time" which is in the real world,or "quest time" which is the mechanism where you arrive just in time to save people for a quest, or to hear their dying words after you failed to save them, etc.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...