Removing invisible walls

[Evil.1580]

Why there is not the common option "Leave it as it is"? Other (in comments) doesn't work well with lazy people, because they won't comment, but can work only if there are valid 3rd, 4th etc opinions.

[Kodokuna Akuma.9570]

generally invisible walls are used to hide locations or prevent access to location in where assets have not been built a perfect example of this is the big wall above the above the black lion vault. If you fly up to the top an invisible wall stops you from falling in to an area that isnt full asseted.

Im sure anet could be more liberal with the uses of invisible walls but at the end of the day its about avoiding map breakouts, saving on asset placement and development and optimisation by simlifying but the number of rendered objects and also the collision objects.

[Ben K.6238]

When you let the level designers do their jobs, less things break. So, do that.

[Menadena.7482]

How they can fix no mount zones is allow you to enter such an area mounted ..... however you can not get off (or get on) the mount while in the area. I play another game that is littered with no mount/no fly zones and, while people justifiably complain about invisible walls wherever there (users can erect them) nobody complains about no fly areas as they do not affect you if you started flying outside the zone.

[alcopaul.2156]

I know an invisible wall in real life/outside the internet. it's called "friendzone".

[Nogothanc.5014]

I like exploring the maps and when there is a top of a mountain I want to get to the top.... but... invisible walls does make exploring a frustrating experience. I dont want to be frustrated so I stop exploring.

[Fundor.2098]

The use of invisible walls and no-mount zones is definitely understandable in the case of jumping puzzles and clearly unfinished parts of the maps.However, there are a ton of completely unnecessary invisible walls too, great examples being Hoelbrak and Divinity's Reach. For example, I never understood why we aren't allowed to fly over from the central garden to the surrounding city areas and just the other day I realised the highest tower of DR has been surrounded by invisible walls, despite having been accessible with a springer and griffon for ages. Sure the top of the tower looked a little unfinished with its undetailed textures and there was an unintended gap a player could fall into, but it could have been a lot easier to fix by adding a simple collision floor instead of surrounding the whole tower with invisible walls. The tower used to be one of my favorite hangout locations.And nowadays it's a nighmare to try to fly in Lornar's Pass, thanks to so many of the mountains being wrapped in invisible walls. Many of them lacked collision before, but that broke my immersion way less than slamming my mount head first to something I can't see, all the frigging time :I

TLDR; No-mount zones and Invisible walls do have their places, but the latter is currently used quite a bit too much.

[Tekoneiric.6817]

While I dislike the invisible walls and deathzones I think they should be replaced with a (Claw of Jormag level) fear zone as in "Be afraid because here be dragons" for the short term. If a player wants to explore they can use a skill like the ranger's "Strength of the Pack!" to summon enough strength to go through the fear zone.

Long term I would rather see them make the map edge zones map to map transition zones when they connect to another map. Basically it calculates your current position in relation to the next map and pops you on the other map in that relative position. I would further suggest if you are gliding or moving on a mount it makes you in the same state on the new map. So if you happen to be on the griffon or skyscale in the air you just transition to the new map and continue on flying. Same with maps with water to water contact. Skimmer from one map to the next.

[DeWolfe.2174]

Invisible walls along the perimeter of the map I can see for technology reasons, even though they destroy any open world experience. All invisible walls within a map though should be removed. Just delete them Devs!

[Ashantara.8731]

I don't see the point in "No mount Zones" vs "No Invisible Walls". They will both block access to the area you would like to trespass, so it's to the same effect.

I would prefer no invisible walls, period, as there are way to many that make zero sense.

[Cerioth.7062]

No mount zones would be worse than invisible walls.

[Absconditus.6804]

No mount zones are arguably far more annoying, to me at least.

[Drecien.4508]

@"Cragga the Eighty Third.6015" said:I understand that some blocking tactics are necessary, but IMO they are overdone. Instead of protecting important areas, and keeping people from cheating their way into rewards, they are just stuck in to prevent people from finding interesting new paths.

Do we really NEED the west side of Dry Top to only be accessible through the spider tunnel? I was so proud to have managed to get my griffon all the way to the tops of those cliffs to go east, only to hit solid air. Why?

The other day I was in Mount Maelstron, in that hexagonal Inquest base, when I realized that there was no ceiling overhead, and I could fly out through a big hole in the roof--only to find myself trapped in an invisible box. (If the Skyscale could cling to invisible walls, I could have done an awesome mime impression.) If there is a real reason to prevent people from entering and exiting at the far end of the base, maybe the Inquest should fix their roof. Does it really matter which end of the base you come in and go out of?

You can get through the crucible of eternity through the hole in the wall at the blue area, there is a tube running up into it. I went there from the outside the other day, wasn't expecting it.

[Sicarine.3985]

[deleted]

Edited October 7, 2021 by Sicarine.3985
privacy and security: deleting old comments

[Adrianna.3092]

the no mount zones seem a bit extreme in some cases... like in one of the maps i was remapping on my necro there was a no mount area on one of the main pathways thru the map... probably cus there was a jumping puzzle or something nearby but i didnt see anything and i just wanted to use my mount to walk on the road... but nope dismounted for seemingly no reason..

[Solvar.7953]

The really sad bit about all of this is that even with the no mount zones, walls, etc, that exist for some jumping puzzles, there is still gaps in the coverage and you can short cut to the end if you know what you are doing. And of course, players will try to find these shortcuts.So they put a some amount of effort to try to block off the puzzles, annoying the player base by adding no mount/no fly zones on various maps, and still don't fix the problem. And its really unclear what problem they are trying to fix (minor amount of loot from the puzzle? You can also park characters at the end of most puzzles and open the chest 1/day).They should really just toss in the towel, say it was a bad idea, remove those, and move on. Or if concern, maybe try removing it from some of the maps where it is more annoying (do to the jumping puzzle being in the middle of the map), and really see if it affects the game in any negative way. I suspect it will affect the game in a positive way, as the players will be happier.

[killermanjaro.5670]

I get the need invisible walls in certain areas, so rather than just remove them I'd prefer it if they just tweaked them a bit. Especially some of the colliders around bits of vanilla maps where the collision boxes are quite sloppy and excessively oversized on the higher bits of objects because at the time they didn't matter as no one would ever know. That's been the problem retrospectively adding mounts etc to areas that weren't designed for them.

I would though like it if they removed no mount zones from most areas, they serve little to no purpose in most cases imo. Around JPs they are pointless as most can still be bypassed if you find the right spot, or use a combo of mount, glider and the mastery that jumps you off a mount. Plus the loot from a JP is fairly insignificant,and people have been able to bypass JPs with portals for years anyway. No mount zones just get in the way when your travelling across the map near a JP.

[hugo.4705]

I really think that anti-mount or invisible walls at jumping puzzles are pointless, as many said, now you can bypass a jumping puzzle by using mesmer portals, if not that by gliding from an higher point or finally using springer/gryphon/bond of faith. You can even use rifle 5# of engie to be sure to not fail your jumps. Jumping doesn't mean anything now apart maybe in SAB, dement clocktower or wintersday parkour. Eventually, they can add a no mount/glider buff the first time doing the puzzle, after it's removed.Now about map borders, yeah something is needed, but not within maps, small holes within maps have to be filled with collision or random asset.

[Tinker.6924]

I hate the idea of no mount zones. I think most invisible walls are necessary due to technical limitations and not for blocking fun. Walls aren't the end of the world when we run into them

[Tekoneiric.6817]

@EmmetOtter.8542 said:I hate the idea of no mount zones. I think most invisible walls are necessary due to technical limitations and not for blocking fun. Walls aren't the end of the world when we run into them

All maps have (not sure the technical term) what I call stutter barriers at the map edge. It's the barrier where you character starts doing stuttering movements. Those are sufficient to notify the player of a map edge. Invisible walls are haphazard at best and unjustified because the maps could just be properly finished. A lot of times they are to block areas without collision zones. Before the devs fixed Frostgorge Sound there was a chunk of the map in the center with invisible walls around it. The whole area had no collision layers on the textures and you would fall thru. On Hoelbrak they slapped no mount zones to keep players from going into areas where they didn't bother to put collision zones. I guess no one felt the need to fix the map but meanwhile we keep having to be dismounted on that side of the map for no good reason.

I developed a big distaste for invisible walls back in the Quake days. Something about the engine caused developers to use them a lot. On the other side I don't think I ever encountered one on the Unreal games. You could stand on tiny ledges.

[Random Wax Orc.7695]

Remove the no mount and no glide zones around JPs and give JPs adventure mechanics to be able to access the chests & get credit. The JP adventure mode can selectively block mounts, gliding, and even mesmer portals for all I care.

Invisible walls should be phased out, and removed when possible. Fireheart Rise is just an embarrassment of invisible walls.

Oh, and while anet is at it. Remove contested waypoints from PvE maps... except the Dragonstand meta waypoints. The Guild Puzzle waypoints should never be contested. Very little point in events contesting waypoints except in a few extreme cases.

[Tekoneiric.6817]

@Random Wax Orc.7695 said:Remove the no mount and no glide zones around JPs and give JPs adventure mechanics to be able to access the chests & get credit. The JP adventure mode can selectively block mounts, gliding, and even mesmer portals for all I care.

Invisible walls should be phased out, and removed when possible. Fireheart Rise is just an embarrassment of invisible walls.

Oh, and while anet is at it. Remove contested waypoints from PvE maps... except the Dragonstand meta waypoints. The Guild Puzzle waypoints should never be contested. Very little point in events contesting waypoints except in a few extreme cases.

Try navigating Dragon's Stand in a griffon, springer or now a skyscale. They put up so many invisible walls to keep people from crossing back and forth on different lanes. It's a crazy patchwork of jungle and invisible walls. On top of that you can't go to a map when the event is finished because you didn't partake in it so the result is you have to do the event to do map complete and good luck finding an instance that isn't full or a fail map. That map needs to be taken off the list of daily event maps in the short term.

Long term I'd like to see them rework the whole thing. They could add the unfinished lane and put each lane in it's own instance so that more people could partake in it then sync the event across the instances. They could make a pact staging area which has portals for the different lanes

[Egrista.5823]

I agree that invisible walls should be removed (of course except once which are around the zone). I think they completly ruin the experience of flying on gryphon because if you hit anything with it then you loose all the speed and its like you are not even aware that you will hit one soon so you are pretty surprised with it. About skyscale what people complain its not that bad because he keeps stable high and not flying fast so we can think of ways of flying somowhere around the wall, although I understand why no-mount zones in puzzles exist and I am not against those ones because they were suppose to be a challenge from all the beggining

[JekthAvid.1408]

Removing all invisible walls would break the game. There are some places you just don't get to access (Like that bridge in Brisban ?). While some are probably useless, plenty of these there for a reason

[Strider Pj.2193]

Holy necro’d thread Batman.....