Returning Player - How much of the old story can i still experience?

[Blazer.3792]

Heyo, this is going to be...broad, so i do apologise, but would be grateful for any help

I played GW2 on launch, but sadly my friends drifted from it and i couldn't get my momentum going, so i never reached the end of the base games plot, i got a bit of the way into the personal story and that was about it.

Now i've kept vaguely abreast of the plot, but the biggest thing that's always kept me from coming back was that people have told me that, due to it being living world, all the things that i haven't experienced in the past like...decade, are no longer there for new players - the world exists in its current state and there's no "time bubble" for new players to progress through, seeing all that story as it happened.

I've mostly accepted that, but i feel like trying again and i wanted to see exactly what i would and wouldn't be able to actually play through - story is the most interesting part of the game for me, so it always feels yuck to be left feeling like i've missed out on important and interesting plot; is anyone able to summarise for me which bits i wouldn't actually be able to experience anymore? Or how to go about experiencing it all in the correct order?

[Jukhy.2431]

Majority of the story is accessible if you have it unlocked. You can see it in chronological order in the ingame Story Journal or in the wiki page. Only part missing is the Living World Season 1 (Scarlet's War) but the latest patch added the first part "Flame and Frost" and they will add more in later patches so those who missed it can play it too.

Edited April 20, 2022 by Jukhy.2431

[Danikat.8537]

You can play almost the entire story, more than you could a couple of days ago and more will be coming back soon.

Anet stopped doing temporary releases in April 2014, everything since then has either been permanently available or festivals which come back for a few weeks at the same time each year. They've just started re-releasing the stuff from the first year which was only available temporarily and this time it's going to be permanent too.

The downside is you will need to pay for any expansions and Living World (DLC) releases you haven't already got. Expansions have to be bought with real money but the LW stuff can be bought in the gem store, so you can convert gold to get it. If your priority is playing the story in order you can wait until you reach each release before buying it. Although I recommend buying the season bundles of LW episodes because they're slightly cheaper and buying the expansions together because they're cheaper that way too. You might also want to look out for sales.

The full story order (which is shown in-game in the story journal) is:

• Personal story - starts at level 10, has a chapter every 10 levels until 80 then 3 or 4 chapters to finish it off)
• Living World Season 1 - Episode 1 is available now, another 4 episodes will be coming over the next few months
• Living World Season 2
• Heart of Thorns - First expansion
• Living World Season 3
• Path of Fire - Second expansion
• Living World Season 4
• Icebrood Saga - aka Living World Season 5
• End of Dragons - Third expansion
• Living World Season 6 - not yet fully announced, but we know more is coming, probably later this year

If you want absolutely everything there's also other parts of the game which tie into the story. For example the core game dungeons' story paths are interspaced into the personal story and tie into some steps (particularly the level 40 and level 80 parts) and one of the explorable paths in Twilight Arbor ties into Season 1. There's a series of 'side story' achievements which also tie into Season 3 and 4, they're not directly part of the story but can help give you more of a sense of the impact the events of the story are having on the world as a whole.

Now that Season 1 is coming back I think the only thing which isn't available is the Lost Shores weekend event which introduced Southsun Cove and the karka, but the map itself is still available, so all you're missing is seeing the characters reacting to it's discovery for the first time.

[Blazer.3792]

3 hours ago, Danikat.8537 said:

You can play almost the entire story, more than you could a couple of days ago and more will be coming back soon.

Anet stopped doing temporary releases in April 2014, everything since then has either been permanently available or festivals which come back for a few weeks at the same time each year. They've just started re-releasing the stuff from the first year which was only available temporarily and this time it's going to be permanent too.

The downside is you will need to pay for any expansions and Living World (DLC) releases you haven't already got. Expansions have to be bought with real money but the LW stuff can be bought in the gem store, so you can convert gold to get it. If your priority is playing the story in order you can wait until you reach each release before buying it. Although I recommend buying the season bundles of LW episodes because they're slightly cheaper and buying the expansions together because they're cheaper that way too. You might also want to look out for sales.

The full story order (which is shown in-game in the story journal) is:

• Personal story - starts at level 10, has a chapter every 10 levels until 80 then 3 or 4 chapters to finish it off)
• Living World Season 1 - Episode 1 is available now, another 4 episodes will be coming over the next few months
• Living World Season 2
• Heart of Thorns - First expansion
• Living World Season 3
• Path of Fire - Second expansion
• Living World Season 4
• Icebrood Saga - aka Living World Season 5
• End of Dragons - Third expansion
• Living World Season 6 - not yet fully announced, but we know more is coming, probably later this year

If you want absolutely everything there's also other parts of the game which tie into the story. For example the core game dungeons' story paths are interspaced into the personal story and tie into some steps (particularly the level 40 and level 80 parts) and one of the explorable paths in Twilight Arbor ties into Season 1. There's a series of 'side story' achievements which also tie into Season 3 and 4, they're not directly part of the story but can help give you more of a sense of the impact the events of the story are having on the world as a whole.

Now that Season 1 is coming back I think the only thing which isn't available is the Lost Shores weekend event which introduced Southsun Cove and the karka, but the map itself is still available, so all you're missing is seeing the characters reacting to it's discovery for the first time.

Thank you!

That's super helpful information, and definitely gives me a bit of a foundation to work off, cheers =3

[Linken.6345]

6 minutes ago, Blazer.3792 said:

Thank you!

That's super helpful information, and definitely gives me a bit of a foundation to work off, cheers =3

If you dident login when the seasons were running you will need to buy to unlock them with gems got through in game gold or cash.

 

[Blazer.3792]

1 minute ago, Linken.6345 said:

If you dident login when the seasons were running you will need to buy to unlock them with gems got through in game gold or cash.

 

Yeah i had figured as much, but ah well, can't have everything - it's good enough to hear that they're playable at all

[Kaltyn of Torbins Deep.294]

2 hours ago, Blazer.3792 said:

Yeah i had figured as much, but ah well, can't have everything - it's good enough to hear that they're playable at all

The way Anet did the living world season episodes for seasons 3, 4, and IBS, and presumably will for season 6, is if you login while it is the current release, you unlock it on your account, even if you don't have the corresponding expansion required to play it (HoT for season 3, PoF for Season 4 and IBS, and, presumably, EoD for season 6).  Once you have the corresponding expansion, those LW episodes become playable.  They recently introduced a "return to season of dragons" that basically re-released all the expansion episodes (including season 2) with a bunch of new achievements tied to them and also unlocked them for free.  I don't know if they'll do another LWS high-light release again, but, if they do, I'd expect it around the time they do the Steam release.

Those "return to..." achievements (under the Side Stories section on the Achievements panel) are really easy and have some decent rewards.  A free 32 slot bag, a token for a free gen 3 pre-cursor (and you can sell the token for 5 gold, you don't need it to get the pre once you get the token for the achievements), and, when you get all of the return achievements completed, a free legendary amulet.