[Suggestion]: "Living World 0.8 Memories of Zhaitan"

[Kite.2510]

I've heard that part 6 of season 3 was unintentional, and was made to cover up a delay on PoF.An existing problem of the Vanila GW2 is that it's finale leaves a lot to be desired. I'm not talking just about the Final Instance (ex Arah story path) with the unfinished fight with Zhaitan, but about Orr in general. We paid players have moved on from Orr a long time ago, but new and potentially paying players get a REALLY bad impression from playing it.

So what if.... in a potential gap due to such a delay of an expansion, instead of a new map with a filler story, the team instead focus on reworking the old Orr maps , their story and events with all the tricks they've learned until now. By that, I mean, Adding huge Meta events with big battles similar to Silver wastes and Dragon Stand, in addition to map mechanics (where the smaller events contribute to the ongoing war), unique currency and big bosses for those who do the meta well, and. When the meta of a map is defeated, I the map whould get perhaps some graphical change on the map for defeating the corruption and after a few minutes the Orrias would launch repeated attacks of ever increasing difficulty to take back the areas until the players are eventually defeated, but at the same time every time they manage to hold up they would give increasingly larger rewards (this one is to avoid the Dragon's Stand fiasco of just tossing everyone out of the map).Such treatment I would expect from the Story at on those maps, and especially from the Final Fight.

While working on the "free player's" content seems like a waste of resource's, I believe it's much more damaging leaving the old world to it's fate and not giving the new players a taste of how things have improved since then. Besides, the maps already exist!

[Rognik.2579]

As good an idea of reworking old maps, I'm going to refer you to the comments they make about bringing back the Season 1 content: "We are better served making new content that all players can enjoy than reworking old content that only some of the player base will actually play", or words to that effect. No matter how much you rework the map or make satisfying rewards for replaying the Orr content, a high percentage of people will say, "I've already done that" and move on. You point to the Silverwastes as an example of a map done well, but how many people are still playing it compared to when it was the newest map? How much did the population drop off between the end of Season 2 and the launch of HoT? I'm not saying the map, or any of the maps for that matter, are dead, but it's a fraction of the coordinated groups that once inhabited them. It's not worth it to ArenaNet, in their eyes and according to their own words, to rework any of the old maps unless they're adding something like a Current Event (or Side Story as they are now called).

As for the comment that Siren's Landing is a filler map, I respectfully disagree. We had heard from pretty early in the Season 3 cycle that there would be 6 chapters, and it would have been a bit strange to only have 5 chapters when they had 3 teams working on the different maps and the third team only made one of them. If they had, they would have needed to make a map WAY better than Bitterfrost Frontier is. (Note: I'm not saying it's a bad map, but it's not a spectacular one that people will be raving about for years.) Also, what about it seems filler to you? The story wrapped up the loose thread about Lazarus, which in conjunction with the White Mantle story line is arguably the core of the Season 3 plot, but it also explained more about the status of Orr without having to undo all the content from the three Orrian maps we already had. I like the fact that some sylvari feel a kinship with the Unbound Risen (however misguided those feelings may be), and it shows just how many minions each dragon has made that even now, there are hundreds to slaughter years after its death. I personally enjoy returning to Orr, even a small portion of it, and not just because I decided my human had Orrian blood in her. (For the record, that's not a new decision, either. My GW1 character was Orrian, who left Orr before the Searing and the Cataclysm to help Ascalon fight off the charr.) There's lots of lore that gets scattered around Orr, being the oldest human settlement in the Tyrian area and being lost to us by the time we played GW1. It's the only place they can make references to Abaddon, which wouldn't have been long-destroyed because of his disgrace eons ago.

[Kite.2510]

@Rognik.2579 said:As good an idea of reworking old maps, I'm going to refer you to the comments they make about bringing back the Season 1 content: "We are better served making new content that all players can enjoy than reworking old content that only some of the player base will actually play", or words to that effect. No matter how much you rework the map or make satisfying rewards for replaying the Orr content, a high percentage of people will say, "I've already done that" and move on. You point to the Silverwastes as an example of a map done well, but how many people are still playing it compared to when it was the newest map? How much did the population drop off between the end of Season 2 and the launch of HoT? I'm not saying the map, or any of the maps for that matter, are dead, but it's a fraction of the coordinated groups that once inhabited them. It's not worth it to ArenaNet, in their eyes and according to their own words, to rework any of the old maps unless they're adding something like a Current Event (or Side Story as they are now called).

Does the "All players" include the free ones?Regardless, with it being the best content a free player can find and the support of the mega servers, three Meta heavy maps could easily stay filled, especially since they've now learned their lesson and most large metas can be completed with 20-25 players if properly spreaded.Also as I said, allowing this old flawed anticlimactic content being all free players experience makes it harder for them to jump the pay wagon. However if the game ends in such a high note, then it would do wonders as advertisement. They might as well toss a trailer for Heart of thorns or LWS1 & 2 after it.As for old paying players like us, If they rework the story in today's standards with achievements, the much MUCH improved voice acting, the better final battle, and new mechanics, it'll feel surprisingly newish. Especially if they do some good work on those maps, with some new graphics, better metas, slight changes on the geometry to be less tedious and taking into account the gliders and mounts new players might have. (imagine your player due the Dragon's corruption watching Orr from the distance as undestroyed, until he/she gets close enough to see the ruins, or imagine once the meta is beaten the cloud opening up to allow sunlight to go through).

@Rognik.2579 said:As for the comment that Siren's Landing is a filler map, I respectfully disagree. We had heard from pretty early in the Season 3 cycle that there would be 6 chapters, and it would have been a bit strange to only have 5 chapters when they had 3 teams working on the different maps and the third team only made one of them. If they had, they would have needed to make a map WAY better than Bitterfrost Frontier is. (Note: I'm not saying it's a bad map, but it's not a spectacular one that people will be raving about for years.) Also, what about it seems filler to you? The story wrapped up the loose thread about Lazarus, which in conjunction with the White Mantle story line is arguably the core of the Season 3 plot, but it also explained more about the status of Orr without having to undo all the content from the three Orrian maps we already had. I like the fact that some sylvari feel a kinship with the Unbound Risen (however misguided those feelings may be), and it shows just how many minions each dragon has made that even now, there are hundreds to slaughter years after its death. I personally enjoy returning to Orr, even a small portion of it, and not just because I decided my human had Orrian blood in her. (For the record, that's not a new decision, either. My GW1 character was Orrian, who left Orr before the Searing and the Cataclysm to help Ascalon fight off the charr.) There's lots of lore that gets scattered around Orr, being the oldest human settlement in the Tyrian area and being lost to us by the time we played GW1. It's the only place they can make references to Abaddon, which wouldn't have been long-destroyed because of his disgrace eons ago.

, and it kind of stands. They might had decided to include it pretty early but it's clearly an extra, and don't forget we had that yearly long content drought, so the "early" part can still be a year later. After all, according to the video, the words come from the developers. They just took the opportunity to tie some loose ends, that might as well had appeared at a later story part.

[Rognik.2579]

@Kite.2510 said:

@Rognik.2579 said:As good an idea of reworking old maps, I'm going to refer you to the comments they make about bringing back the Season 1 content: "We are better served making new content that all players can enjoy than reworking old content that only some of the player base will actually play", or words to that effect. No matter how much you rework the map or make satisfying rewards for replaying the Orr content, a high percentage of people will say, "I've already done that" and move on. You point to the Silverwastes as an example of a map done well, but how many people are still playing it compared to when it was the newest map? How much did the population drop off between the end of Season 2 and the launch of HoT? I'm not saying the map, or any of the maps for that matter, are dead, but it's a fraction of the coordinated groups that once inhabited them. It's not worth it to ArenaNet, in their eyes and according to their own words, to rework any of the old maps unless they're adding something like a Current Event (or Side Story as they are now called).

Does the "All players" include the free ones?Regardless, with it being the best content a free player can find and the support of the mega servers, three Meta heavy maps could easily stay filled, especially since they've now learned their lesson and most large metas can be completed with 20-25 players if properly spreaded.The developers probably have an even harder time justifying doing something for just the free-to-play players than doing something for F2P and paid players. Unless there are new achievements or other rewards to motivate older players to return to Orr, there will still be very few who actively go back there to do it. Even then, the players will probably go there for the goals, grab them, and disappear again. Still not enough motivation to stay.Also as I said, allowing this old flawed anticlimactic content being all free players experience makes it harder for them to jump the pay wagon. However if the game ends in such a high note, then it would do wonders as advertisement. They might as well toss a trailer for Heart of thorns or LWS1 & 2 after it.I've watched a few new players who started streaming their progress in the game, and most of them had bought the game very quickly. If a player has made it all the way to Orr with a level 80 character and not bought the game, they either are never going to buy the game or so dedicated, they're likely to buy the game just so they can see how it improves. Have you ever tried playing on a free character? No map chat, whispers and mail only with mutual friends, no trading post, only 2 extra bags, only 2 character slots. It's incredibly restricting.As for old paying players like us, If they rework the story in today's standards with achievements, the much MUCH improved voice acting, the better final battle, and new mechanics, it'll feel surprisingly newish. Especially if they do some good work on those maps, with some new graphics, better metas, slight changes on the geometry to be less tedious and taking into account the gliders and mounts new players might have. (imagine your player due the Dragon's corruption watching Orr from the distance as undestroyed, until he/she gets close enough to see the ruins, or imagine once the meta is beaten the cloud opening up to allow sunlight to go through).The whole map will never be remade from the ground up. They could add new achievements, maybe rescript some of the events, and improve the rewards (which are already fairly unimpressive), but that's the extent of it. What you're expecting is a Cataclysm-style reboot, and doing so means that they aren't building new maps like the Living World or Path of Fire ones. That's not going to happen.

@Rognik.2579 said:As for the comment that Siren's Landing is a filler map, I respectfully disagree. We had heard from pretty early in the Season 3 cycle that there would be 6 chapters, and it would have been a bit strange to only have 5 chapters when they had 3 teams working on the different maps and the third team only made one of them. If they had, they would have needed to make a map WAY better than Bitterfrost Frontier is. (Note: I'm not saying it's a bad map, but it's not a spectacular one that people will be raving about for years.) Also, what about it seems filler to you? The story wrapped up the loose thread about Lazarus, which in conjunction with the White Mantle story line is arguably the core of the Season 3 plot, but it also explained more about the status of Orr without having to undo all the content from the three Orrian maps we already had. I like the fact that some sylvari feel a kinship with the Unbound Risen (however misguided those feelings may be), and it shows just how many minions each dragon has made that even now, there are hundreds to slaughter years after its death. I personally enjoy returning to Orr, even a small portion of it, and not just because I decided my human had Orrian blood in her. (For the record, that's not a new decision, either. My GW1 character was Orrian, who left Orr before the Searing and the Cataclysm to help Ascalon fight off the charr.) There's lots of lore that gets scattered around Orr, being the oldest human settlement in the Tyrian area and being lost to us by the time we played GW1. It's the only place they can make references to Abaddon, which wouldn't have been long-destroyed because of his disgrace eons ago.

, and it kind of stands. They might had decided to include it pretty early but it's clearly an extra, and don't forget we had that yearly long content drought, so the "early" part can still be a year later. After all, according to the video, the words come from the developers. They just took the opportunity to tie some loose ends, that might as well had appeared at a later story part.I'd say it's more like an epilogue to the previous 5 parts, as they introduced Lazarus to us, and then kind of reneged on an actual mursaat by Episode 5. This way, they actually give us Lazarus, finally put him to bed, and (re)introduce Livia so she could be used in future story, possibly. The Eye of Janthir also tells us where Balthazar is going, something we didn't get from the epic encounter with Primordus. And while I do agree that Flashpoint felt like a better end-point, Balthazar vanishing as the device explodes doesn't tell us a thing about where he's going, and so we needed this chapter to point the way to the Crystal Desert and Elona.

[Fenom.9457]

Id gladly pay for standalone LW episodes, but if they have a map, it should be new