Can you not lock important content behind story?

[EpicName.4523]

I have never been particularly fond of the story in GW2. Let's face it, the writing and the characters aren't appealing to anyone over 10. Sorry, but that is the truth and every time a new living world map is released, I feel forced to endure the story content in order to play the new map. 

 

However, this isn't much of an issue when you can simply start the story, listen to a few conversations, fight a bit and hopefully leave with the new area unlocked. No more.

 

As a returning player due to the newly announced expansion, I tried the last episode of Icebrood saga(only one I have) and it was a horrible TORTURE.  Just finished the Gendarran defence and have a hard time pushing myself through this any further.  Almost every mission is some kind of mind boggling grindfest where you have to kill a boss with HUGEEE health pool while surviving ENDLESS mob waves...Who thought this was fun? 

 

Why am I whining? Who put a gun to my head to make me play it if I dislike this so much? Well, tons of mastery points are locked behind this horror and you can't get points unless you survive the kitten inducing process. What is worse, I can't just enter, get the point and leave, I have to stay and kill in order to go further into the map to reach the mastery point without getting kicked from the instance. 

 

My point is simple. If someone likes to grind Diablo style over and over again - more power to them. Can the ability to get important bonuses like mastery points, not be locked behind the...story in the next seasons? Pretty please?

[Warscythes.9307]

4 minutes ago, EpicName.4523 said:

I have never been particularly fond of the story in GW2. Let's face it, the writing and the characters aren't appealing to anyone over 10. Sorry, but that is the truth and every time a new living world map is released, I feel forced to endure the story content in order to play the new map. 

 

However, this isn't much of an issue when you can simply start the story, listen to a few conversations, fight a bit and hopefully leave with the new area unlocked. No more.

 

As a returning player due to the newly announced expansion, I tried the last episode of Icebrood saga(only one I have) and it was a horrible TORTURE.  Just finished the Gendarran defence and have a hard time pushing myself through this any further.  Almost every mission is some kind of mind boggling grindfest where you have to kill a boss with HUGEEE health pool while surviving ENDLESS mob waves...Who thought this was fun? 

 

Why am I whining? Who put a gun to my head to make me play it if I dislike this so much? Well, tons of mastery points are locked behind this horror and you can't get points unless you survive the kitten inducing process. What is worse, I can't just enter, get the point and leave, I have to stay and kill in order to go further into the map to reach the mastery point without getting kicked from the instance. 

 

My point is simple. If someone likes to grind Diablo style over and over again - more power to them. Can the ability to get important bonuses like mastery points, not be locked behind the...story in the next seasons? Pretty please?

This sounds more like you are having difficulty with the mission than anything else.

 

If you don't do any CM the missions are all relatively simple. What class/build are you running? GW2 by design is not a super easy game, if you just slap on random pieces of gear and traits then sometimes you just lose.

[EpicName.4523]

7 minutes ago, Warscythes.9307 said:

This sounds more like you are having difficulty with the mission than anything else.

 

If you don't do any CM the missions are all relatively simple. What class/build are you running? GW2 by design is not a super easy game, if you just slap on random pieces of gear and traits then sometimes you just lose.

 

It's not difficulty that makes this annoying to me and I agree the game is easy. Problem is that there is certain kind of content I find quite poorly designed and If I try to skip it, I put all of the characters on my account at a notable disadvantage. 

[Warscythes.9307]

Just now, EpicName.4523 said:

 

It's not difficulty that makes this annoying to me and I agree the game is easy. Problem is that there is certain kind of content I find quite poorly designed and If I try to skip it, I put all of the characters on my account at a notable disadvantage. 

I mean you are talking about endless waves and bosses with huge hp. The thing is though that even as solo I mostly sleep walked through it, the waves die easily and boss also phases quickly. Is a very standard 5 wave defense with a boss at the end. With a decent build then this is quite literally a slightly tougher open world random event. My biggest gripe for it is more that the missions are all very similar with the structure of pre-event, escort, sometimes defense, wave. But the basic concept is fine as this is just a couple random event all sticked together.

[Ferret.3087]

I definitely agree as a returning player in terms of the story there definitely needs to be some sort of option to skip the constant dialogue, especially when so many maps require you to go through some of these horrific story missions. I've been playing Guild Wars for 15 years and the story has always been horrible, and that is putting it nicely. The writing in terms of characters, dialogue, story plots has always been "after school special" feeling, and is geared towards 10-12 year olds. 

 

What Arena Net does well is world building, and lore building. The world is so interesting and every map is a great experience to go through, but please don't make me sit through Taimi's dragon magic tech mumbo jumbo.

[BlueJin.4127]

Not being able to skip uninteresting dialogues does more than drag out the story missions; it just puts me in a foul mood that makes the rest of the story feel like a chore, too. After sitting through 5 minutes of uninteresting dialogues with almost no gameplay, I just want to get the heck out of this stupid story instance. When I finally get to some gameplay in the story instance, instead of being glad, I'll just not be in the mood for an HP sponge with annoying mechanics that drags things out.

Edited September 1, 2021 by BlueJin.4127

[Gibson.4036]

1 hour ago, EpicName.4523 said:

I have never been particularly fond of the story in GW2. Let's face it, the writing and the characters aren't appealing to anyone over 10. Sorry, but that is the truth and every time a new living world map is released, I feel forced to endure the story content in order to play the new map. 

I'm 48. I've rolled my eyes many times during the story, level 1 to season 5, but I've also had times where I laughed, developed affection for a character, and even been emotionally touched. Maybe I have the tastes of a 10 year old. My kids wouldn't agree with that, though.

Oddly, it's not the story, but the weird repetitiveness of post EotN Icebrood Saga missions that has turned me off to them. I've been spacing them out quite a bit, since it became clear that all the "story" left was, "hey, attacks in this new-old part of the world, go escort a few denizens to safety, power up some things, then fight a boss". Every once in a while I go do another, typically with one or two other players at most who happened to join the public story version, then go back to do other things for a while.

From my vantage, it's that the story kinda disappeared, or got artificially stretched out that made Icebrood Saga lose my interest.

Edited September 1, 2021 by Gibson.4036

[Blocki.4931]

None of the strike missions are difficult at all. They are properly scaled and without challenges active any person spamming 1 can beat them in 20 minutes.

[Gibson.4036]

43 minutes ago, Warscythes.9307 said:

I mean you are talking about endless waves and bosses with huge hp. The thing is though that even as solo I mostly sleep walked through it, the waves die easily and boss also phases quickly. Is a very standard 5 wave defense with a boss at the end. With a decent build then this is quite literally a slightly tougher open world random event. My biggest gripe for it is more that the missions are all very similar with the structure of pre-event, escort, sometimes defense, wave. But the basic concept is fine as this is just a couple random event all sticked together.

Agreed. Feels very copy-pasted.

[Acelidon.1358]

Oh boy

Wait until you find out about the 'return to' content 

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

What Icebrood Saga Masteries do you feel you must have?

The only one that one might feel is important, I'd think, is United Legions Waystation Synchronization.

 

If you really feel that is that important, wait until the other Chapters are released at no cost, and pick up the few Mastery Points needed, then. 

[radda.8920]

the saga is terrible in terms of story and if I understood correctly you are talking about DRM so the worst content added in the history of gw1 and gw2

Normal that you find that atrocious.

[DanAlcedo.3281]

Everytime I read Gw2 has grind in it or any kind of difficulty in its story content, Im asking myself if the person has ever played another game before. 

 

Edited September 2, 2021 by DanAlcedo.3281
Spelling

[Ultramex.1506]

6 hours ago, radda.8920 said:

the saga is terrible in terms of story and if I understood correctly you are talking about DRM so the worst content added in the history of gw1 and gw2

Normal that you find that atrocious.

Yep, DRMs are complete joke as a content. I say that a lot but its bear repeating because it really is.

[Konrad Curze.5130]

3 hours ago, DanAlcedo.3281 said:

Everytime I read Gw2 has grind on it or any kind of difficulty in its story content, Im asking myself if the person has ever played another game before. 

 

tbh Gw2 balance is so enormously, ludicrously out of whack that its hard to dismiss complains of difficulty entirely

 

you hear 2 people complaining about hard story/open world content. one of them play condi scourge. the other a zerker pWeaver.

 

That people's experience is more different than a raider vs a rper

Edited September 2, 2021 by Konrad Curze.5130

[shrew.3059]

11 hours ago, Ferret.3087 said:

The writing in terms of characters, dialogue, story plots has always been "after school special" feeling, and is geared towards 10-12 year olds. 

 

I don’t love the story elements in GW2, but I don’t get this familiar criticism. Which MMOs have good stories that are well-written? Do we need another video game where edgelord antiheroes battle “soul corruption” and demons? More mature themes probably aren’t easy to handle in the MMO format; as much as I may want Hamlet: MMO, it’s unlikely to happen.

Edited September 2, 2021 by shrew.3059

[The Boz.2038]

12 hours ago, EpicName.4523 said:

 

It's not difficulty that makes this annoying to me and I agree the game is easy. Problem is that there is certain kind of content I find quite poorly designed and If I try to skip it, I put all of the characters on my account at a notable disadvantage. 

So... soldier's gear?

[ASP.8093]

… You are just doing the public instances with five players, right?

[Zavijah.2695]

People that complain about story, and yet still here. /facepalm

You want bad story? Try BFA or Shadowlands. Please... tell us your thoughts on how BDO storywise is in comparison to this?
Also, talking about timeframe to get through things? Come back to me when you've done Heavensward, Stormblood and Shadowbringers - THEN tell me what's long on tooth. 

You have no idea.... zero.

You should be thankful for all of the components that make up the game you *clearly* love, if you have spent as much time in the game as you say you have. 

With critical thinking, I can rationalise Why Icebrood Saga was not as fleshed out as the Mordremoth build given it was during the first year of covid when life paused for Everyone. Developers included - also while trying to build an expansion in the background.  What surprises me is why you can't you figure that out, and have some grace about it?
 

[Kabeljau.3106]

I think everyone can agree, that the last episode of the Icebrood Saga sucked. but you really don't have to play it. The masteries in the Icebrood saga, except maybe the United Legions Waystation, are only useful inside of the Icebrood Saga content itself. and if you don't want to play the icebrood saga, then why do you have the urge to get the masteries? maybe you want essence manipulation for the chests in bjora marches, or something else, and for that the mastery points you get from the other Icebrood Saga maps should be sufficient. just collect all insights and do a few achievements

[ASP.8093]

Wait wait wait, the actual complaint here is that the DRMs have mastery insight points in the map instances (like some of the raid maps do)?

 

They're Icebrood Saga mastery points! If you hate DRMs you can just skip the whole Dragon Slayer tree, it's all just DRM stuff.

[Danikat.8537]

5 hours ago, DanAlcedo.3281 said:

Everytime I read Gw2 has grind on it or any kind of difficulty in its story content, Im asking myself if the person has ever played another game before. 

 

These days 'grind' seems to be used to mean "anything I don't want to do". Not just here, I see it used that way when talking about all kinds of games.

 

DRMs can be a grind in the sense that if you want all the rewards you will need to repeat each of them multiple times to get enough Tyrian Defence Seals (although some of those rewards are available from other places as well, like the auric and kodan weapons).

 

But if you just want mastery points there's no need to do that. If you're not going to do DRMs much you can skip the Dragon Slayer mastery track since it's only useful in DRMs, so that's 20 fewer points required. The mastery insight ones only require you to do each DRM once and there's only 6 other points earned from DRMs.

 

In total there's 77 IBS mastery points available and it costs 63 to train all the mastery tracks (including Dragon Slayer) so in theory you could skip the 6 from DRM achievements and still train all the masteries, but again there's no need to get Dragon Slayer if you're not doing DRMs.

[Ferret.3087]

1 hour ago, shrew.3059 said:

 

I don’t love the story elements in GW2, but I don’t get this familiar criticism. Which MMOs have good stories that are well-written? Do we need another video game where edgelord antiheroes battle “soul corruption” and demons? More mature themes probably aren’t easy to handle in the MMO format; as much as I may want Hamlet: MMO, it’s unlikely to happen.

Fair point, to be honest I wasn't comparing the story to other MMOs, I don't really care if other MMOs have good stories or not, and to answer your question LOTRO has pretty good plot points IMO.

Can't speak for other people but I personally am not even asking for a better story as I know some people enjoy it and its a matter of taste. I just want a way to skip the horrible dialogue that just honestly makes me mad to sit through and frustrated when every single mission has a bunch of dialogue from characters I don't care about, with some non sensical plot points. I'm fine to do the mission thats part of the game but don't waste my time with the plot

[shrew.3059]

6 minutes ago, Ferret.3087 said:

Fair point, to be honest I wasn't comparing the story to other MMOs, I don't really care if other MMOs have good stories or not, and to answer your question LOTRO has pretty good plot points IMO.

Can't speak for other people but I personally am not even asking for a better story as I know some people enjoy it and its a matter of taste. I just want a way to skip the horrible dialogue that just honestly makes me mad to sit through and frustrated when every single mission has a bunch of dialogue from characters I don't care about, with some non sensical plot points. I'm fine to do the mission thats part of the game but don't waste my time with the plot

 

LOTRO probably has the advantage of strong source material, but that’s only an uninformed guess on my part.

 

I fully agree with the skip request. It’s not that I hate the story, but given the replayable nature of the story and how ENORMOUSLY CHATTY the later missions are, sometimes I just feel like my character is secretly screaming “get on with it”. If I have to redo a mission for achievements or an alt, it can be annoying to have to listen to character banter for the umpteenth time. Even if the dialogue was better, there would still be a point where I just don’t care anymore because I’ve heard it all before.

[Gehenna.3625]

12 hours ago, Blocki.4931 said:

None of the strike missions are difficult at all. They are properly scaled and without challenges active any person spamming 1 can beat them in 20 minutes.

What do Strike Missions have to do with the story? Or did you mean Dragon Response Missions?