Living story is the single worst gaming experience so far in my entire life.

[Raigai.4218]

NPC's not resurrecting while standing right next to me, boss fights that are cheap & chaotic and occasionally in a very tight space so that you cannot see anything. Occasional story missions dragging on and on.. It's been nothing but frustration for me. The last boss fight in living story season 3 in episode 4 was godawful. Really forcing myself to do this. I guess I should probably just stop and watch the story from somewhere else because actually playing it is an unbelievable chore. And to think I actually paid for a few chapters too. Stupid of me.

[Deathanizer.3716]

In season 2 you learn about the origins of Scarlet's hair style.

[Plautze.6290]

Or OP might just ask in map chat if someone is willing to assist in fighting Caudecus? I hear living story instances don't get scaled up...?I clearly remember leaving Caudecus' mansion naked with only my half-eaten helmet on, so no hard feelings, OP ;)

[battledrone.8315]

yea, it was one of the reasons i quit playing this game tooi would return in a heartbeat, if they decided to make more casual contenti play for fun and relaxation, this is neither

[Omnicron.2467]

@Plautze.6290 said:Or OP might just ask in map chat if someone is willing to assist in fighting Caudecus? I hear living story instances don't get scaled up...?I clearly remember leaving Caudecus' mansion naked with only my half-eaten helmet on, so no hard feelings, OP ;)

hahahaha yeah the same, had no repair canisters and was not about the restart

[Scrivs.4501]

I wholeheartedly agree. I absolutely despise the story missions. All of them.

They drag on way too long ("thank god, took me half an hour but I finally killed that boss ... oh, I'm only halfway there, gotta kill another one"), the fights are horribly tedious and gimmicky, and on top of that you're dealing with the constant stress of possibly getting disconnected after a cutscene and having to do it all over again.

It's a good thing I really wanted to play PoF, because I barely had any hair left after Season 3.

Though I now find myself, once again, having lost complete interest in the PoF story and just logging in to do my daylies.Actually gave one of the Vabbi missions another go yesterday but out of frustration I just instantly exited to desktop after I died in another one of those impossible battles.

[Mewcifer.5198]

The living story is what keeps me going.

[Theros.1390]

I just regret that the title is just SO negative, and the op post so unconstructive.

It would have been great to see more sentences like "How can we improve this : ", and less like "This is a whole tr*sh"

[Yannir.4132]

These kinds of threads make me feel like a pro. Thank you!

[Ameepa.6793]

I love the living story!

[Imperadordf.2687]

"Oh look, something that is slightly harder than open world, let me complain about it with godly over-exaggeration."

[Brother.1504]

Got hustled for $200 bucks playing mahjong with some lil old lady Chinese seniors while volunteering at a community centre. That definitely sucked more then the gw2 story.

[battledrone.8315]

@"Imperadordf.2687" said:"Oh look, something that is slightly harder than open world, let me complain about it with godly over-exaggeration."

how many would buy a casual mmo for HARDCORE STORY CONTENT? lol

[Cynn.1659]

@battledrone.8315 said:i would return in a heartbeat, if they decided to make more casual content

I heard stories about raids being more casual than the story, now we know the answer.

[Omega.6801]

Well, to be fair, I had encounters with the old grumpy man where I ended up half naked and exhausted.

Having said that, since most bosses in story instances don't regain health/reset, even if an encounter is hard or your struggling at any given point you can attrition it out, not the most fancy thing to do, but it works. Then there's also, you know, all the other ppl playing this MMorpg. If you struggle at something, chances are high, others are as well. Team up and you'll be fine.MMOs don't get more casual than GW2 open world. It's casual to the point where you can play for hundreds of hours in the open world w/o knowing what the cc skills of your class are, how to effectively dodge AoEs or what the point of melee weapons is. Open world PvE asks next to nothing from the players which not only prevents players from learning a few tricks about the game but also gives most players a sense of false security/badassnes when they encounter slightly harder content. So when they go into an encounter that is slightly more demanding and fail it can't possibly be because they have missed something about the encounter or failed to use basic in-game mechanics, it's because the game is bad and not casual friendly enough. There is only truth in that statement in the sense that the open world fails to teach ppl about mechanics by not demanding it.

[battledrone.8315]

@lokh.2695 said:Well, to be fair, I had encounters with the old grumpy man where I ended up half naked and exhausted.

Having said that, since most bosses in story instances don't regain health/reset, even if an encounter is hard or your struggling at any given point you can attrition it out, not the most fancy thing to do, but it works. Then there's also, you know, all the other ppl playing this MMorpg. If you struggle at something, chances are high, others are as well. Team up and you'll be fine.MMOs don't get more casual than GW2 open world. It's casual to the point where you can play for hundreds of hours in the open world w/o knowing what the cc skills of your class are, how to effectively dodge AoEs or what the point of melee weapons is. Open world PvE asks next to nothing from the players which not only prevents players from learning a few tricks about the game but also gives most players a sense of false security/badassnes when they encounter slightly harder content. So when they go into an encounter that is slightly more demanding and fail it can't possibly be because they have missed something about the encounter or failed to use basic in-game mechanics, it's because the game is bad and not casual friendly enough. There is only truth in that statement in the sense that the open world fails to teach ppl about mechanics by not demanding it.

sooo...its not the wrong product, its the wrong customers?

no, this was sold as a casual mmo

[derd.6413]

@battledrone.8315 said:

@"Imperadordf.2687" said:"Oh look, something that is slightly harder than open world, let me complain about it with godly over-exaggeration."

how many would buy a casual mmo for HARDCORE STORY CONTENT? lol

gw2 is the dark souls of MMORPGs

[Healix.5819]

@battledrone.8315 said:how many would buy a casual mmo for HARDCORE STORY CONTENT? lol

GW2 was never meant to be casual, it was meant to be casual friendly, as in it didn't waste your time with the needless grinding typically required in MMOs. ArenaNet has never catered to the casual players like most MMOs do, as in easy mode. GW1 for example was nearly impossible if you tried using random builds and henchmen. The big problem is, the game was heavily nerfed back in the original beta, since people were essentially playing like they would in WoW, only to die within seconds. Obviously they risked losing a large amount of players right at the start over the difficulty, but if that never happened, it would have been like HoT from day 1.

@lokh.2695 said:MMOs don't get more casual than GW2 open world.

Most are. Every MMO/RPG that relies on vertical progression is by far easier than GW2. The only thing GW2 has going for it is the fact you're not punished for zerging, but rather generally rewarded for it.

[costepj.5120]

GW2 is casual in the sense you can dip in and play whenever you like. If you take a break, your gear will be just as relevant when you return.It is not casual in the sense you can faceroll every bit of content. And for that, most of us are eternally grateful.

[Omega.6801]

@battledrone.8315 said:

@lokh.2695 said:Well, to be fair, I had encounters with the old grumpy man where I ended up half naked and exhausted.

Having said that, since most bosses in story instances don't regain health/reset, even if an encounter is hard or your struggling at any given point you can attrition it out, not the most fancy thing to do, but it works. Then there's also, you know, all the other ppl playing this MMorpg. If you struggle at something, chances are high, others are as well. Team up and you'll be fine.MMOs don't get more casual than GW2 open world. It's casual to the point where you can play for hundreds of hours in the open world w/o knowing what the cc skills of your class are, how to effectively dodge AoEs or what the point of melee weapons is. Open world PvE asks next to nothing from the players which not only prevents players from learning a few tricks about the game but also gives most players a sense of false security/badassnes when they encounter slightly harder content. So when they go into an encounter that is slightly more demanding and fail it can't possibly be because they have missed something about the encounter or failed to use basic in-game mechanics, it's because the game is bad and not casual friendly enough. There is only truth in that statement in the sense that the open world fails to teach ppl about mechanics by not demanding it.

sooo...its not the wrong product, its the wrong customers?

no, this was sold as a casual mmo

more like: the product is flawed in that it doesn't demand more of the players on a regular basis which leads to players to being overwhelmed when the game actually wants them to do something.it is a casual mmo

[battledrone.8315]

@derd.6413 said:

@battledrone.8315 said:

@"Imperadordf.2687" said:"Oh look, something that is slightly harder than open world, let me complain about it with godly over-exaggeration."

how many would buy a casual mmo for HARDCORE STORY CONTENT? lol

gw2 is the dark souls of MMORPGs

yea, that would explain it all..i wish they would say so in the ads

[battledrone.8315]

@lokh.2695 said:

@battledrone.8315 said:

@lokh.2695 said:Well, to be fair, I had encounters with the old grumpy man where I ended up half naked and exhausted.

Having said that, since most bosses in story instances don't regain health/reset, even if an encounter is hard or your struggling at any given point you can attrition it out, not the most fancy thing to do, but it works. Then there's also, you know, all the other ppl playing this MMorpg. If you struggle at something, chances are high, others are as well. Team up and you'll be fine.MMOs don't get more casual than GW2 open world. It's casual to the point where you can play for hundreds of hours in the open world w/o knowing what the cc skills of your class are, how to effectively dodge AoEs or what the point of melee weapons is. Open world PvE asks next to nothing from the players which not only prevents players from learning a few tricks about the game but also gives most players a sense of false security/badassnes when they encounter slightly harder content. So when they go into an encounter that is slightly more demanding and fail it can't possibly be because they have missed something about the encounter or failed to use basic in-game mechanics, it's because the game is bad and not casual friendly enough. There is only truth in that statement in the sense that the open world fails to teach ppl about mechanics by not demanding it.

sooo...its not the wrong product, its the wrong customers?

no, this was sold as a casual mmo

more like: the product is flawed in that it doesn't demand more of the players on a regular basis which leads to players to being overwhelmed when the game actually wants them to do something.it is a casual mmo

and if the game demanded more of the players, then it wouldnt be CASUAL, would it?

[Omega.6801]

@battledrone.8315 said:

@lokh.2695 said:

@battledrone.8315 said:

@lokh.2695 said:Well, to be fair, I had encounters with the old grumpy man where I ended up half naked and exhausted.

Having said that, since most bosses in story instances don't regain health/reset, even if an encounter is hard or your struggling at any given point you can attrition it out, not the most fancy thing to do, but it works. Then there's also, you know, all the other ppl playing this MMorpg. If you struggle at something, chances are high, others are as well. Team up and you'll be fine.MMOs don't get more casual than GW2 open world. It's casual to the point where you can play for hundreds of hours in the open world w/o knowing what the cc skills of your class are, how to effectively dodge AoEs or what the point of melee weapons is. Open world PvE asks next to nothing from the players which not only prevents players from learning a few tricks about the game but also gives most players a sense of false security/badassnes when they encounter slightly harder content. So when they go into an encounter that is slightly more demanding and fail it can't possibly be because they have missed something about the encounter or failed to use basic in-game mechanics, it's because the game is bad and not casual friendly enough. There is only truth in that statement in the sense that the open world fails to teach ppl about mechanics by not demanding it.

sooo...its not the wrong product, its the wrong customers?

no, this was sold as a casual mmo

more like: the product is flawed in that it doesn't demand more of the players on a regular basis which leads to players to being overwhelmed when the game actually wants them to do something.it is a casual mmo

and if the game demanded more of the players, then it wouldnt be CASUAL, would it?

If the game demanded more in the open world, ppl would learn and thus know more about the game and its mechanics which would make them struggle less. What do you want, press 1 to receive your selection of BiS gear and a Legendary?

[Lankybrit.4598]

I haven't even finished the generic Personal Story on any character yet. Some of the stuff is really horrible.

[TwilightSoul.9048]

Just wanna put out a different opinion:I actually enjoy the story but I feel like almost all story instances are way too easy. We've had some pretty nice build-up's to some fights story-wise but in the end the bossfights usually disappoint in difficulty. I don't consider myself a harcore player but I do think that I'm a pretty good player. So while I can understand how frustrating it must be to struggle through fights in the story I do struggle to understand how the story bosses (with some exceptions) could be so challenging that you'd want to quit the game. If you embrace the power of the dodge roll (which is basicly god-mode for a short duration) and don't have a completely ridiculously terrible build you really shouldn't have much struggles. And if you do then you're maybe better of reading a book? There are many amazing books out there, I'd reccommend Terry Pratchets Discworl romans, they are great!And if you do want to continue playing GW2 then I'd say ask someone for advice on your build, changing exotic gear is really not that expensive. I guess your probably don't want to change your utility skills or weapons because you've probably found some combination that you really enjoy using and that's perfectly fine, meta builds are incredibly overrated in this game so if you've found a setup that you really enjoy using then that's a great first step to finding a build for you that is both fun and enjoyable but strong enough at the same time. As I've said, try asking someone for advice, there are many people out there who really enjoy tinkering with builds like me ;)Another thing is, practice dodging! That sounds like a chore but it turns into a habit quickly. Almost all attacks in story instances are telegraphed (easy to see coming) and thus really easy to dodge. And it sounds stupid but most problems players have in this game can be solved if they knew how and when to dodge. With how I mean weather to use the dodge roll or not - many attacks can be "dodged" by moving into some direction for half a second, saving your endurance for harder times!And last but not least: CC, thats the one and only thing where you might have to adapt your utility/weapon choices in order to include sufficient CC. Some of the newer Bosses have breakbars which make the fights a lot easier if you can actually break them in time.

I hope I could help you one way or another - this is really not a hard game but it does have a weird learning curve.Feel free to send me a PM here on the forum if you have any questions :)