Anyone else disappointed?

[BrotherBelial.3094]

The story was short, like really short. A total of 4 maps again, with not much happening on them at all, and lets not even start on trying to get an ST. I didn't expect anything going in, but their was so much wasted potential. The new "masteries" are pointless, the skiff, is kind of cool, but adds nothing we didn't already have. Everything just feels like "filler". The maps are beautiful, as they always are. but overall, I really can't see me wating to replay EoD

[Tiamat.8254]

I don't mind the story length. I was quite happy given the amount of new content. What I was disappointed by was the same old ending. Fight the dragons again on a platform 🤦‍♂️ just such a disappointment as it was good up until then. Also the story makes zero sense, but it never has...

[Gibson.4036]

I’ve been enjoying the maps, fishing, and I’m just starting to explore the new especs.

I was disappointed the story seemed short and choppy. Characters feel like they’re just getting built up to be interesting and then they are gone. We learn about new problems and then they are quickly solved.

I’m disappointed the siege turtle wasn’t unlocked early in the story to be used as we played it but instead put at the end.

Im most disappointed that ArenaNet has decided to push us into strikes, locking the turtle and Jade bot upgrades behind them. I see no reason why open world features should be locked behind instanced group content where you can’t even use them.

Edited March 14, 2022 by Gibson.4036

[ProtoGunner.4953]

Well, yes only four maps and rather short story, but I took my time and I like the atmosphere - especially Seitung, there is a lot of detail and the maps have lots of secrets. The quality of the story was great, dramatic, great presentation and voice acting. The overall quality was good. I like the masteries with jade bots, it's a cool addition and I have fun with the Vindicator (though the Mechanist is rather bland, have to try the rest).

Edited March 14, 2022 by ProtoGunner.4953

[yoni.7015]

I am not disappointed at all. I really enjoy EoD. The maps are even better than I thought. I like the events, many of the new collections. The strike missions are fun. I’m really enjoying Harbinger. The story was okay, nothing really great but it was like HoT and PoF. Is it that much shorter than the stories from previous expansions? 

Edited March 14, 2022 by yoni.7015

[Tukaram.8256]

I have been having more fun in Cantha than I have had in a long time.  I still do not like that fishing has a mini-game, but such is life.  Although, I think Cantha would have been a great place to launch a new profession...  a ninja or shogun, something. 😎

[Gibson.4036]

29 minutes ago, yoni.7015 said:

 Is it that much shorter than the stories from previous expansions? 

That's a good question. It may just feel like it with the way it sort of jumps over what feels like should be more story build. It'd be interesting to see how it actually measures out in comparison to the other two.

We also have the LW seasons that attach to both expansions to look back on, so maybe that's making it feel shorter, too.

[aspirine.6852]

I just wanted to go to Cantha. So I have one small dissapointment that is not valid, because I know they will probably fix this. Not all of Cantha is available yet. 

Some bugs that annoy me and forced content too, but I think they will fix this is later releases.

[BrotherBelial.3094]

20 hours ago, Gibson.4036 said:

I’ve been enjoying the maps, fishing, and I’m just starting to explore the new especs.

I was disappointed the story seemed short and choppy. Characters feel like they’re just getting built up to be interesting and then they are gone. We learn about new problems and then they are quickly solved.

I’m disappointed the siege turtle wasn’t unlocked early in the story to be used as we played it but instead put at the end.

Im most disappointed that ArenaNet has decided to push us into strikes, locking the turtle and Jade bot upgrades behind them. I see no reason why open world features should be locked behind instanced group content where you can’t even use them.

I agree, I have zero interest in strike missions/Raids. I really can't be bothered with the elitism and toxic environments that always accompany  "end game" content like that. Since adding raids Anet seem to be losing touch with what many day one players got the game for in the first place. locking content behind things like raids and strike missions is a bad idea, especially when the things locked behind them where selling points of the expansion. 

 

They want more people to play raids, I think because they have spent a lot of money on them with very little in way of players actually doing them. I mean unless you want the legendary Armor. So now they want to use strikes as a stepping stone to get more people doing them, and they are using the ST and JB as hooks to do that. problem is, that will not work. people with ether just flat out not do them, or once they have what they want. never touch them again. Only a small amount will play them over and over.

[Gorem.8104]

Yes, very. I wrote a better story in /say in the last instance so that I could actually feel epic doing the battles then the current Fanfic story from Twitter that is mostly alt-Tabbable dialogue instances where you can even afk the fights. Not to mention the badly balanced E-specs that hardly changed at all from beta 2, which I guess we are waiting for the mass balance patch to see any changes. Turtle being behind a raid boss meta that is not rewarding, the worst meta the game has ever seen. The lack of players in zones as they capped it so low, the lack of NPC's. Grothmar Valley is a better zone then anything we got in Cantha. Giant sprawling city that swears at you as you pick up boxes with hardly any commotion. 

Smaller maps then PoF, No Griffon or Skyscale adventures? Make them this vertical then not give us that? Sidequests apparently do exist but you need to find them, some of the side quests are even voiced but if you don't know about them you don't know about them. 

In this current state, when we are done in Cantha, the entire region will be abandoned. Cept for a quick stop in Arborstone to buy stones that are still dropping in price but worth it weekly. 

Edited March 15, 2022 by Gorem.8104

[mercury ranique.2170]

After I entered Kaineng City I took my time and do full completion of seitung. Just that place is amazing and very full and rich in details and events. Due to my personal time limits I then did the story to the end (and only just finished, just to say how little time I have to play). I have seen enough of the other maps as well to know they are as filled as Seitung and even more. So I'll enjoy playing them.

Another things that I love is that all four maps are very different. Obviously they all have an asian theme, but thats all thats the same. So, no, I'm not dissapointed at all. Just you need to realise there is more to the expansion then rushing the story.

[Eekasqueak.7850]

The metas fill the holes in a lot of parts of the story so if you skipped them it can seem choppy. 

[Ashantara.8731]

On 3/14/2022 at 1:27 PM, BrotherBelial.3094 said:

The story was short, like really short. A total of 4 maps again, with not much happening on them at all, and lets not even start on trying to get an ST. I didn't expect anything going in, but their was so much wasted potential. The new "masteries" are pointless, the skiff, is kind of cool, but adds nothing we didn't already have. Everything just feels like "filler". The maps are beautiful, as they always are. but overall, I really can't see me wating to replay EoD

I couldn't agree less. The emphases were just distributed differently than in previous expansions, but the contents are there. HoT's story can be played through in one evening as well when you have already uncovered all locations you need to go.

The Strikes are great and a lot of fun, there is so much new stuff to do, including the Masteries which are not pointless.

I'm on my third playthrough, by the way, with six more to follow.

The only thing I am truly disappointed in are the new Elite Specs. Most are plain awful and, to use your own words, pointless indeed.

[AliamRationem.5172]

50 minutes ago, Ashantara.8731 said:

I couldn't agree less. The emphases were just distributed differently than in previous expansions, but the contents are there. HoT's story can be played through in one evening as well when you have already uncovered all locations you need to go.

The Strikes are great and a lot of fun, there is so much new stuff to do, including the Masteries which are not pointless.

I'm on my third playthrough, by the way, with six more to follow.

The only thing I am truly disappointed in are the new Elite Specs. Most are plain awful and, to use your own words, pointless indeed.

The emphasis certainly seems different, but I disagree on the content.

The story was great, in my opinion.  Given that, I could have used more of it.  It seemed a little abrupt in how Mai Trin and Ankka were dealt with and then it was a rush to the final battle.  But overall I enjoyed it, so I can't complain.

Open world was a huge letdown for me.  Only Echovald and maybe Seitung even seem like finished maps.  Dragon's End has the worst design of any map they've ever produced, in my opinion.  Forcing us to grind copy/pasted events for an hour just to start a dragon's stand-style meta?  Why not just make it like DS and skip the copy/paste boredom?  Kaineng is just straight up unfinished.  It has a few copy/pasted events and a broken meta and that's it.  At least they finished the story and lore elements I guess?

Where is the content here, guys?  We couldn't even manage to finish 4 maps?  And did you not listen to any of the feedback on what sucked about PoF compared to its predecessor with regard to events and replay value?  Somehow you managed to make EoD an even worse offender.

Strikes seem good.  I think they're much more interesting than IBS strikes.  But there are only 4 of them and we've heard not a word about fractals, which is content I'm more likely to participate in than the 10-man stuff.  I'm also not sure how much I'm actually going to play these strikes in pickup groups either (which is about as much as I can be bothered to participate in strikes).  Harvest Tower seems too lengthy and difficult to bother with unless you're running with a group that knows their stuff already.

Elite specs were also a letdown.  They range from really questionable mechanics (mechanist, bladesworn) to pretty uninspired (virtuoso, untamed).  Aside from specter, I don't think any of these specs really stand out.  Pretty boring.

I'm afraid what this expansion really needed was more time.  If only they had started developing it as soon as the dust settled on PoF.  But NCsoft and ANet seem to have an extremely dysfunctional relationship that just doesn't allow for coherent planning.  It's a shame to ruin such a great game.

 

[Dawdler.8521]

6 hours ago, Gorem.8104 said:

Smaller maps then PoF, No Griffon or Skyscale adventures?

The skyscale was released about 1.5 years after PoF.

Assuming Anet keep going at the same pace, you've only seen half the expansion. The other half is living stories.

[Borked.6824]

As a whole I'm finding this expac to be tepid.  I really can't point at anything and say "oh wow that is awesome."  I'm probably an outlier, but even as a lore-enjoyer, the story did nothing for me.  The maps are plagued with linearity from meta events, and really just don't have a fullness in activity that allows people to meander.

For anyone similarly disappointed, I wonder how much of this is just residual disappointment stemming from literally all the new specs being garbage.  If we got PoF/HoT quality specs, would the flat and short story have been more enjoyable just by associating that pleasure and excitement?

Edited March 15, 2022 by Borked.6824

[ThaKrulll.4150]

10 hours ago, Eekasqueak.7850 said:

The metas fill the holes in a lot of parts of the story so if you skipped them it can seem choppy. 

Yeah.  Especially the echovald wilds meta events. A gang war breaks out and Ayumi rallies allies to stop them. During the fight with the gangs one of their machines gets corrupted by void and everyone has to team up to fight it. After the event is done the gangs make peace to face the bigger threat. And you can talk to them after the meta to hear some more lore stuff that leads into the Jade sea. 

[Razadune.9260]

11 hours ago, Eekasqueak.7850 said:

The metas fill the holes in a lot of parts of the story so if you skipped them it can seem choppy. 

    

If anyone is doing them. The maps feel empty and as often as not nobody even does the metas. It's frustrating so far.

[Pinkeh.4207]

Story was ok. Writing was ok. Love the first three maps, but the last map can get stuffed.  Got my turtle never going back. 

Edited March 16, 2022 by Pinkeh.4207

[Thombright.3529]

I was having fun with Cantha, super excited to play it. After getting into the story and playing the zones its underwhelming. The meta's  are horrid, most people do not want to be forced to raid. When i started playing guild wars it was a refreshing game considering i came from everquest. Where to get anywhere to had to have a good grp of friends or a raid guild. That is part of the reason i left the game. This expansion reminds me of that or at least the meta events do. I enjoy doing my own thing and if a grp of people is doing the meta i like to join in if a good grp is going. I don't want to feel like i have to be in a certain type of guild or group of people. High disappointed with this expansion. If they wanted people to focus on strike and raid type play they should look at making guild wars 3. That way they can build the game more focused on that type of play. Not slowly force player into it, which is how end of dragons feels.

[voltaicbore.8012]

9 hours ago, Borked.6824 said:

As a whole I'm finding this expac to be tepid.  I really can't point at anything and say "oh wow that is awesome."  I'm probably an outlier, but even as a lore-enjoyer, the story did nothing for me.  The maps are plagued with linearity from meta events, and really just don't have a fullness in activity that allows people to meander.

For anyone similarly disappointed, I wonder how much of this is just residual disappointment stemming from literally all the new specs being garbage.  If we got PoF/HoT quality specs, would the flat and short story have been more enjoyable just by associating that pleasure and excitement?

Even if every spec was awesome, that wouldn't be enough for me to ignore the lack of "fullness in activity" you so accurately mentioned. There are places you can walk through in Kaineng and everything just screams "we didn't have time to actually do this." The place could easily become just as lifelike as the core cities, but that will take some time and work (if ANet ever decides to addresss it at all).

I actually had a ton of fun with my mechanist and bladesworn, and even on those classes, Kaineng and Dragon's End just felt like unfinished maps. The amount of murderous fun I was having couldn't hide that.

Edited March 16, 2022 by voltaicbore.8012

[Bast.7253]

Yep. 

I did the Dragon's End meta just for exp earlier. I wondered around every corner of Kaening and Echovald the other day just out of boredom looking for little collection items or just trying events I hadn't done before. I was hoping I'd see something and be like, WOW. Instead I just wound up feeling like everywhere I went was a dead map or there was nothing to do but micro-events that aren't very engaging. 

The story - the worst yet. The technical delivery of the story with the cut scenes, the camera effects like landing on Shing Jea - really cool. The story felt short but I think the issue was the subject matter. We have a bunch of characters we're focused on far too much at the beginning because they seem to be more keen on character building than the lore/mysticism/fantasy that originally drew me into the game. 

As a veteran who has always been extremely intrigued by the elder dragon lore, having the chunk of the story dealing with Scarlett and Aetherblade nostalgia, Ankka who just... wants to be evil for the sake of being evil, and Joon who is just an amalgamation of Braham and Taimi or Li who is basically just another Caudecus with no real intrigue...

Then to end the story the way it did, after only having minor interaction with her the entire time.. all these pre-existing interesting factions and lore from Cantha's past get swept aside or pushed to collection items in favor of jade tech. Not just jade tech but forced mount and combat golem training. If they wanted to do this I feel like they should have saved it for side events, compensated the story in other ways, or just went full in and made Tengu playable and incorporated this in a starting area. (Yes, the last part is unrealistic and I never expected it.)

I also listen to Aurene's dialogue sometimes and it's like.. okay, this is cheesy af. Mainly the Dragon's End meta. And all I hear are the writers from guild chat putting their personality into Aurene. Even the voice and pronunciations sound... different to me for some reason. 

To me, it feels like the devs listened to feedback and fanfiction, made a list, and then threw it together last minute in their best attempt to push out an expansion. And I respect them for that given the pressure they've likely been under for the past few years, covid, and all the other obstacles they've faced. Development, deadlines, crunch time... is stressful beyond belief... 

That being said I think what they chose to focus on, how they made things fit, and the general plot of the story mixed with the masteries that seem to only exist to sell gemstore skins or in the case of the jade bot, for now, simply a way to provide jewelcrafters a way to make their craft useful again... 

I don't know. I've always been a huge fan and passionate about the game. My love for the game, their ideals and emphasis on inclusion and representation are what inspired my career change. Tyria and this game has got me through nearly a decade of severe depression and isolation. 

But I'm afraid this expansion severely misses the mark for me. Maybe it's stress, maybe it's the fact that I'm getting older.. maybe it's just that I don't have the time that I used to and can't enjoy the small things the way I used to but I feel like their design decisions since IBS have really left me feeling disconnected from the game.

I think the thing that bothers me most about their development process and releases is that they never seem to learn from the past. It's extremely inconsistent. Take these new crafting items for example, how many times have they retroactively added something to material storage because of player complaints about inventory clutter. Yet every release they do it again, and again, and again. That's only one MINOR inconsistency that really doesn't even bother me that much. Sometimes I think they try a little too hard to reinvent the wheel and they're more focused on doing things differently than they've done in the past than doing things that are beneficial to the player or gameplay. 

I've spouted a lot of hate about this expansion since release and I'm not trying to devalue the work they put into this expansion or the journey they've been through to get here. I'm just frustrated, because as you said, they had SO much potential just because of the location alone. 

I get that things will have changed over the past 250 years and resources are too tight to do the story they'd probably LIKE to tell, but I I've suffered through the story twice and I still don't even remember what I did in Echovald besides chat with people in Arborstone and battle Ankka. It's like we leave the reactor instance in Kaening and the story just takes this rushed nose dive towards the ending for the sake of "being done" with it. 

On the plus side I think they're entering a brand new era and the pacing at the studio may be a little less hectic now so we might start seeing them get their bearings back again. I know it's been tough and I think they've done a great job at listening to player feedback and making changes at a pretty rapid pace to address some quality of life issues in relation to the expansion but it would be nice if they would be a little more consistent. 

I love the story but I think there's just a lot of emphasis since IBS on trying to tell these elaborate character building stories and I'm sure some people are into that, but the story in EoD a little too disjointed the characters really weren't that interesting to me. But honestly, it's hard for me to get invested in new characters when we have Gorrik and Canach. 

I like skiffs but fishing annoys me so bad I rarely even use it, even with maxed masteries. I legit tried to catch a fish for like 30 minutes in Windswept yesterday and finally, after having the stupid bar bounce back and forth a dozen times a second I just couldn't keep up and gave up. Not really enjoyable or relaxing when I'm chasing some tiny bar tunnel visioning the screen and unable to appreciate the fact that I'm on my own boat, in a beautiful location somewhere. I don't really know what would improve it for me and it's mostly optional so it's not really a big deal but I think it might be worth spending some time revisiting this and finding a different approach that's more player friendly. 

The elite specs - Harbinger, Specter, Willbender - all incredibly fun for me and Willbender doesn't feel THAT different from core guard with teleports or shiro rev but it is a very nice flowing spec with a great pace.  The rest - lukewarm at best for me.

I still think Catalyst just needs to be gutted and reworked into a new spec. It has a "flow" to it but if I'm going for melee bruiser, Weaver does the job much better and far more enjoyably.

Untamed - I thought I would hate this and I'm not sure that it would be enjoyable without running very specific builds but it's still leagues better than Catalyst. 

I've always loved mesmer and thought it was one of the most unique classes in an mmo, but Virtuoso feels like an entirely different class and not in a good way. I think it plays fine, outside of the still incredibly awkward cast times on the elite and the shatters.. but I've tried condi grieving and viper, and power builds, and they just don't feel rewarding to me. It really just feels like I'm playing scepter ele but instead of channeling lightning on skill 1 I'm making long cast times for shatters. 

Vindicator - honestly just boring for me in pve. 

Mechanist - I haven't played around much but condi support seems to be a little more interesting than trying to run a power build. I think the biggest issue with this on me is that I feel like I'm just afk farming while my bot does everything for me and the mace skills, personally, feel a little out of place. I think I'd almost rather run rifle and auto or just use grenade kit. 

Bladesworn - gunblade feels like a hot mess and I'm not a warrior main to begin with but this is probably the spec I would put directly above Catalyst on the bottom of the list. I think the whole root and dragon slash thing is just a little too... "look at me I'm going super sayian isn't this cool?" and it just doesn't really have a purpose outside of strikes and raids if you're running the max charge version. I think I've collected more deaths just trying to figure out how to use this class in any viable setting than I ever did playing on core ele. 

I'd say one of the biggest issues I've had with elite specs is that some of the weapon choices and skill choices on those weapons just feels out of place or separated from the identity of the spec. For some, like Virtuoso, I feel like it could have been better with an off hand dagger option or a longbow. Catalyst - Umm.. I don't know.. figure out what you actually want to do with the spec before designing weapon skills. Why am I a melee bruiser with mixed range weapon skills? And not just mixed ranger but a negligible 600 yards with, frankly, boring skills.. one slot of which is dedicated to this orb mechanic that expires too quickly, forces you to be in range to do damage despite it being a mixed ranger weapon, and don't even get me started on the "jade sphere." 

The other big issue with these elite specs - the utilities often feel either so overloaded they're mandatory or they're so useless you wind up with most slots using core. 

Last but not least - GUILD HALLS. I wasted a 100 gold ready to capture this place, couldn't find a group unlike previous expansions, tried solo'ing it and couldn't... and finally watched a video of someone exploring post catpure. Personally, it looks dull and tiny to me. I'm sure there are interesting decorating possibilities but it looks like they may be intentionally trying to design guild halls with little need to decorate as possible because, frankly, I feel like they're just tired of dealing with it. 

Here's the problem, if you're listening - It's an abandoned feature and I get it. It was what partially made me fall in love with the game and I've spent thousands of gold across three guild halls decorating and creating my own scenes, enjoying the sandbox life. But scribing is and always has been too expensive, guild upgrades have always been too expensive and grindy, and the actual decorating tool is TERRIBLE and always has been. 

If you don't plan on expanding this feature, please for the sake of new players entering your game, make them affordable enough that even one person wanting a supplementary home instance can upgrade one to full restoration. Stop making convoluted scribe recipes and just sell the decorations from unique vendors throughout the world like you did during the Lake Doric release. Also, if you can't increase the decoration limit I believe that giving the decorating tool the ability to rotate axis, and adding somekind of arcing target ability with a tether indication and allowing people to place decorations without needing solid ground to place them on would be HUGE improvements to the system. Maybe there are technical limitations, maybe it's just not deemed worth the resources. But even after all these years this feature still has potential, but some of that potential may not be worth the effort until you make them more affordable. 

Guild content in general - for an expansion with siege turtles and strike mission focus, there is yet to be a single new guild mission related to either of the new game types Path of Fire or End of Dragons introduced. Guild missions, if I'm not mistaken, haven't been updated since core. I suspect this is probably some legacy code issue and I totally get it, but if you have the time and resources and are looking for community engaging teamwork based ways to improve the game over this expansion, maybe this would be a good place to start putting some of that innovative thinking in. 

I know this is a wall of text nobody will read, but I'll drop it here because I haven't given Arenanet my 2 cents yet today. Despite it all I'm not very technically saavy or "hip" and am too lazy to google the markup so I'll just put *laughing crying emjoi". 

To a new beginning and smoother sailing ahead!
 

[Lupini.6938]

The art department did a fabulous job.  Honestly, even if one doesn't like all of the trees in Echovold, it has to be recognized that the time they put into the look of everything was worth it.

The story was kind of a foregone conclusion.  Some of the details were unique and unexpected, but there was a lot of foreshadowing in the past parts of the game, so the story didn't knock my socks off.

Various game mechanics though...honestly, it feels like this was a totally new crew that was missing continuity.  So many aspects of game play that we've complained about and they have acknowledged were added back in again.  Simple "quality of life" aspects that we've come to expect will always be included were left out.  Add in "mechanics bloat" to many of the big events, and I have to admit I'm disappointed.

[Zok.4956]

22 hours ago, Gorem.8104 said:

that is mostly alt-Tabbable dialogue instances where you can even afk the fights.

I was actually AFK and it worked. 😎

During the boss fight in Arborstone (when I played the story instances alone) I went AFK because I had to take a phone call. When I came back to the game around 10-15 minutes later, my NPC "henchmen" killed the boss for me.

[Zok.4956]

6 hours ago, Thombright.3529 said:

If they wanted people to focus on strike and raid type play they should look at making guild wars 3. That way they can build the game more focused on that type of play. Not slowly force player into it, which is how end of dragons feels.

Maybe they are already doing this and the DE meta (and the next Living World) will be a preparation/build for GW3 which will be some hardcore raid/PvP game.
Anet is still looking for several devs/designers that have experience with the unreal engine and I doubt that the GW2 engine will be changed. So they are again working on  "unannounced projects".

Edited March 16, 2022 by Zok.4956